I don't understand how there isn't a thread for the best team in the NHL, but here we go. I've been a Red Wings fan since '97, when I started to get into hockey. I went to the game a few years back when Osgood and Roy got into their fight at center ice (and was 7 rows from the ice.)

Anyway, the Wings have a big game tonight against the Ducks, hopefully we can avenge last year's loss in the WCF.

welcome to the hockey forum...I dont like the Red wings particularly, but i respect them as a solid franchise..

Good luck

chippy game tonight thus far.

My great grandfather played for the Red Wings in the thirties, won two Stanley cups for them, and is in the hall of fame.

So, I'll always have a thing for the Red Wings in my heart.

yes, definitely. been an entertaining game as well.

mindnumbingly inconsistantly called both ways.

name?

Was it Marty Barry or Ebbie Goodfellow?

Herbie Lewis.

http://redwings.nhl.com/team/app?service=p...wol-herbielewis

http://www.legendsofhockey.net:8080/Legend...st=ByName#photo

John Sherf?

EDIT: Damn

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbie_Lewis_%28ice_hockey%29

You should do his Wiki page justice.

very cool. Any of his old game sweaters lying around? Or those of his teammates?

I think I will. I'll see if I can get around to it this weekend




Not that I know of. I'll have to ask around the family. I do have a ton of great pictures, though.

A 2 minute 5-3, a 2-0 break when Beauchemin breaks his stick and then trap the rest of the way and it's game over. Hopefully someone upsets the Wings in Round 1.

Hopefully it's the Hawks.

I love the Wings.Its true.
I never could hate them.
I tried , im not capable of.
Very successful franchise.
In the west i'm rooting for them.

oh yeah? Well, I'm related to Mickey Mantle. So there.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. That was funny.

I have thought about making one of these but there doesn't seem to be many fans of them so no point and what fun is a thread if the team is actually pretty good and we can't enjoy it like say the Leafs topic.

I have been a Wings fan since probably 85 I think. I would have to look it up but I went to my first game around then during the playoffs against St Louis. My dad and his friends went to all the games in that series in St Louis and in Detroit and he took me to the last game. It was pretty cool. I liked hockey but didn't get into it that much but that was the start of my love for the Wings and the game in general. I have had the pleasure of being at 100's of games over the years thanks to my dad and his friends with great season tix. Some of my most memorable experiences at the Joe:

-Was at the game when they broke the record for most wins in the season. Still to this date I have not been in a louder place.

-My friends and I snuck into game 7 against the Blues when Stevie scored the only goal of the game in OT and by that point we were sitting, well standing in row 7 right behind the net he scored on.

-Throwing two hats thanks to a Shanny hat trick and a McCarty hat trick and not getting my hat back from the McCarty one because he kept the hats he liked.

- Watching Wayne Gretzky shoot from the point and the puck hurdle right at me and have the douche bag in front of me jump up and take it in the chest and the puck falls into the lap of his friend next to him. Dammit it was mine!

-going to the big rallys after all 3 cups

-My friends and I deciding that at 11:00 pm the night before Game 4 of the 98 Cup Finals that we should jump in the car and drive to DC and try and get tickets to the game at the MCI center. Got there about 11am after getting lost in PA and calling ticket master and getting tickets with no problem and then watching the Wings win the cup that night live and in person.

Those are the highlights but there have been many more. I will admit that I am lucky to be Wings fan as they have given us a ton to be happy about over the last decade and more and now with the Tigers doing well it is just good to be in Detroit. Now all we need is to kick the Lions out and we are straight.

I was born in Detroit, and follow every game. It's been hard these last few years, after being so damn good during the regular season, then not bringing it home in the playoffs.

This season though has been different so far with the addition of a scoring defenseman Brian Rafalski. At the start of the season, I was a little worried, because I had seen him give up the puck a couple of times and didn't think he was the right fit. Then he was paired with Lidstrom, and even if Rafalski makes a mistake now, Lidstrom is the best defenseman in NHL history, so even giveaways Lidstrom defends.

Datsyuk having an awesome year, Zetterberg has had a bad back, but is still top 10 in points.

Great players like Cleary and Filppula are starting to find their footing.

What about goaltending you ask? Umm...a 6-time Vezina / 2-time Hart trophy winner in Hasek AND simply the best goalie in the league to this point of the season in Chris Osgood with a 20-3-2 record with a 1.87 GAA.

If there's one thing that I'm worried about is that we don't really have an enforcer, maybe Downey, but I just don't think he can cut it.

Either way, the cup is coming home to Motown this year.

Saying Osgood is the best goalie of the league is talking without taking into consideration the strong team and defensive he got in front of him.

Just a question to the Red Wings fans

Has the fan base diminished?I believe if I am not mistaken attendance has been down...

no its because detroit is getting poor

they can't sell their cars anymore

in fact i dont know what im talking about , but this is what i heard

Though NFL games still sell out...

This is just what I heard, but the people from Detroit don't have as much money to spend on sporting events. Then you add into the fact that the Lions were better this past year, the Tigers went to the world Series two years ago and made a huge trade to try and go back, and the Pistons are again one of the best in the Eastern Conference. So maybe they have to choose what to spend their money on, and right now it's not hockey because they know the Wings will just fold in the playoffs. Hockeytown my ass.

big words from a fan of a team that has its share of attendance issues..

lol

Here in MTL , we have real attendance issues...it's so difficult to find tickets !!! AHAhaHAhaHAhaHAh

Number of factors I believe contribute to the low attendance.

1. Economy. While the US is gearing up for a possible recession, Michigan has been in one for awhile. Things are really bad here. I see it all first hand in my job. Talking to the officer that handles our evictions said a year and a half ago he was doing 25-30 evictions a week. Now he is doing 40 a day.

