stoked for the return of the live blog!  unfortunately, my band has a show tonight in the heart of the beast (San Jose).  i’ll be wearing my Arcadia, Michigan shirt and praying for a Wings-Sharks conference final.  looking forward to reading over the wonderful, ridiculous comments on plays i will only be able to recreate in my mind.

bold predictions, Chief. got my fingers crossed.

With all this juvenile humor today a little ditty from grade school has gotten stuck in my head, so I’m making a stab at passing it along to someone else and getting it out of my brain. 

In days of old,
When knights were bold
And toilets weren’t invented,

They left their loads
Beside the roads
And walked away contented.

anybody manage to get the sopcast feed to work?  says it’s offline for me.  :-(

Franzen is showing absolutely no hesitation about shooting the puck.

This sucks.  The NHL Network- and Comcast in Denver- is the bane of my existence…

I came in late, Tivo’d the last 10 minutes and just caught FSD’s tribute to McCarty before the faceoff. It was a thing of beauty...absolute beauty. Whoever picked the music is my new favorite person.

Filppula looks good so far - quick and his skating is smooth, isn’t having any trouble handling the puck, so he is obviously at 100%.

Because I love you sop://broker.sopcast.com:3912/33952

sopcast is working now!!!

ok, well, it’s only sort of working.  damn.

Just missed a Blues goal.

/friendly trolling

“Because I love you sop://broker.sopcast.com:3912/33952”

perfect!  I love you back!

Thank You SO much Solo.

I am a huge Wings fan who recently moved to Beijing and today is my birthday.  I woke up early so I could watch Mac’s return on sopcast but it hasn’t been on

Let’s Go Wings

Cleary-Dats-Hank looks good.

PP is on…

LET’S GO RED WINGS!!!

LOL @ Mobil promo.  “On the Run.  The Blues win, you win.” Gee Mobil, really putting yourselves out there aren’t you?  sheesh.

Blues had one of the worst changes ever.  Boy was the ice empty.

wow.  Kronwall is something else.

Happy birthday in Beijing! 

Posted by PaulinMiamiBeach:
LOL @ Mobil promo.  “On the Run.  The Blues win, you win.” Gee Mobil, really putting yourselves out there aren’t you?  sheesh.

Even funnier is that there are no Mobil on the Run stores across most of the St. Louis Metro area—All are in Missouri and only in select locations.

The worst kind of commercials - the ones for businesses that aren’t even in your city.  I hate those!

Thank You Baroque

Hoping the wings can pull it out.  Hockey is what I miss most from the states.

Watching on Sopcast has been a blessing, though getting used to watching with coffee and cereal instead of beer and wings took some getting used to.

so… Just one shift for D-Mac?

About what we all expected if true… Bud dammit Grandpa would be happy to see him in the winged wheel again.

Crazy end to the period.

*but

Damn iphone keyboard…

Wow, just like old times on the live blog!
I can’t figure out the reason many of you can’t see the game. I’m watching on FSN Detroit on DirecTV in NC. Same feed on NHL net, which I understand isn’t carried on many systems. I thought the Fox Sports packages were pretty much everywhere.

Chief, if it makes you feel better, the low resolution feed is giving a pretty bad “halo” effect on the hockey sticks and referee shirts.Sucks. I can hardly watch it.

Dougie, I think those of us watching it on SopCast or whatever illegal stream we have access to are doing so because we have cable providers who don’t carry Gary’s Network.

All: hope you’re enjoying the return of the liveblog.

No, he had several shifts.  With Hartigan and Drake - looked fine, but it will obviously take some time to get his timng back.  Ken and Mickey mentioned that he got a huge ovation from the crowd when he came out for warm-ups.

Actually, he and Maltby and Draper were the starting forwards at the beginning of the game.

Watching on Sopcast has been a blessing, though getting used to watching with coffee and cereal instead of beer and wings took some getting used to.

You mean beer and wings aren’t the Breakfast of Champions? 

is McCarty wearing #25?

Dunno the feed im watching is pretty freaking good as far as feeds go. Its about equal to standard digital TV.

yeah, I thought his only shift was the first of the game. Been running back and forth during the game - yes, I get NHL Network. Thank god.

