Sure they do, when your previous GM left the team with no talent at the professional level and an absolutely gutted farm system. But hey, Ken Holland kept that meaningless playoff streak alive! For what it’s worth, Yzerman has only been “rebuilding” for 5 years. The remainder of that was a stupid attempt at keeping a silly playoff streak alive by Holland that completely destroyed the Wings from top to bottom.
Most people felt the pistons were dead before this season and they are pretty much assured the playoffs. Things can change quickly, lets hope Stevie Y sorts it out
They should have traded Larkin to get more capital early.
But the last 2 seasons they have done virtually nothing.
Revolving door of bottom feeder FAs.
I get theres lot of young kids coming up, but its gonna take all these young kids. (kasper, daniels, solderblom, MBN, costa, augustine) a year or two of steady NHL ice time to get to speed
So even if they bring them all up next year. They wont be a real contender till 2027?
The only criticism I do have with Yzerman is that he also tried to make the playoffs by signing quite a few middling talents to multi year deals.
Most of them haven’t turned out well, and created multi-year salary cap headaches.
On the other hand… I’m not sure too many top level UFAs would really have come to Detroit with the situation Ken Holland left behind.
Also… this is exactly why I hate the NHL salary cap rules!!!
NHL teams are obligated to meet the salary cap “floor”… which is almost 75% of the cap “ceiling”…. causing bad teams have to force signings and take on bad contracts… or even trade for crap contracts.
On top of that… the NHL doesn’t have the “rollover” of unused cap space like the NFL… so rebuilding teams can’t use that to help them get better in future seasons.
I’m glad you brought this up because I was going to when you brought up the contracts for middling talent. It’s a combination of needing to hit the cap floor, as well as…who wants to come play for the Wings right now? The Wings don’t have much to offer anyone other than overpaying, unless they’re from Michigan and want to return home. I haven’t been a fan of all (or most) of Yzerman’s FAs, but I’ve never thought this team was going to be turned around in 5 years or less. You have to get extremely lucky and/or already have some things in place. All the Wings had in place was Larkin, and as much as I love him, he’s really a #2 C.
