When the Detroit Red Wings general manager Ken Holland got past offseason plan your approach, he had one simple goal:
He wanted to win.
I know, it’s strange.
His team made the playoffs for 25 consecutive seasons, streak unprecedented in hockey these days. Jonathan Toews Jersey. In all sports, in fact. Holland wants 26. He just was not ready to give up the Eastern Conference in the Tampa Bay Lightning, Washington Capitals and Pittsburgh Penguins – or do not want to make room for the young teams making strides in the East, as the Toronto Maple Leafs and Buffalo.
So when Pavel Datsyuk left after 14 seasons as a wing, replaced him Netherlands Frans Nielsen. When he saw the weakness in the power play of his team, Holland turned to him, adding Vanek. GM thought his dressing room needed more personality and spark. Enter Steve Ott, who has both oozing out of his pores. Constantly.
Rebuild? No thanks. This is not something that the Netherlands is interested in the company.
“There are no guarantees with the rebuilding,” said Holland after the Red Wings practiced on Wednesday. “There’s no guarantee that you’re going to come out on the other side, and you’re going to be the elite.”
Rarely playoff teams start their own recovery. Rebuilds are the result of petering team for some reason, a franchise that has reached the end of the line. Not a team with a rich history of success, which is the result of decades of instilling a culture of victory and playing the right way in every player that enters the organization.
In Detroit, it is a culture that prize was made of Steve Yzerman to Nicklas Lidstrom to Zetterberg and now Dylan Larkin, Peter Mrazek and Andreas Athanasiou.
You can forgive Holland and Red Wings, if they are not too eager to snatch the success of cloth in exchange for the opportunity to prepare somewhere closer to the top.
But I admit that I wondered if a few years down the Red Wings can do some good. I suggested as much. I wondered what the organization could do if he added a pair of top-10 picks her talented young nucleus. Of course, I understand why some fans were puzzled by the last couple of years that Detroit brought in guys like Mike Green, Vanek and Ott instead of the young players who might be able to do the same thing much cheaper to gain experience, to lose a few more games and help improve the chances of the project.
Holland made the analysis – and decided that the cost and the risk of having to go down that road far outweigh the potential rewards.
“There’s now a lottery. The first four picks are lottery picks. You can be the worst team in the league and get the fifth pick in the draft,” Holland said. Hossa Jersey. “Every year, we go forward, it is becoming more and more value for the league. Why? Players get out of the entry-level, and they go from the entry-level contracts to $ 5- $ 6 million.”
RED WINGS 100TH 