Mr.TaterSalad

Can we please fire Warde Manuel already. How many times does bad **** need to happen in this athletic department before someone at the university realizes the common denominator in all of their problems?

I do think they would trade #2 overall for Larkin though. With Larkin they could have him anchor the second line while Misa develops. They can also move a guy like Alexander Wennberg over to wing to be a linemate for Larkin.

Does this mean we can get Jaylen Brown in a 3-team deal?

I would not want that particular package as I want a top 3-5 pick for Larkin. While I want to tank and rebuild the rebuild, having a collection of picks in the mid to late 20s does nothing for me. I want high picks and/or top prospects.

Welp, this takes out Florida as a trade partner.

With the straits closed yet again, I presume the price of a barrel of oil will go back up at market open on Monday and thus gas prices won't go down.

I thought I read somewhere that Florida wasn't open to moving Lundell period. If they are and would package #9 overall with it, I'd take that trade. it allows us to get a high-er draft pick and still presents the opportunity to tank with Larkin out of the picture. Truthfully, I'd try and flip Lundell for more picks or prospects, but I know that won't be Yzerman's plan.

I know this won't happen because we wouldn't do it and the Pelicans/Nets likely wouldn't either. However, I'm going to ask a question out of ignorance. Is there any world out there where Duren could be apart of the trade package for Trey Murphy or Michael Porter Jr.? Is it a 100% guarantee that we have to and will hold onto Duren? Would Paul Reed be an option for starting at center if Duren was traded?

Just because he didn't veto the trades doesn't mean he cares. He let his GM do his job. I guess he cared enough to fire Al Avila. Yet, Yzerman, who has had no more success than Avila did, is still around. Rebuilding a baseball team takes essentially the same amount of time as it does in hockey. Yet here we are with Yzerman still here and no more success than Avila had.

I doubt Chris Ilitch is frosted and I doubt he cares all that much. When you run a crime family like he and his slumlord father have for years, the focus is likely on the other rackets they've had going. He makes so much money gouging people for parking at one of his lots, letting buildings depreciate for tax write-offs, and conning Detroit taxpayers out of hundreds-of-millions in abatements and subsidies. All this makes sports largely secondary. He cares as much about this team as he does developing the District Detroit. I'll put it that way. And that should show you how much he cares.

I've said several times here I'm not quite ready to fire Yzerman. I also don't think he's ever getting fired. He'll be the new Jim Devellano and get moved upstairs before he's ever fired. That said, changes have to be made somewhere in the front office. Analytics, scouting, etc. Teams like Montreal started later than us in their rebuild process and are on a better track than we are. Hell, Jarmo in Buffalo managed to turn things around quicker and he built off the failed rebuilds of three prior GMs going back to the 2010s. Both of those teams managed to make the playoffs and have success winning series. At this rate, given how poor the rebuild has gone, San Jose may be a playoff team before us.

Make it not top-ten protected and I don't hate the deal.

Some fans don't seem to think so. You've got fans out there making excuses for Yzerman and this regime talking about puck luck, injuries, bad breaks, and so forth. Not saying anyone here is doing it. It is out there though among a fair number in this fanbase. The Yzerbots if you will. This regime under Yzerman has failed to build a team with either the depth or top end scoring that historically goes along with winning a Cup. Yes, Carolina won a Cup just this year without elite top-end scoring, but they brought scoring depth. The Hurricanes had 11 guys above 12 goals or more and 12 above 30 points or more. We had 9 guys above 30 points and 8 with 12 or more goals. They also were top 5 in the league I believe in 5on5 goals. Our 5on5 productivity was in the bottom 10. When there isn't a PP, we struggle mightily to score.

