Red Wings defenseman Olli Maatta spoke with Ilta-Sanomat’s Tommi Koivunen regarding his decision to sign with the Red Wings, and here’s a rough translation of the Finnish article:

The Finnish defenseman is in a new situation in the NHL–he chose a rebuilding team: “There’s an awful fire to succeed there”

Olli Maatta signed a one-year contract with Detroit, one of the rising teams of the NHL.

Chicago, Los Angeles, now Detroit.

Olli Maatta spent the first six seasons of his NHL career in Pittsburgh, but since the summer of 2019, his address has changed frequently.

Maatta played for the Blackhawks and the Kings on the same season, with the 6-year contract he’d signed with the Penguins.

“When the trade to Chicago happened, I was afraid to go to a new team. Now that a couple of team changes are behind me, I know that joining a new team is quite easy. The biggest challenge is adapting to everyday life in a new city and finding routines,” Maatta summarizes.

Paul Stastny is 36 and will turn 37 years of age this upcoming season, but he’s been a relatively productive, tenacious two-way center for the past five years. As such, the Hockey News’s Mike Stephens tries to play “matchmaker” this evening, suggesting three potential landing spots for Stastny, including the Red Wings:

Detroit Red Wings 
2022-23 Cap Space: $9,246,111

Whereas the Canadiens have one foot in rebuild mode while still looking like a win-now team, the Red Wings are going full-steam ahead after a teardown of their own, throwing money at established veterans all summer long in an effort to make their roster competitive in the toughest division in hockey. 

Stastny seems like the logical final piece to the puzzle GM Steve Yzerman has been building this offseason. 

Not only do the Red Wings have a need for a useful middle-six centre to compliment Dylan Larkin and Andrew Copp, but they actually have the cap space to give Stastny what he’s asking for, operating as one of the very few teams league-wide with upwards of $9 million in available funds to spend however they like. 

No matter where Stastny goes, a short-term deal is likely all he’s getting — which works best for all parties involved, really. The Red Wings can exceed any offer Stastny receives, and their roster will be boosted in the immediate future by an effective and versatile veteran with plenty left in the tank. 

Continued; the Red Wings already have Pius Suter slated to be their 3rd line center, the Red Wings have Chase Pearson no longer waiver-exempt in their prospect pipeline, and I don’t see a reason for the team to spend another $4-5 million on another middle-of-the-lineup guy.

The fit doesn’t make sense to me.

I’m incredibly cautious regarding writing about Red Wings prospects’ preseason performances in European leagues, in no small part because the levels of competition that they’re facing vary wildly from game to game…

So we’ll allow Detroit Hockey Now’s Kevin Allen to note 1) that Liam Dower Nilsson is doing very well for the Frolunda Indians during the month-long SHL preseason, and 2) Perhaps more importantly, Dower Nilsson is skating alongside his presumptive linemates for the upcoming season in Joel Lundqvist and Max Friberg:

Liam Dower Nilsson (134th overall in 2021) is showing flash in his play for Frolunda in the Swedish Hockey League’s preseason. He has five goals in three games. Dower Nilsson, according to Swedish media reports, has been playing on a line with Henrik Lundqvist’s brother, Joel and Max Friberg.

Joel Lundqvist is 40, Friberg is 29 and Dower-Nilsson is 19.

“All praise to them,” Dower Nilsson told rakapuckar.com. “They mean a lot, both on and off the ice. When they come and say things, about the structure and other things, you really think about it.”

Dower-Nilsson is a Hakan Andersson special project. Kris Draper said Detroit’s European Scouting Director pounded the table when he insisted the Red Wings draft Dower Nilsson. Dower Nilsson is a smart, enterprising, responsible center with a scoring touch. He didn’t score in 10 SHL games last season, but registered 50 points in 34 games in the junior league.

This will be an important development season for Dower Nilsson. He believes he has much more to give.

Allen continued; LDN isn’t particularly big at 6′ and 172 pounds, but he’s a pesky little bugger. We’ll see whether he continues to produce solid numbers alongside what will probably constitute Frolunda HC’s 3rd line.

