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A New Season
Jennifer Miller	10/23/2006
EDITOR'S NOTE: My apologies to Jennifer for taking so long to get this posted...hectic life and such. With the same stoic tone that is his trademark, Red Wings public address announcer Bud Lynch ushered in a new era in Hockeytown. "Introducing your new Red Wing captain number 5, Nicklas Lidstrom." Ta da! Welcome to the new world order of the NHL. Not that the NHL actually had anything to do with Yzerman's retirement. You can blame Gary Bettman for many evils in the world but Father Time had more to do with the changing of the guard than anything else. So it is the start of a brand new day for fans of the boys in red and white. Apparently one where they got up on the wrong side of the posturepedic. A 3-1 loss to Vancouver and they looked dismal in the process. Not the way that Mike Babcock wanted to start his second season. Certainly not the way Dominic Hasek wanted to start the second sequel of "The Dominator Does Detroit." And undoubtedly not the tone that Nick Lidstrom wanted to set for the beginning of his tenure as captain of the team. The question now lurking is where the team goes from this point and how many concerns the fans need to have right now. Answering the second question first (because I'm like that), I will say darned few. And where they go from here, well, to the playoffs. I know I didn't get my tushy in gear to do a full on prediction for the season but I was never planning on picking our guys for the President's Trophy this season. I figure they have a good shot at third place by merit of winning the division. As we have learned in the last couple of post season disappointments, terrific regular season play can be overrated. What we care about is being healthy, sharp and on a roll come April and just good enough to not be taking early golf trips. This team is surely built to find its way into the playoffs and is built better for the post season than in the previous couple of years. And that's regardless of Hasek being healthy enough to go. There is more youth on this team and that equals more speed, more grit and more creativity than we have seen in quite a while. It also means there are more players on the team who have already made the adjustment to the new rules where the older guys are still working on it. The Wings are the only team (I am pretty sure of this but call me on it if I am wrong) that can boast two Stanley Cup winning goaltenders. Say what you want about Hasek's age but he is still an amazing netminder when healthy and Chris Osgood is starting out the season healthy, confident and with a great attitude. As much as this first game was no real fun to watch, there is a lot that I have seen from the team in the preseason and through the first game that I really do like. I am very happy to see Jiri Hudler and Tomas Kopecky with the big team this year. They will bring an energy that was perhaps missing before. I love the use of Johan Franzen on the second power play unit to do the same dirty work as Tomas Holmstrom. Opposing teams will have the devil's time moving "The Mule" from the sightlines of their goalies. I am excited to watch the continued development of young blue liners Brett Lebda and Niklas Kronwall. And adding Danny Markov is almost like getting Vladimir Konstantinov back. Between Markov and Kronwall, the other teams will have to be careful how they move through the neutral zone. All in all, I feel good about this team. I have been watching the naysayers all week talking about how the Red Wings are rebuilding and won't amount to much this season and the Ducks are the ones to beat. I will give Anaheim credit for their off season moves and they will be formidable. But I don't think it is ever safe to count our guys out entirely. There is a lot of skill and pride in the dressing room down at the Joe and once that all gels together, some good things will happen. So one game down and it is only one game. One of eighty-two. That's a lot. Onward to the young stud Penguins. And in the meantime, Go Tigers!!