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It’s The Money. No It’s Not. Yes It is.
by IwoCPO on 07/17/10 at 09:40 PM ET
Comments (18)
I’m going to tread lightly with this one, because it’s going to reek of hypocrisy. So, tactfully…here goes.
Chris McCosky? You’re changing your mind like a chick. It’s kinda weird.
13 July/Detroit News
It’s about the money. It’s always about the money.
If the money were right, Mike Modano would’ve already signed a one-year deal with the Red Wings. The money, obviously, isn’t right, but the money isn’t going to change, either.
17 July/Detroit News
Just because he hasn’t yet accepted the $1.25 million offer doesn’t mean he feels slighted or he’s holding out for more.
The money did, in fact, change as McCosky pointed out himself in the second article, the one where he says salary isn’t an issue despite the fact that he’d said four days ago that “it’s always about the money.”
Ahhh, but it’s not just the hormonal shift of gears. No. McCosky also uses this latest manifesto as an opportunity to climb up on his pedestal and toss a few arrows at the unwashed among us, the ignorant fans.
The Wings can wait; too bad so many of their fans can’t. It seems that an alarmingly large number of Red Wings fans, at least from the e-mails I’ve been getting, want to vilify Modano.
“If Modano doesn’t want to play here, forget him,” has been a common sentiment.
“What, is he too Hollywood for the Red Wings now?” is another.
So, just wondering…how many of you are flooding McCosky’s inbox? Uh huh. I thought so. I’m sure he’s not reading the blogs, those nasty, grammatically horrific, slanted, uninformed voiceboxes of the biased. McCosky’s above that, I’m sure. Instead he’s quoting his overflowing inbox. It’s filling up at an “alarming” rate, you know. Because you’ve been tip tapping and sending and posing questions.
Speaking of hypocrisy, I just wrote about Modano. And I said I wouldn’t until he signs or retires. And speaking of hypocrisy again, I’m the guy who ripped Jiri Hudler for two years, then started a grassroots campaign that would have resulted in Gramps formally adopting him if all had gone well. Then he left and I hated him until the hooker thing and then he was a hero again. So, bitches, I know a little about hypocrisy. Hell, it’s a staple around here.
Coming down too hard on McCosky? Maybe. But he’s a Digger now and coming down too hard on the DD’s is a staple too. So which is it Chris? Is it about the money, or not?
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Comments
If you wanna go and take a ride with me
We three-wheelin’ in the Four with the gold D’s
Oh, why do I live this way?
Hey, must be the money!
McCosky seems to have gotten the wrong end of the shaft. Very few of us are vilifying Motown Mikey for flip-flopping like a largemouth bass (see what I did there?) in the bottom of a bucket. It’s because the flakiness and incessant gum-flapping confirms a character flaw that we don’t want on our team. If he doesn’t actively WANT to be a Wing, then we don’t WANT him. See how that works? It has to be mutual. Feel the love, baby.
Posted by AndrewFromAnnArbor from Fortress Europe on 07/18/10 at 02:51 AM ET
Absolutely classic! Not much I can add to your take on this one Chief. I needed a good laugh and what better way to get it than the oddly captivating spectacle of watching a man declare war on his own opinion.
He’s stiill stuck on the money issue? Really? Whatever. Hell, we’ve moved on to other topics. It’s about will. It’s about Willa. It’s about the biggest no-brainer of all time—the idea that several of us have already expressed: $1.25mil to become a Red Wing? $800k to become a Red Wing???—whatever—at age 40, in the salary cap era no less!?!?!—again, whatever!
McCosky misses the point of his e-mailing masses, be they real or imagined. This thing will be resolved sooner or later. We all get that. In the meantime we’re merely astonished and/or speculating as to why a 40 year old hockey player wouldn’t run through hell in a gasoline tuxedo for a chance to play for his home-town team that would give him one final chance to win the cup and forever cement his legacy…
Posted by WestWing from Portland, Oregon on 07/18/10 at 03:20 AM ET
If you want to get into DD conspiracy theory, in April and May, the Free Press got into the Red Wings controversy-making business via Rosenberg’s “Lidstrom’s done” article and Evil Drew’s “is the dynasty over?” crap, and over the past few weeks, Kulfan and McCosky have gotten into the, “Okay Wings fans, we’re going to tell you what to think, and if we contradict ourselves, don’t worry about it” business.
From what I can gather, the reasons these guys are talking about hockey in July are pretty simple:
1. It sells papers, especially when you’re trying to fill “dead space” before the Lions’ training camp begins (after which point fans will spend five hours talking to WXYT about what Matthew Stafford had for breakfast);
2. The MSM has taken a page from the Wings’ blogosphere here in at least understanding that the Wings’ fan base is passionate enough that even a print media that’s been taught to treat hockey as the fourth-most-important beat can, again, sell papers and generate hits especially because Wings fans are both voracious in terms of gobbling coverage up and are very web-savvy;
3. McCosky’s trying to cement his reputation as both the DD captain and somebody who’s going to stir up shi, I mean stuff, every Sunday in the same manner that he did during his tenure on the Pistons’ beat. He’s very openly tried to start via-his-column fights with Babcock while trying to establish himself as the coach’s conscience/reality check, and he certainly seems to be just as willing to insist that he’s going to tell fans the “real story” and offer them a “realistic perspective,” at least in his opinion…
Even if that means ignoring, over the course of his Modano columns, for example, that signing Modano does not mean that the Wings will have to say goodbye to Helm and/or Abdelkader (fan favorites, of course, so why not stir shi, I mean stuff up by suggesting as much?) due to bumping up against the cap as the Wings can exceed the cap by as much as 10% all the way up until the last day of the exhibition season in late September, when anybody who isn’t a shi, I mean stuff-stirrer knows that they’d waive Ritola and possibly move Drew Miller if they had to clear cap space because there’s no way in hell that KH will get rid of Helm or Abby.