Via Detroit Sports Nation’s Michael Whitaker, Red Wings goaltender Alex Nedeljkovic appeared on 97.1 the Ticket’s Stoney and Jansen with Heather show on Monday morning, discussing his offseason training (as he recovers from a lower-body injury which required surgery after the World Championship) and the Red Wings’ offseason changes, including the team’s coaching changes:

Red Wings defenseman Olli Maatta turns 28 today:

🎂🎉‼️ pic.twitter.com/AzPT3gzXeL

— Detroit Red Wings (@DetroitRedWings) August 22, 2022

The Athletic’s Max Bultman weighs in on the World Junior Championship performances of the 9 Red Wings prospects who took part in the WJC:

Donovan Sebrango: He may have been overshadowed a bit by the production of his defense partner — Anaheim prospect Olen Zellwegger was arguably the tournament’s top defenseman — but I liked what I saw from Sebrango at this tournament. Playing on Canada’s top pair, he looked like a player who spent the last two years competing against men and was the defensive stalwart of the pairing with Zellwegger. I liked his first pass, and he’s fearless going into battles along the boards. Sebrango’s arrow keeps trending up.

Sebastian Cossa: Cossa played only one game in the tournament for the eventual champs, giving up a pair of goals to an upstart Latvia team that advanced out of pool play. After he appeared to be the third-string netminder in the winter, though, Cossa being Canada’s back-up for the rest of the tournament was no surprise. It’s just hard to take much away from the one game.

Of course, while starter Dylan Garand was good for Canada, the fact Cossa was relegated largely to the bench while fellow top 2021 netminder Jesper Wallstedt was the tournament’s top goaltender has to sting a bit for the Red Wings. Detroit traded up to pick Cossa over Wallstedt last summer, and while there’s plenty of room for both to develop into quality NHL netminders, Wallstedt is clearly off to the better individual start post-draft.

The two don’t need to be compared against one another forever — nor should they be — but right now, it’s fair to be left wanting a bit more out of Cossa.

Eemil Viro: I saw fewer of Finland’s games than most of the others here, so apologies for a lighter report on Viro. When I did see him, he was largely the same profile I’ve seen in the past: a defense-first defender with good mobility and a solid first pass, playing a second-pair role. He had an assist and was +1 for the tournament on a Finnish team that was inches from upsetting Canada for the gold, and his assist came in that gold medal game.

He’s got a solid foundation to become a depth defenseman, and we’ll now see if he can pop a bit more as he begins his North American pro career in Grand Rapids.

Continued…

Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff weighs into the Jesper Wallstedt-vs-Sebastian Cossa debate by suggesting that success or failure at the World Junior Championship is simply a poor barometer of future NHL success or NHL failure:

As much as everyone likes to see their team’s prospects shining when on the game’s biggest stages, the fact of the matter is that it doesn’t always mean greatness is blooming. Judging a goaltender’s quality off of a world junior performance is akin to writing off a 19-year-old netminder because they didn’t step to the fore.

Looking back at the netminders who were earning golden moments at the World Juniors, there isn’t a track record of NHL success on most resumes. For every Juuse Saros (Finland, 2014), John Gibson (USA, 2013) and Carey Price (Canada, 2007), there are countless guys like Dmitri Shikin, Jeff Glass, Tomas Duba and Tyler Parsons.

In 2006, after Justin Pogge was leading Canada to gold, the Toronto Maple Leafs were certain they’d found their goalie of the future. So certain, in fact, they traded the rights to the guy who was No. 3 in the goalie stats at the World Junior tourney. Fellow by the name of Tuukka Rask. Maybe you’ve heard of him.

Carter Hart (2018) and Kaapo Kahkonen (2016) are gold-medal winners from whom the jury remains out regarding long-term NHL success. Certainly, that ship has set sail for journeymen puckstoppers Zach Fucale (2015) and Dustin Tokarski (2009).