The goal of any hockey team is to make and win The Stanley Cup. In order to win a Stanley Cup the data is fairly clear, you need to score goals to win one. This team has a scoring problem and I used AI to give me some data around points, goals, and Stanley Cup winners. I asked ChatGPT a series of questions to get some data back on this. Q1: How many teams have won a Cup since 1990 without a player who produced over 90 points A: Of those 35 Cup winners 19 teams had a player who produced 90+ points and 16 did not have a 90+ point player. Q2: How many Cup winning teams had two guys over 80+ points in a season? A: Of the 16 Stanley Cup winners since 1990 that did not have a 90-point scorer, 8 teams had at least two players score more than 80 points in the regular season. Q3: Of the last 35 Cup winners, how many teams had at least 10 guys above 30 points? A: Of the 35 Cup winners from 1990 through 2025, 31 teams had at least 10 players score 30 or more points during the regular season. Q4: Of the last 35 Cup winners, how many teams had at least 10 guys above 12 or more goals? A: Of the 35 Stanley Cup winners from 1990 through 2025, 34 teams had at least 10 players score 12 or more goals in the regular season. Q5: Of the last 35 cup winners how many teams were in the top 5 of the NHL in goals scored? A: 18 of the last 35 Cup winners were top-five teams in goals scored. The odds are better, if imperfect, that if you have a player who produced 90+ points in a season, you are more likely than not to win a Cup. Of those teams 16 that lacked a 90+ point producer, half of them had two guys above 80 points. The odds are also better when you can role out 3 lines of scoring with at least 10 guys producing 12 or more goals and 30 or more points. The Wings had only 8 players reached 12 or more goals and only 9 players reach 30 or more points. For us, I ask this question. Where are we going to get a 90+ point guy without tanking or who are going to be are two 80+ point guys? Where is the scoring depth going to come from based on the current roster and farm system? We need obvious scoring depth. If it isn't coming from within, do you trust this front office, GM and scouts, to make the proper evaluations and free agent signings/trades to add the scoring necessary to get us to the SCF and bring us a Cup?

If you were trading up to get one of Yaxel or Carr, what would be your preference?

I read that the Lions signed Tarik Black. There's a name I haven't heard in a long time. And yes, it is the same Tarik Black from Michigan.

Then that leads us to the person who does issue contracts, hire coaches, and make the final roster decisions, the General Manager, Steve Yzerman. Now, I'm not ready to fire Yzerman yet. If he choses to keep this going without a rebuild, I want to give him another season or two (at most) to turn this around. If we are siting here at the end of 2027 or 2028 and still haven't made the playoffs, he then needs to go. If he choses to do a full-scale rebuild like I want, my patience will run longer than a year or two. In my mind though, scouting is still a problem. I get that none of us, myself included, have a clue about who reports to who, what their scouting reports look like, and does Yzerman listen to his scouts and how much weight does he give them if he does. Pro scouts must have made some recommendations on at least some of the bad players we've signed since he has been here one would think. And those recommendations have hurt this team and slowed its progress. Hence, there needs to be more changes made to pro side scouting.

People rip on those responsible for scouting NHL players because they've made a number of moves that have either been outright bad or have at best underwhelmed based on the paychecks they are receiving and cap space they are taking up. Bad: Compher, Gustafsson, Husso, Holl, Nedeljkovic, Petry Underwhelmed: Appleton, Chiarot, Copp, JVR, Perron, Reimer, Talbot Whoever is running pro scouting, be it Horcoff or the individual scouts themselves, need to be changed out. They've made some scouting changes already when Verbeek left and took guys with him. There is still more that needs to be done clearly.

Why the eye role? You either believe they've done a good job scouting North American amateur talent, a mediocre job, or a poor job. The same thing is to be said about their pro side scouting. When it comes to amateur scouting in the US and Canada over the past decade, what players has this organization drafted that you really think will be or have been already impactful to this roster? Larkin, Finne, Baby Bert, maybe Mazur one day, maybe Augustine one day, maybe Danielson one day, maybe Cossa one day? Can't wait to see Dylan James and Brady Cleveland.

You know you agree with a bulk of it. You know this front office needs changes. You know Draper and his team have done (at best) a subpar job of amateur scouting and putting together a good pipeline of North American players. You know Horcoff and our pro side scouting has not brought us productive NHL players. You know we've overpaid for guys that haven't produced and are on contracts nobody else in the league would want.

You think our North American scouting and pro side NHL scouting has been good and produced for this organization?

Welcome to the most exciting and news worthy offseason since Kenny left and Stevie came in.

