Plinko said:
I'm starting to think the Wings' problem is more X's and O's than player-related.
After watching several other teams (Pittsburgh, Toronto, Washington, Edmonton, etc) I see a huge difference in what the Wings run in the offensive zone compared to what everyone else does. When watching those other teams I see a lot of guys moving around and an almost constant desire to get the puck in close. I see a lot of other teams getting a LOT of open shots.
Detroit, on the other hand, is content to keep feeding the puck back to the defenseman and let him shoot from as far back as possible, trying to get the puck through 5 bodies. It's ridiculous.
That's what I've been saying for 3 years now. Teams have easily caught on to this and just clog up the middle of the ice, totally negating all good scoring chances. They also know when to pressure our D to make them hurry the shot, 9 out of 10 times blocking/deflecting it before it even comes close to be a scoring threat. If I could write down what my brain is seeing fast enough when I watch them play, I could predict 8 out of 10 plays/passes/shots that the Wings will attempt before it happens. It's quite sad. I was hoping two new assistant coaches would be able to shake things up a bit, but it appears they're just sticking with what they think works.
Detroit loves that puck control and they still do control the puck better than any other team in the league, but because they limit themselves to that style of play, other teams have figured out how to stop them. Detroit isn't set up to play dump and chase, we don't have fast/big players that can skate into the corners and retrieve the puck. Helm is fast, but not big, Homer is big, but not fast, etc.
I think Tuesday's game against the Wild will be a blow out one way or another. It won't be another 1-0/2-1 win/loss. Either the Wings wake up and smoke them 5-2 or 6-1, or the Wild hand us another embarrassing loss.