2. Success of other teams, namely the Tigers. Detroit has always been a baseball town, it's just that our team was pretty bad, like the Leafs of the MLB. Just kidding serge! ;P Their success the last couple years has coincided with the decrease in attendance at the Joe. I am a Wings fan but for the cost of 2 decent seats to a Wings game got me 2 tickets for 5 Tigers games last year. I would not be surprised if that isn't a factor.

3. Probably can be put in number 2 as well, but I think some are a little peeved that the strike happens, our teams payroll is cut in half and there was 0 price change on tickets. The tickets my dad gets me are $74 a pop. In the situation the State is in right now, that is a lot for one 2 hour game. I have no problems sitting at home watching it. I love being at the Joe but I can do a lot more with $148 these days.

4. The NHL. I know a lot of people that are not happy about the "new" NHL that were pretty big fans before the strike.

5. It's old hat. We have always done well in the regular season the past decade. That many years of winning and there is going to be a slight...I don't know the word off hand, but people just don't get excited as much, it's the same ol same ol.

I can't explain the football thing. But having been to both games, two completely different sets of society. Same can be said for Piston games as well. The people I see at Lions games are not the same fans I see at Wings games. Plus you have to take into a account how many games are played. In football 8 games are played at home and 41 at the Joe. Those 8 football games all have meaning while not all 41 Wings games do. People will spend the money to see a football game that has a meaning before buying much more expensive tickets to see the 19th Wings game of the season. I would personally choose the Wings but that is because I despise the Lions.

Regardless of how many people are not in the stands, just remember this, the amount of people in the stands has no reflection on how good a team is. There could be zero people in the stands and I would gladly put money on them in a 7 game series against the Leafs, Habs, and even the Blackhawks. Sadly though, except for the Habs, the other two teams getting to play in a 7 game series this year might be slim. /trashtalk

No chance the habs will play a 7 games serie this year....


























its gonna be a total massacre against every opponants.

very good post and we appreciate your insight..I believe most of your comments to be dead on...The price of tickets is even worse here as most people have been priced out of the ticket buying market. The thing with Toronto is there is so much corporate support that the tickets get gobbled up regardless of the amount..For example i get to about 4-5 games a year and am lucky to get the seats for free through my fathers associates..The tickets are $250 a pop, I would say I am financially middle class and cant justify spending $500+ on a hockey game......The thing about Toronto is you will notice that most of the true die hard fans arent the ones at the games, thats why traditionally we have had a quieter than most arena.

Same things seems to be happening here. I have execs all around me talking business while I am trying to enjoy the game.

Damn same here , tuesday in the total massacre against the bruins , I had VERY GOOD TICKETS like just behind the bench , the price was 150$ but my father's company have a lot of tickets so I didnt paid a penny , but if I wanted to sell that ticket , I could have sold it up to 600$ easily.

But we still have the loudest arena out there so I think Leafs fans need to look them self in the mirror and practice their YELLING lmao

That's completely illsnufus.

Before ATL got a team, I was a massive Wings fan. I still wear my favorite old Wings hat (I've had it since 7th grade) at least twice a week. I don't follow them like I used to, but the fanship progression has them at number 2, behind ATL, but ahead of NYI.

You're right, the statement doesn't make any sense. When you only face 20 shots per game, you better not give up more than 2 goals. Most of the credit should really go to Lidstrom. At the same time though, Osgood is playing way better than Hasek, and that is usually saying something.

Although I'm getting pretty sick of the Hasek flail. He has no clue where the puck is and he just lies there, I saw it happen last week in the San Jose game. He's laying flat on his back for like 4 sec., which is a fairly significant amount of time. Sure enough, the puck goes from the crease, to the corner, back to the crease, and into the net before he has a clue what happened. Just doesn't seem as sharp as he once was.

Michigan is one of the few states that's losing population these days. Detroit: Winning at hockey, losing at life.

Detroit 3
Phoenix 2

Only saw the third period, but what a period it was. Homer's goal was typical Homer, and Lidstrom's goal from the blue line was great. Then Ozzie slammed the door on Doan with 30 seconds left.

The other thing not taken into account is the open seats you see on tv most of those are sold but the people are with clients in the olympia room drinking and stuff so it looks alot worse than it is

6 in a row baby!

Beantown's gonna bring the hurt.

jeez, i keep working on nights that the Wings play...Hopefully I'll be back for the 3rd tonight. GL Troyomac & the Bruins.

Good luck to you as well.

Should be a good game. Not that it matters, but Boston has been dominating that series for the last few years.

It was a very entertaining game to watch.

Just keep rollin'...

Yes it was...I watched all of the 2nd and part of the 3rd at work. I missed Rafalski's goal but saw the highlight, I'm really glad we picked him up.

The 2nd period was great last night, one of the best periods I have seen this year except for that one blues game.

Yeah, I don't miss Schneider at all.

Rafalski was one of the best signings of the summer. I liked Schneids but Rafalski was a great replacement.

weeee, finally get to watch a game in its entirety, the Wild have given us trouble every time we play them, so hopefully we can come out and do well early on.

CLEARY! lol @ getting outplayed for 45-50 min. of the game and still getting at least a point.

and ship 8 straight...wow.

That was sick.

I was listening to Babcock on my way home tonight and he was saying that all he asks is people just shoot shoot shoot. He said that if you look at the stats the players that shoot the most get the most goals, so shoot shoot shoot. And Cleary did just that. That is a horrible goal for Backstrom to give up, HORRID!

I still worry they are blowing their wad too early but it still fun too watch.

they should be fine as long as they dont go on a terrible run right before the playoffs they just need to get through the first round quick and they should go deep

Agreed.

Herro hockey forum.