Keep in mind that none of what I'm about to say will happen but I'm going to say it anyways. An ideal offseason for me revolves around first and foremost cleaning house in the front office, even if Yzerman stays. Anything less than wholesale changes to our front office personnel is just beating around the bush and ignoring the real problem. In particular, our scouting staffs are seemingly among the worst in the league and something needs to change there this offseason and beyond. Our entire North American scouting staff, pro and armature sides, needs to be revamped top to bottom. There are people in positions that shouldn't be there. People who haven't done their job well but are there because of their prior affiliations with this franchise and Steve Yzerman. Yzerman's friends and ex-Red Wing players, like Kris Draper and Shawn Horcoff, need to be jettisoned for new leadership and a different vision for how we move forward. He needs a new Director of Amateur Scouting in particular to replace Kris Draper. Our North American amateur scouting has been particularly awful and that falls at the feet of Draper. Who are the good North American born players they've drafted on this roster sans Larkin and Finnie? Both Draper and Horcoff (but Draper in particular) need to be replaced by people outside of the organization with new perspectives, a different vision, and a fresh set of eyes. The new Director of Amateur Scouting must be from outside the organization and have not played with Yzerman at any point in their career. They need to be given some level of autonomy to bring in some of their own individual scouts with them and the ability to revamp their scouting staff should they so chose. Our European Scouting side, lead by Hakan Andersson, has been great through the years. So I'm not making changes there. But the new Director of Amateur Scouting needs to make wholesale changes to the individual scouts we do have on the North American side if that's what they come in and feel they need to do after an evaluation of the place. This organizations pro side scouting is equally horrendous and has lead to terrible signings and overpayment of players like Appleton, Chiarot, Compher, Copp, Husso, Petry, and Perron the second time. This falls mostly on Yzerman, but also a but on Horcoff. They desperately need changes among the staff on their pro side scouting and Yzerman needs to be listening to different people. The moves in free agency they made have largely been a failure. You can count on one hand the number of free agent signings or trades that worked out (DeBrincat, Ghost, Gibson, Kane, maybe Lyon if you're being generous, ummmmm). Continuing on with these same pro-side scouts would be a failure. Jimmy Develano or Chris Ilitch needs to grab the reigns and force Yzerman to make changes. I'm normally against meddling owners. I normally like an Owner to hire their GM and let them operate with autonomy from there. I don't like the Jerry Jones type of owner who interferes with everything and is involved in every decision. But the friends, family, and ex-players plan in this front office has failed miserably and changes must be made. If he won't and Yzerman won't do it on his own accord, that's where the conversation of firing Yzerman comes in. From a roster construction standpoint, I would be looking at starting the rebuild over again as I've said here for the past week. It's time to admit the rebuild failed. It's time to acknowledge this team as presently constructed won't be winning a Cup anytime soon. They can't even make the playoffs. It's time to admit that maybe you do need a first line center, capable of producing 90+ points, more scoring depth on your second, third, and fourth lines, a tougher forecheck. Acknowledge all the deficiencies that this team has and revamp the roster top to bottom, just as you should do in the front office. Looking at this year's draft, their doesn't appear to be at first glance a true #1, high point producing center. There isn't a Bedard, Celebrini, Drisital, McDavid type prospect at the center position. To me, rebuilding the rebuild involves trading all of Larkin, DeBrincat, Faulk, and Gibson. Each of these players should be able to net you first round draft capital and/or decent prospects in return. I'm then replacing each of their roster spots with prospects down in the AHL. Larkin will be replaced by Danielson, DeBrincat replaced by Mazur, Fault replaced by ASP, and Gibson replaced by Cossa or Postava or Augustine. I might be willing to sign a veteran or two to a short-term deal, but that's it. Playing NHL 26 and making my fantasy GM trades for all of these players would look something like this in an ideal world. Detroit + San Jose Trade Detroit gets: #2 pick overall in the 2026 draft, San Jose gets: Alex DeBrincat Detroit + Minnesota + Anaheim Trade Detroit gets: Charlie Stramel/C (Minnesota), Danila Yurov/RW-C (Minnesota), 2027 1st (Minnesota), Roger McQueen/C (Anaheim), Lukas Dostal/G (Anaheim), 2027 1st (Anaheim), Minnesota gets: Dylan Larkin, Anaheim gets: John Gibson and Justin Faulk.

I think either Larkin or DeBrincat are worth the #2 pick straight up. My proposals and thoughts have largely been along the lines of a one for one. This rebuild has failed and we need to wipe the slate clean.

Assuming we're not doing a rebuild I don't mind this trade because we get younger at the center position and I think there is still upside for McTavish to improve. Plus, I like the size, speed, and physical combo that McQueen is rumored to offer. There are worse trade packages for Larkin that I've seen out there.