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All Lidstrom, All Over
by IwoCPO on 02/20/08 at 03:53 AM ET
Comments (9)
Scott Morrison, on HNIC radio last night said he was in a restaurant Monday night in Naples when Lidstrom got hurt. Ken Holland was there too, with several other GMs, all watching the game. Morrison said Holland’s eyes got big for a moment, followed by an awkward silence, then it was right back to normal.
An interesting contrast to me. I was in my living room, watching the game. When Lidstrom got hurt, my eyes got big, followed by an awkward silence, followed by an attempt to sever my own achilles tendon with a Jenga block. I’m ok.
Today, everywhere you look, it’s all Lidstrom.
The diggers have been voracious, calling people and asking questions and stuff.
“I hope to be back playing within a week,” Lidstrom told Expressen, a Swedish newspaper, Tuesday. Lidstrom said he had some ligament pain on the inside of his knee, but that “I can walk quite normally today.”
The Wings had Tuesday off as planned, and Lidstrom had several personal commitments to fulfill, which is why further testing was postponed until today.
I’m sure all those personal commitments were stipulations in the contract that pays Nick 7 million US dollars per year. I’m going to leave the “personal commitment” thing alone and take it as a good sign that this thing isn’t serious. Me? I have a few personal commitments to take care of today, but I’ll probably get them done, you know, after work. I’m just sayin’.
No matter what today’s tests show, the Wings are still looking at a minimum of one more game with their top three defensemen down, and probably more. Hints are that Rafalski’s groin isn’t getting better all that quickly.
Babcock said he isn’t sure if Brian Rafalski (groin), who has missed the last three games, will be able to return Friday in Calgary. The Wings can’t afford a long-term injury to Rafalski, what with Lidstrom now out for a while, and Niklas Kronwall (clavicle) not expected to return until after the road trip.
Decision time for Holland, as the Wings are currently only 5 deep with Dmen. Not a pleasant place to be with the Way West Swing coming up.
Khan(!)
Lidstrom won’t play on the team’s upcoming three-game western Canada road trip, which begins Friday in Calgary. Holland said the club will decide today whether to recall a defenseman from Grand Rapids…Holland wouldn’t speculate on which defenseman would be called up, but Jonathan Ericsson would be next in line.
There’s the latest “news”, now let’s turn briefly to Denver. It wasn’t a matter of when, only who. Here’s Adrian Dater with the column we all saw coming.
But, was it a dirty hit? Nope. Not even close. It was a hard hockey hit, yes. It resulted in a player getting hurt, yes. But, no, Laperriere’s left elbow was not up high. Yes, it was flanked out from his body some, and yes, he followed through with that elbow on the hit. But the elbow was below shoulder level. Therefore, the elbow was not up high. It just wasn’t.
The Wings were upset at what happened. And, so would the Avalanche if it had been Paul Stastny or Joe Sakic that had been hurt on the same hit. But the argument that “It’s a matter of respect, it’s a matter of protecting the star players” - sorry, take it somewhere else, Red Wings.
This is a team, Detroit, that regularly cheap-shotted Peter Forsberg for years. They would slash him on all parts of his body, hit him from behind all the time and all kinds of other nefarious things. Did I ever hear a word from the Red Wings, saying, “Sorry, we shouldn’t have done that. We forgot, Peter Forsberg is a star player. It won’t happen again”??? No, never. Never heard that.
Jesus. Shut up dude. Read the entire rambling, babbling, manifesto on how the Wings have been traditionally dirty, how Wing fans are crying foul over a clean “hockey hit”, how we all feel our star players deserve special treatment. Dater had that thing written before Lidstrom made his way to the Wing room at the Ass Can.
It was a good hit. Relatively clean. His elbow got up there but the hit was a good one. Laperriere saw an opportunity to drill Nick Lidstrom and he took it, as he should have. It was violent and it was painful to watch, but it was hockey and that’s the way the game should be played. I guarantee there were twenty other hits around the league the last two days “dirtier” than that one.
Now, Laperriere’s run across the ice later? Dirty, but Downey made him pay for that one too. Cody MacLeod’s attempt to fight the entire Wing bench, then his yapping afterward? Typical.
I’ve seen very little outcry about the Lidstrom hit itself. Lots of talk about the “discussion” between Uncle Mike and little Toni. Lots of talk about the fight. Huge amounts of discussion about the injury, but little realistic objection to Laperriere’s original hit. Yeah, Zetterberg said it was dirty, so did Babcock and Holland and Lidstrom himself even hinted at it. But no one’s calling for a suspension, or further retribution (next year…because the Dive certainly aren’t making the playoffs, not with that garbage team).
It was a good hit, laid on a superstar by a hard-nosed player. Borderline? Yeah. But what isn’t in hockey?
On to the blogs. We turn first to the New York Times, where hockey blogging has become cool.
The Wings had been so methodical and animatronicly perfect that Coach Mike Babcock wondered a week ago whether a little short-term adversity might be a good thing for his team. Longer-term adversity — troublesome losing streaks mixed with injuries to major stars and role players like Dan Cleary — could put a significant dent in the Winged Wheel’s confidence going into the playoffs. Of course, not having Lidstrom for the playoff run would be catastrophic.
You don’t have to believe me, but I was going to use “animatronicly” in a post later today. Seriously.
Big Frigging Al at the Wayne Fontes Experience offered some common sense yesterday.
They are calling it a sprained knee. Suuuure…And I have shares in the Ambassador Bridge I’d like to sell to you.
Does anyone truly believe Babcock? We all know whenever a NHL coach is moving his lips in regard to any injury, he’s lying. I’m not saying Lidstrom is seriously injured, but it’s much too early to be unfurrowing our brows, and breathing those sighs of relief, either.
