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Hossa the shooter
Watching the Red Wings' top forward line -- Pavel Datsyuk, Tomas Holmstrom, Marian Hossa -- in scrimmage has been fascinating. Datsyuk and Holmstrom are extreme players, with Holmstrom more extreme than Datsyuk. Homer plays the net-front, period. And if he roams, it's to retrieve the puck. Datsyuk carries the puck and makes plays. He has obviously added a nice scoring touch, but keeping the puck on his stick is Datsyuk's trademark.
Enter Hossa, who although just 29, has already spent parts of 10 seasons in the NHL (would be 11 if not for the lockout). And he's done so because he has a multi-faceted game. So what role will Hossa take on the top line?
"I have to make sure I shoot the puck to the net," said Hossa. "That's probably going to be my job. I like to play that kind of game."
Sounds good. Hossa has six 30-goal seasons to his credit and two more 29-goal seasons. The rest of the Red Wings combined have six 30-goals seasons and one 29-goal season.
30-GOAL SEASONS
Hossa 6
Zetterberg 3
Datsyuk 2
Holmstrom 1
Enter Hossa, who although just 29, has already spent parts of 10 seasons in the NHL (would be 11 if not for the lockout). And he's done so because he has a multi-faceted game. So what role will Hossa take on the top line?
"I have to make sure I shoot the puck to the net," said Hossa. "That's probably going to be my job. I like to play that kind of game."
Sounds good. Hossa has six 30-goal seasons to his credit and two more 29-goal seasons. The rest of the Red Wings combined have six 30-goals seasons and one 29-goal season.
30-GOAL SEASONS
Hossa 6
Zetterberg 3
Datsyuk 2
Holmstrom 1
posted by Chuck Pleiness at
1:21 PM
4 Comments:
It's almost scary to think of the kind of offense this team could shell out if Hossa stays on past year 1 and if Leino develops into a 3rd version of Hossa and Zetterberg which is possible and even easier when matched up against another units 2nd or 3rd pair of defenders. 3 scoring lines. No other team can legitimately claim that. And all three lines feature a playmaker (filpula, hudler, datsyuk) and a net wrecker (holstrom, franzen, cleary). Leaving a 4th line of grit and defense with an amazing upside from among the rest(samuelson, helm, downey, kopecky, mccarty, helm, draper, maltby). Let's see, there are I think 15 stanley cup rings on the 4th line? I'm ok with that.
what are your thoughts on the other forward line combinations, Bruce? obviously the defensive lines are mixed up (although i find it strange that Lebda/Lilja is still intact) but the forward lines seem to be that of Babcock's plans for October. how about the supposed lines for the soon-to-be Griffins? thanks for updating us as we all wish we could be there watching training camp!
I think it's great that Hossa plans to shoot a lot. At the same time, unlike Crosby, Pav has a really good shot. I remember someone wrote that Pav has one of the top 5 in the league and I agree. So, I hope Hoss is ready to make plays as well because we all want to see Pav shoot more.
We all saw how the Wings made the Crosby line look human. It'd be great if teams didn't know where the shots were coming from. Try and cover Hoss and he will power right through. Try and cover Pav and he will make you famous on YouTube.
I think the Lebda-Lilja issue is due to the fact they are not "veterans" like Lidstrom and Chelios. These aren't guys who can teach a clinic on defense to other NHL'ers so the focus is on having them work on themselves. Try to put this in perspective of your day-to-day job. If you have 4 senior employees, 4 new hires and 2 employees who have been there long enough to know how most of the biz runs, but not enough to train the new hires? You leave those two to get their jobs done while the veterans train the new guys. If you have the semi-experienced training the new, they tend not to be as efficient at their own responsibilities. Whereas, the experienced can teach and work at the same time. Babcock has a recipe for getting everyone on the same page and this is just one way to get all the cylinders going full speed.
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