Continued

MLive’s Ansar Khan answered questions about the playing futures of Sebastian Cossa and Simon Edvinsson in a mailbag feature:

Q: With all the bodies the Wings have on defense now, what are the chances of Simon Edvinsson making the team? Will they need to trade someone to make room for him? – Rick

A: They wouldn’t need to trade anyone but might have to eventually waive a defenseman to keep Edvinsson on the NHL roster. Yzerman indicated in the offseason that he has Edvinsson “penciled in” for the Red Wings roster this season. But his play in training camp and the preseason ultimately will dictate whether he’s in the NHL at the start of the season or in Grand Rapids.

Injuries to Mark Pysyk and Jake Walman alleviate the logjam a bit at the start. Pysyk could miss half the season following surgery for a torn Achilles tendon. No timeline was provided for Walman’s return following shoulder surgery.

The Red Wings’ top four is pretty much set with the likely pairs of Ben Chiarot-Moritz Seider and Olli Maatta-Filip Hronek. That would leave four others competing for the third pair spots – left-shooters Edvinsson, Jordan Oesterle and Robert Hagg and righty Gustav Lindstrom.

Do the Red Wings want Edvinsson playing third-pair minutes as opposed to a potential starring role and big minutes in all situations in Grand Rapids? Would they slot him ahead of the veteran Maatta alongside Hronek? This will make for a competitive camp.

One thing seems certain: If Edvinsson makes the roster at the start of the season, it won’t be as a temporary replacement for an injured player. The last thing the Red Wings would want to do is start him in the NHL and then demote him, unless he struggles. And it goes without saying Edvinsson won’t stick around as the seventh or eighth defenseman. He’ll only be in Detroit if he’s playing every game.

Continued

Last night around this time, I posted a translation of an article in which new Red Wings forward Dominik Kubalik spoke with NHL.cz after a charity hockey game in Prague, and there’s a similar article out there in which Kubalik speaks with the CTK News Agency. The article has many similar themes to the NHL.cz article, but this one offers some new quips and quotes as well, so, here we go:

Kubalik: Detroit means new blood in my veins; I believe it will work

Prague: Hockey forward Dominik Kubalik has had his first jersey change in the NHL. His tenure with the Chicago Blackhawks ended with a not-so-successful season, both personally and as a team. Thanks to signing a 2-year, $5 million contract, a new stage of his overseas career awaits him in Detroit. Today, the just-turned-27-year-old Kubalik believes that his move to the Red Wings will be an impetus for his star to rise again.

With the new contract, which he signed on July 13th, the first day of the opening of the free agent market, the Pilsen native was relieved. “A person in a similar position always has the urge to question whether it will work out, where things will go, what position he will have and the like. But after the talks with Detroit, it poured new blood into my veins, and I believe it will work,” Kubalik says in an interview with journalists.

Two more NHL scouts and prospect gurus weighed in on the performances made by participants at the 2022 World Junior Championship on Sunday.

Sportsnet’s Jason Bukala wrote an “NHL Scout’s Take” on the players that he watched during the World Junior Championship, and he had this to say about Simon Edvinsson:

Simon Edvinsson, Sweden (Detroit Red Wings, sixth overall, 2021)

WJC Stats: 6GP-1G-1A-2PTS

Edvinsson is a hulking 6-foot-6, 207-pound defender. He projects to be a two-way “D” at the NHL level. He skates very well for his stature and can lead the rush on occasion. He sees his options and makes sound puck plays. I thought he could have been used more at this tournament. This kid is going to have a long career in Detroit. He compliments a partner who is more of a risk taker. There’s also some growl to his game. He takes away space effectively and gaps up physically.

Bukala continues, and I’d say that’s a particularly polite take on Edvinsson’s ups and downs at the tournament;

And The Athletic’s Scott Wheeler offered the following takes on Red Wings prospects who participated in the WJC (and I can’t include everything he says, given that there were 9 Wings prospects participating, so we’re going to go with his takes on Team USA and Team Sweden):