NHL Preview: Detroit Red Wings

Let's continue, shall we? In the face of considerable adversity, I'm going to keep trying to get you the half-baked NHL previews you so desperately need. Next up, the Detroit Red Wings.

In the interest of full disclosure I will state right off that I despise the Detroit Red Wings. Partly for their obnoxious fans who invade opposing arenas throughout the country. (It is a common misconception that the fanbases of teams like the Red Wings or Pittsburgh Steelers "travel well". This is false. The expatriate fans are already in the opposing team's hometown because they got the hell out of Detroit/Pittsburgh as fast as they possibly could because these towns are god forsaken hellholes not fit for human existence. There is no travel involved.) Partly for their unrivaled success (no US based team has won more Stanley Cups). But mainly, I hate the Red Wings for 1998.

Which is why I'm going to take so much joy in their inevitable collapse this year. After a 2005-06 regular season that saw the Wings finish atop the league standings, they managed to get themselves eliminated in the first round anyway. The disappointment was further compounded by an abyssmal offseason that saw Brendan Shanahan leave for the New York Rangers via free agency and Steve Yzerman leave for the corporate suite upstairs. Worst of all, somebody in Detroit's front office, apparently having just awakened from a five year hibernation, decided that Dominik Hasek was the best of a large crop of available goaltenders, rather than trading with one of several teams currently carrying two starting-quality goaltenders (Buffalo and/or San Jose, to name a few).

So what can Detroit fans expect for the upcoming season? Probably more of the same. Look for the Red Wings to have a reasonably successful regular season, assuming Chris Osgood can perform adequately in place of the probably-going-to-be-injured Hasek. But in a city that refers to itself as "Hockeytown" (bleagh) a high playoff seed won't be enough. Unfortunately, that is all that they are likely to get. Barring some truly amazing performances from Pavel Datsyuk, Henrik Zetterburg and/or Niklas Lidstrom, the creaky old Red Wings won't make any more playoff noise this year than last.

For a team with such a fervent following as the Red Wings, you'd think I'd be able to find a blog that has been updated in the past few months. No such luck, but feel free to try Detroit Red Wings or Behind the Jersey.