We need to get the puck moving more..

anybody know where i can get league-wide stats for Power Play Shots Against?

Of course he’s wearing 25!

Rafalski!

“is McCarty wearing #25? “

Yep

You mean beer and wings aren’t the Breakfast of Champions?  smile

Oh it is!  But usually I have to go to work after the game and the boss is nice enough to let me come in late on Wings games mornings.

Craptastic call of goaltender interference.

What a nice boss.

I’m not a parent, but it seems to me that maybe if I had flown to Florida, had a baby daughter, then flown to Minnesota, I might give up two goals in the first period, too.

Vancouver trailing 2-0 after one period.

Mickey is funny when he is high dudgeon about a penalty.

Seems to me like he has a bit more edge , since he returned from his surgery. I like edge.

can we paint the goal line blue and put Lidstrom in net?  man he’s unbelievable at holding that thing in!

Datsyuk and Filppula together.  Poor Blues.

Warm fuzzies gone. Babcock needs to spend some time in practice working on getting the hell out the way of a teammate’s shot.  The raging pessimist in me says Franzen loses a spleen or something.

Got the FSN St. Louis guys on SopCast. What are we hearing about Franzen?

I wasn’t thinking spleen.

I have an old television, with no HD, so maybe someone else had a better view...but it looked like poor Franzen took a puck to the lowest part of his midsection.  That’s a pretty sensitive area for guys, I hear.

If you want to know what it feels like Baroque, think back to Game 5 last year against the Poultry.  I seem to recall we even had a name for it.

The game’s on, so of course I have my beer, remote, laptop, snacks...what am I forgetting?

Mickey is funny when he is high dudgeon about a penalty.

Oh, that’s right. My dictionary.

it looked like poor Franzen took a puck to the lowest part of his midsection

I’m not sure where it hit, I didn’t see the replay.  Not that it matters, I have no clue where the spleen is.

“Not that it matters, I have no clue where the spleen is.”

I bet Forsberg could tell ya!

Ha-ha. 

Mickey just went off on a touching penalty (can’t recall whether they called it a hook or a slash) on one of the Blues.  Said the crowd would be up in arms if the penalty was called on the Wings, and it wasn’t even enough to be called for a foul in basketball.  You could hear the “harrumph” in the tone of his voice.

Babcock just said Franzen was fine, got winded a little bit - and he’s back on for the third period.

It looked like he caught a puck right in the gonadal region, which would account for him being hunched over at the bench and then going into the room with the trainer.

Minnesota 3, Vancouver still 0 in the second period.

“8 spot is completely up for grabs. Bubba’s killing Columbus. Minnesota’s killing Vancouver.  The Dive took a 2-0 lead over Edmonton only to choke it away and they’re tied.”

I want the Predophiles!!

Just got off the phone with my mom.

I mentioned that Detroit was losing to St. Louis and having a tough time scoring on Legace (plus the two posts).

Her exact quote:

“Of course he’s playing well.  It’s the regular season, and he doesn’t dissolve into a puddle of pee until the playoffs.  At least that won’t be a problem playing for St. Louis this year.”

Franzen goal.....apparently his gonadal region survived insact.

I heart Franzen.

There were no Blues at all on that half of the ice!

I think that shot to the junk just made Franzen mad. Hat trick and the game winner?

“Hat trick and the game winner?”

It’s fate.

Osgood should give the net a big hug for that one.

Osgood should give Franzen a hug for bailing him out of a mediocre game.

That too.

Bummer.  Oh, well. (sigh)

Nobody seriously hurt and they get another point.  Only a few more games until the playoffs start.

Boyes, ... deserves plenty of credit for scoring 40 goals playing for such an absolute garbage team.

As you probably guessed, I must take exception with this.  The number of one-goal and overtime losses for the Blues this year is staggering.  If we converted a few more here and there, we would be in the playoffs.

