The Malik Report

Previous entry: Red Wings mid-day tidbits: Hudler’s on the block, Toledo rocks and the Wings plug a sponsor

by George Malik on 08/20/11 at 12:56 PM ET
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Three weeks from today, the first slate of practices at the Red Wings’ prospect tournament will be wrapping up, but this morning’s crop of Wings news was so incredibly lean that I couldn’t cobble together an overnight report, and this one yields a barely coherent set of tidbits, too.

NHL.com’s John Kreiser kicks off the proceedings by suggesting that the Red Wings believe Ian White should slide into the #2 defenseman’s role, which isn’t quite accurate given that the Wings are assuming that it’s Niklas Kronwall’s time to shine:

Ian White, Red Wings—The Wings took a hit when defenseman Brian Rafalski, one of the NHL’s most underrated players, unexpectedly announced that he was going to retire with one year still left on his contract. Detroit GM Ken Holland got a good look at White during the Wings’ second-round loss to San Jose and was impressed enough to sign him to a two-year deal. White doesn’t have the three Cups on his resume that Rafalski did, but the Wings are expecting him to be able to step in and serve as a second offensive defenseman behind Nicklas Lidstrom.

Um, kinda sorta? The Wings view White as a #3/4 defenseman who can post 35 points and provide assistance in terms of replacing Rafalski via a committee consisting of White, Kronwall, Brad Stuart and Jonathan Ericsson. He’s not going to be expected to simply slide into Rafalski’s spot and offer 50-point level of production or remarkable adaptability.

Otherwise, erm… Paul already posted this, but Nicholas J. Cotsonika’s story about Brendan Shanahan’s attempts to provide both transparency as the NHL’s new disciplinarian and his close working relationship with the NHLPA’s most active and visible presence, fellow Wings alum Mathieu Schneider, is a helluva read—and it’s tremendously important to know that the NHL and PA plan on actually teaming up to bolster player safety while eliminating the “wheel of justice” factor from the disciplinary equation…

• In the promotional department, as previously mentioned, the Wings are partial sponsors of an attempt to stage the world’s largest dodgeball game today on Belle Isle at um, 1 PM? I guess this is an, “If you’re in the area” note, then…

• We know now that while Boston Bruins goaltender Tim Thomas won’t be placing the Stanley Cup on public display when he brings it to Davison, MI on August 24th, Tim Kampfer will display the Cup at Yost Ice Arena from 11 AM-1 PM on August 25th, and will then allow the public to take pictures with it for a $10 donation to the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital from 3:30-6:30 PM at Daryl’s Downtown in Jackson, MI…

And both Thomas and Kampfer’s days with the Cup will be preceded by Bruins goalie coach Bob Essensa’s showing thereof in East Lansing, MI on Tuesday the 24th, as the Flint Journal’s Mark Spezia notes:

On Tuesday, one day before Davison High School graduate and Boston Bruins goaltender Tim Thomas is scheduled to appear with the Cup in Davison, Bruins’ goaltending coach and former Detroit Red Wings’ netminder Bob Essensa will bring it to Oxford.

Essensa, Boston’s goaltending coach the past eight seasons, resides in Oxford during the offseason and will appear with the Cup at 9 p.m. at 24th Street Sports Tavern (13 S. Washington St.).

Unlike when Thomas brings the Cup to Davison High School next Wednesday, fans will be able to take photos with the Cup for fees ranging from $10-15, according 24th Street owner Viktor Paljusaj.

• In foreign-language news, part 1: Eurohockey.com posted a translation of the Swedish Ice Hockey Federation’s release regarding NHL players committing to play in the World Championships in Stockholm and Helsinki next spring, and as is the habit of hockey players, Henrik Zetterberg stated that the Tre Kronor keeps its potential charges apprised of news regarding the team via text messages (which don’t leave the paper trail of emails, Facebook messages, etc.);

• In foreign-language news, part 2: Sports.ru’s Igor Eronko’s tribute to Chris Osgood actually holds up pretty well in translation;

• In foreign-language news, part 3: This is just bizarre. According to Hockeysverige.se, former CSKA Moscow GM/president and former Russian minister of sport (and former Wing) Slava Fetisov ripped into the structure of Russian hockey while talking about Team Russia’s loss to Canada at the Ivan Hlinka Memorial Tournament (for under-17-year-olds), suggesting that Russian players’ agents have to pay bribes to get their players onto the national team…

And that players whose families can’t afford to shell out bribes are “forced” to leave Russia to play Major Junior hockey in Canada, where Fetisov insists that players’ careers and confidence go to die, with players returning home with “mental problems.”

Given that Fetisov is also the chairman of the KHL’s board of directors, and that the KHL uses both petro-dollars and money that comes from the budgets of Russian provinces to pay professional hockey players to come to Russia and bolster the ranks of a league that could never survive on its own, Fetisov’s allegations of corruption and unfair practices being used to undermine Mother Russia’s stead in the hockey world…

They reek of corruption at best and tell you how far removed Fetisov is from the player that stood up in opposition to the Soviet hockey system (many of the Russian Hockey Federation’s executives and coaches are holdovers from the communist era) to demand better treatment of and legal freedoms for hockey players to play wherever they please. Fetisov now stands as one of the greatest and most influential supporters of and advocates for the system he once opposed, and that system truly hasn’t changed a bit.

He’s gone over to the “dark side,” if you will, and when you look at where his former teammate and fellow anti-Soviet iconoclast Igor Larionov has ended up—in opposition to the KHL and the Russian Hockey Federation’s practices after attempting to help the KHL and SKA St. Petersburg out, now bringing players to the OHL or QMJHL so that they can be given better opportunities to further their professional hockey dreams and simply be treated like human beings instead of pawns in the KHL and FHR’s power plays while playing in the KHL-established Russian junior leagues…

That tells you all you need to know about who knows what’s going on and who’s simply tossing off more BS because it’s a convenient, face-saving excuse.

As this is a pretty sorry crop of news and most of you are still talking about the whole Jiri Hudler situation (does he stay or should he go?),  I hate mentioning pulling out the Paypal button, but I’m three weeks away from paying an average of a hundred bucks a night to stay at the damn Howard Johnson for 15 days in Traverse City (the Hojo’s nice and all, but believe me, it isn’t the Park Place Hotel, so that should tell you everything you need to know about how expensive it is to stay in Traverse City) for the prospect tournament and main camp.

So here I am begging that if you can toss $5 or $10 my way, it’d be huge.

You’ll have to use my email address, rtxg at yahoo dot com, to donate…please and thank you and this makes me feel really uncomfortable.

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