Malik Under Fire

Wow.  Check out this article entitled, "George Malik is a Whiner" by the Toronto Maple Leafs blog, Pension Plan Puppets.  Apparently, they have some issues with one of the most consistent Red Wings bloggers out there...

George Malik knows so much about which teams won't make the playoffs based on poor play in October because he's a Red Wings fan and watched them only qualify for the playoffs twice between 1967 and 1983. When the Leafs are that bad feel free to come back and make fun of us Malik.

Of course, it's always nice to point on the PAST struggling of the Red Wings when your team hasn't made the play-offs in four straight years, eh?

Look I'm all for dissenting opinions here but when you're the lone voice saying Gustavsson isn't good and he stops the Red Wings 35 times on 36 attempts (7 on the penalty kill, 3 by Datsyuk, 7 by Zetterberg) you look like a @#$%-ing clown.

So I read the article by Malik and looked for the words "Gustavsson isn't good"...guess what?  I never found it.  Malik suggested that the "legend of the Monster" may have been played up a bit.  Take that personal, did we?

On behalf of Toronto fans we apologize for being excited to watch our best player. We'll work harder to ensure that no one is excited about Phil Kessel so that no one cheers so that the Red Wings can pretend they're at home playing in front of a half empty stadium.

Average attendance for Toronto Maple Leafs: 19, 266

Average attendance for Detroit Red Wings: 19,243

**granted, Detroit is at 95.9% capacity and Toronto is 102.5%.  But, "half empty" you say?

Malik quote: Gustavsson himself made a telling comment about the Wings' contentment with playing perimeter hockey:

PPP's response: This is classic annoying fan of a team with recent success syndrome. Malik is implying that the Red Wings lost because they played poorly and that Toronto is a bad team.

Toronto's not a bad team. The Leafs will probably finish behind Detroit in the points race when the dust settles on this season, but the Leafs will finish this season 1-0-0 against the Red Wings. They finished last year 1-0-0 against the Red Wings and they finished the year before that 1-0-0 against the Red Wings. I'm ok with that.

Recent success syndrome?  How about claiming that winning 3 straight games (year over year) against a single team is compensation for not making the play-offs in each one of those years?  THAT sounds like more of a syndrome to me.  Leafs aren't a bad team, they just have the misfortune of only have three wins this season.

It's not the post-season.

Leafs - 5 Red Wings - 4 (SO)

Good News:

-The Wings, when interested, are better than any of the other 29 teams, or hell an all-star team of the rest of the league combined.

-Johan "Motherf'ing" Franzen plays for the Red Wings. I can see Toskala in two years in one of those old Nike commercials:

Unable to stop Johan Franzen, Maple Leafs goaltender Vesa Toskala is forced to become a taxi driver. "Franzen with his fancy Bauer skates. I never knew what he was going to do, go top shelf, bottom shelf, glove side, stick side! Johan Franzen exposed a weak stick hand, with his strong skating and stickhandling, I couldn't stop him. Are you Swedish sir? That's good, because I'm not picking up Swedish people."

God, what great commercials those were.



Bad News:

-Osgood looks worse than regular season Osgood last year.

-Except for about five minutes of each game, the Wings would rather be somewhere else. And it shows.

Other thoughts:

-Why didn't the Wings put a bid towards Jonas Gustavsson? Makes sense to me...watching the highlights, he seems to fit the bill of what he was advertised as.

-It's preseason, so why am I even making any judgments at all? Hell I only watched five minutes of the game, I should shut the f' up.

-Has an alumni team ever beat the current team in college sports? Because I think it is going to happen today. It's game time.

Toronto's "Monster" Will Star Tonight

Just in, from The Toronto Star. Big rookie free-agent signee, goaltender Jonas Gustavsson will make his exhibition debut at JLA tonight against the Wings.

Here's what the 24 year old tender, nicknamed "The Monster" had to say about tonight's game:

"They've got a couple of good Swedish players but I can't really focus on them. At this level, every player is a good player. It's going to be a tough game. But this is where you want to be, these are the teams you want to play against. I see it as a big challenge, not something scary."

Former Wings whipping boy, Ron Wilson had this to add:

"We'll just ease him into the action. Hopefully, we don't have a first period like we've had the last two starts, where he's going to be under the gun. Unfortunately, I'm half expecting that to happen because of the lineup they have and, in some cases, the lineup we have. (Henrik) Zetterberg is not playing but they have some great Swedes (in the lineup). It could be interesting as they jostle him around in front of the net. That's a big part of the learning, when you've got some of these guys standing in front of him — Franzen and people like that. It'll be a good test."

Just exudes confidence, doesn't he? I guess all those beat downs before getting ousted as San Jose's bench boss has him expecting to lose to the Wings before the puck drops. I dig it.

Oh yeah...he sure looks monstrous, doesn't he?

Friday's Lineup vs Maple Leafs

Khan(!) has your lineup for tomorrow night's game against the Toronto Maple Leafs and yes, Brad May will be playing against his former team. This is probably a good thing since the Leafs are now all "Burked" up and are dropping the mitts left and right.

Here's how the lines are looking:

Franzen-Datsyuk-Holmstrom

Bertuzzi-Filppula-Cleary

Draper-Abdelkader-Ritola

May-Newbury-Pare

Lidstrom-Rafalski

Kronwall-Stuart

Lebda-Ericsson

Osgood

Howard

Still no Zetterberg...**sigh**

Henrik Zetterberg skated briefly at the start of practice and took the ice afterward but continues to be hampered by a groin strain, which almost assuredly will keep him idled through the weekend. Zetterberg is confident he'll be ready for the start of the season. He might be able to play in the final preseason game Wednesday against Swedish club Farjestads.

We'll all consider ourselves lucky if this is the extent of Zata's injuries for the year.

Oh and about Brad May, no way he travels to Sweden next week, no Cap room. I wouldn't be surprised if he does indeed become the new Aaron Downey, though I garuntee he will not be as well liked. Did I mention Chris loves Aaron "There will be Blood" Downey?

Post the pic, Chris.