Bruce MacLeod, last night, gave us a hint as to why he’s the anti-digger. While I could have done without the Mindy Sue info, it’s clear that in addition to being the best writer covering the Wings, he’s also a fan. Not always the right comination for a beat writer, but it works for him.
Seven to 10 days? Those are not good words to Red Wings fans’ ears. Niklas Kronwall is out for 7-10 days with a shoulder injury that’s lasted for 20 days. Henrik Zetterberg had a 7-10 label on him with his strained back late last season. That one lasted 19 games … games not days.
The initial reports have been that Lidstrom has a minor sprain to the MCL and that the team was more worried about a possible concussion.
So this morning will be good news … right? Tell me so.You might think that I’m being overly dramatic calling last night one of the worst ever for a Red Wings fan. Compared with losing in the Stanley Cup playoffs, how bad can this be?
Well, losing playoff series is something that’s going to happen. Nicklas Lidstrom being hurt isn’t supposed to happen.
More later…undoubtedly.
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Comments
I said it before. I didn’t think the hit was all that bad. I wouldn’t have called a penalty on the play. Does Downey still have to stand up for his captain? No doubt. Should Babcock and Zetterberg say it was dirty? In the interest of an event that appeared to galvanize the team, yeah.
While I think Dater is taking it too far to the other extreme, I do agree that the hit was okay.
Posted by Nathan on 02/20/08 at 09:17 AM ET
From Dater:
But, was it a dirty hit? Nope. Not even close. It was a hard hockey hit, yes. It resulted in a player getting hurt, yes. But, no, Laperriere’s left elbow was not up high. Yes, it was flanked out from his body some, and yes, he followed through with that elbow on the hit. But the elbow was below shoulder level. Therefore, the elbow was not up high. It just wasn’t.
The issue of whether Laperrierre’s elbow was “up high” or not is irrelevant. To use a little Daterspeak…Was it an elbow to the head? Yes it was. It really, truly was.
It’s time to put the notion that head shots are somehow okay behind us. In this case, it’s Lidstrom and, thankfully, it appears (based on the lies from lying liars we’ve received to date) that he doesn’t have a concussion. Many other guys, however, have suffered both minor and major concussions this season and in the recent past. I don’t know whether incidents are actually up or it’s just that more are being reported. (Where’s James Mirtle when you need him?) The thing is, too many players are getting their gray matter scrambled on a fairly regular basis and that’s not good. Not even close.
Posted by YzermanZetterberg on 02/20/08 at 11:14 AM ET
The hit was clean, I think both men were off balance which made the situation look a lot worse than it actually was. Downey did what he felt was right, sticking up for his fallen teammate and captain, there’s nothing wrong with that.
As for Dater’s ramblings, he’s just a sourpuss about the whole thing since the Avs had a chance to seize the game with the Wings down 3 top D, and they blew it. Forsberg being wacked on? Okay, so was Steve Yzerman and Sergei Fedorov, so call a spade a spade, Dater. The rivalry was intense, so star players were gonna be picked on to try to throw them off their game.
The Wings will be okay, Lidstrom will be okay and the panicking will end next week. Take a deep breath and remember this is why the Wings jumped out to a large lead…it’s paying off right now.
Posted by Jeremy from Bowling Green, OH on 02/20/08 at 11:21 AM ET
But the elbow was below shoulder level.
No it wasn’t. It got him on the chin.
Therefore, the elbow was not up high.
...but it was…?
It just wasn’t.
Holy crap. You’re right! I didn’t think of it like that. Socrates himself would be swayed by your rhetorical prowress, Adrian.
Journalistic standards in Denver. Gotta love ‘em.
Posted by Gabriel from San Diego, CA on 02/20/08 at 12:14 PM ET
But, was it a dirty hit? Nope. Not even close.
Just to clarify things with a visual reference instead of all the conjecturing that’s gone on, look at this screenshot sequence.
Lady Laperierre started out with a forearm to the chest but he kept raising his arm until he had jammed his elbow into Nick’s chin. That is a dirty hit…and he should have been called for roughing.
Posted by OlderThanChelios from Grand Rapids on 02/20/08 at 12:30 PM ET
Apparently, Dater doesn’t read around enough. Lidstrom himself said that Laperriere’s elbow came up and hit him in the chin which drove his head into the glass.
Fool.
Dater forgets that sometimes the most seemingly innocuous hit is often the most injurious.
And yet again, Dater pronounces himself “TOTAL TOOL.”
Posted by SYF from Las Vegas, NV on 02/20/08 at 01:48 PM ET
This is just like I feared, minor injury to Kronwall, we still haven’t seen him. Rafalski, just a strain, still haven’t seen him. Lidstrom, minor strain and now we get the word 3 weeks. Ugh. What time does the stress train leave?
Posted by hockeychic from Denver, CO on 02/21/08 at 12:28 PM ET
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Not that I’ve been looking all that hard, but I feel the same way. Any time there’s a hit that injures a player like that - intentional or not - someone’s going to toss around the ‘D’-word. It’s as much a part of hockey as the hit and the retaliation by Downey; Lappy even said he expected the Wings to be pissed. He knows. That’s hockey.
I’ll admit to be a tad nonplussed with Downey and Babcock hinting that Lidstrom should be handled, um, nicer because he’s a Norris Trophy Winner. That sounds too much like the Canucks complaining about the Steve Moore hit on Naslund. That “kid gloves” mentality is more what Dater is railing against, btw, not the legality of the hit.
Posted by Draft Dodger on 02/20/08 at 08:46 AM ET