Other than several December to present “Ears” Toivonen games, there were not many blowouts.  You make it seem like the Blues are an automatic 9-0 win every game.  Not the case.  Just look at the 4-4 season series with the Wings.  I’m sure your local heroes did NOT take tonight’s game with a grain of salt.  They saw what happened to Montreal a week and a half ago.

Good luck in April.

Milo
/Thanks for allowing me to play in your sandbox.
//Baroque:  Your Mom sounds wise.  Ask her whether the Hasek & Osgood tandem will work in the playoffs, or if she would make a choice between them.

Some observations from the game.

Lower bowl fans (generally) suck. They barely know their hockey, arrive in the middle of the game and wear too much cologne. Why would you spend several hundred on tickets and miss all the good stuff. Give me the bleeders with the true blue (glad to be in the building) fans anyday. Ok, lower upper bowl and we’re good.

Babcock did a very smart thing by putting Mac out there with the Grind Line. Get his jitters and the nice loud ovation out of the way so they could focus on the game. And yes, we gave him an ovation as soon as he hit the ice for warmups.

If you think Lilja looks bad on Tv, you should see the guy play in real life. Slow, lumbering, only half-coordinated; it was painful to watch Frankenstein’s monster out there. I’m sure he’s a swell guy but I want Stuart back. Now.

D & Z are absolutely electrifying; the buzz they generate as soon as they get the puck is unbelievable. If Franzen missed on Z’s second beautiful feed, he would have lost his spot. The Circus Freak twins are amazing.

Why point out the obvious? Because it’s only in contrast to seeing other players like Lebda, Draper or others that you appreciate their on-ice vision. Lebda needs to stop shooting into people’s sticks. He had an open man coming late several times, but not the vision to see them.

Seriously, the best players seem to see the ice from a press-box perspective; it’s insane.

I was ready to hang Ozzy and post a diatribe about how we may be effed for the playoffs if Dom isn’t back. You guys called it a “mediocre game” and I’ll eat that pill; like a Zanex.

This may be the first game I’ve seen where Rafalski didn’t get slammed at least once. I’m not sure who gave him the green light, but that man was buzzing.

Mac looked ok, but there were definitely some jitters. He simply wasn’t that aggressive, mostly because I don’t he wanted to be a defensive liability. Draper, however, played great (except the getting shots on net part).

Can’t wait till the playoffs start.

The BJ’s suck!!! And no, I don’t mean that as a joke, even though it’s funny.  I DON’T WANT BUBBA IN THE PLAYOFFS, PERIOD!!!  I am aware of the fact that playing them in round 1 would be the best choice for the travel, but dammit, I don’t want these idiots down here to have the satisfaction.  That’s why my disdain for Columbus.  They’ve only won once, ONCE, against the ‘Turds the last 2 seasons (I think).  People always talk about our record being padded because of our division, but what about Nashville?  Columbus only taking 2 points out of a possible 32 over 2 seasons against one team?  What a piece of crap franchise, city, and state Columbus and Ohio are!!!

Oh the unseen side of things, what the hell has happened to our faceoff percentage?  Draper good as always.  Everyone else?    I thought Babs had explained to them that puck posession starts with winning faceoffs…

Bruce Boudreau is Barry Trotz’s long-lost brother.

Lilja = Lurch.

I was glad to see Filppula back at full speed.

The way Franzen is starting to think like a goalscorer makes me laugh.  He doesn’t seem to be looking to pass the puck much right now - to anyone.  Good for him.

Larry Murphy mentioned a couple times that McCarty was keeping his shifts short, so I’m sure that you pegged it, Osrt - he is jumping right into the homestretch of a season for a playoff team, and it will take him a little while to get back his timing and until then he will likely be cautious about his positioning.  Being reckless would be stupid.

My mom thinks goaltenders should be confined to the goal crease, with leg irons if necessary, and not get delusions of being able to handle a puck.  She’s a bit old-school that way - but she was in high school when the Blackhawks won their last Cup, so she’s entitled.

(I, on the other hand, would go with shock collars instead of leg irons.)

Why is it that I’m always in such a bad mood when the Wings lose a game? I know they can’t win them all, but that is cold comfort to a total nut case like myself. Lets Go Red Wings!!!!!