McCosky certainly makes a valid point in suggesting that Modano’s being thorough and examining his options as he decides whether he wants to play again, and he makes a valid point in suggesting that Red Wings Nation need not completely freak out because a player’s actually told the Wings to wait before he makes a decision—again, while ignoring the fact that yes, Mr. McCosky, a few players have asked for a day or five to decide what they wanted to do before, and pretending that Modano’s the first person to ever say “no” to the Red Wings instead—but McCosky does so while suggesting that fans’ points of view don’t matter, and that even if fans’ opinions do matter, anyone who dares to question Modano’s motives and motivations after he goes from saying, “It’s the Red Wings or bust” to intonating, “Well, let me see what the Wild have to offer me after they fly me to Minny and take me out to dinner, and maybe I’ll do that with the Sharks, too” is an idiot who’s drinking Red Wings Kool-Aid.
So McCosky manages to dare to question Mike Babcock’s infinite wisdom or the lack thereof and do so in such a way as to tell fans to not just not panic, but also to tell them that unless they think about Modano in a sympathetic light, they’re “being silly” instead of voicing valid opinions.
Is he conveniently ignoring a few facts here and there while stirring up crap to sell newspapers, generate web traffic, establish himself as the Conscience of Babcock, and formulating his, “Calm down, fans” message in such a way as to pull an Evil Drew Sharp and instead convey a, “Calm down, you morons, let me tell you how you should think” message?
Yup.
Did it work?
Yup.
Is this whole Modano business about massaging his ego as opposed to deciding whether he wants to play for a team that has a good chance of winning? We’re going to find out, and in the interim, I don’t think it’s proper for any member of the media, MSM or otherwise, to tell fans that not only should they not panic, but that they also aren’t allowed to hold certain opinions because they’re “being silly.”
Posted by George Malik from South Lyon, MI on 07/18/10 at 04:28 AM ET
I don’t know what to say about the bizarre about face, but I do know I disagreed with the first article (it didn’t fit with what we knew about the situation) and completely agree with the second.
So, I guess, for me, change is good.
Mike hasn’t said “No” to the Wings, he said something more along the lines of “I’m 40 and I’m not sure if I still want to play at all.” Modano doesn’t know what he wants to do, and that’s obviously ok with Ken Holland. In Kenny we trust.
Posted by monkey from here to Timbuktu on 07/18/10 at 06:46 AM ET
Posted by AndrewFromAnnArbor from Fortress Europe on 07/18/10 at 03:51 AM ET
pure gold.
Posted by Behind_Enemy_Lines from the Big House,January1,2013. already there bitches on 07/18/10 at 08:50 AM ET
he said something more along the lines of “I’m 40 and I’m not sure if I still want to play at all.” Modano doesn’t know what he wants to do, and that’s obviously ok with Ken Holland. In Kenny we trust.
Posted by monkey
We’ve been all over what he said and what they said, the whole time forgetting that we rarely get the whole story. I think the decision to play was made already, and what has yet to be decided is which team is offering the better place in management when he does retire.
Posted by HockeyTownTodd on 07/18/10 at 09:07 AM ET
“My hyprocricy only goes so far…......”. It appears my hypocrisy knows no bounds”. Doc Holliday.
Posted by MOWingsfan19 on 07/18/10 at 09:30 AM ET
If he doesn’t actively WANT to be a Wing, then we don’t WANT him.
It’s a shame there are so many people who apparently STILL don’t get this.
We’re not Chicago. We’re not Dallas. We’re not Long Island or Tampa. We’re the DETROIT RED WINGS. These kind of excuses for potential players are reserved for those other slob teams who just take whoever they can get… not for the Red Wings.
So while a team like LA is so desperate they’ll give Kovalchuk all offseason to decide and keep coming back to the negotiating table like a woman returning to the man who beats her all the time…. that’s not how the Wings roll. And as fans, that’s just not how we roll either.
Dig?
Posted by Primis on 07/18/10 at 11:01 AM ET
It’s a shame there are so many people who apparently STILL don’t get this.
Holland told him to take his time.
How is it that you don’t get THIS..?
Posted by HockeyTownTodd on 07/18/10 at 11:17 AM ET
Dig?
Posted by Primis on 07/18/10 at 12:01 PM ET
Totally. I’m sick of this whole fracking debacle. The circus surrounding this whole thing rubs me the wrong way. How hard can it be?
One way or the other. Yes, please. No, thank you. Bitches.
Lets Go Red Wings!!!!!
Posted by Kate from Pa.-made in Detroit on 07/18/10 at 12:28 PM ET
Well, that’s a little more reassuring to know that regardless if Modano signs with the Wings or not, Holland is negotiating with Helm and Abber anyways.
Posted by SYF from a "Bron-Y-Aur Stomp" on 07/18/10 at 12:54 PM ET
My five-year old nephew can now ride his bike without training wheels and has also learned how to shuck peas.
And I have adopted an abandoned bunny rabbit and made reservations to go on a real honest to goodness vacation in the UP at the end of the summer. 
We now return you to your regularly scheduled off-season hockey griping. 
Posted by Baroque from Michigan on 07/18/10 at 02:37 PM ET
uninformed voiceboxes of the biased
Did someone call for me?
Posted by MarkK from Maryland on 07/18/10 at 03:02 PM ET
And I have adopted an abandoned bunny rabbit and made reservations to go on a real honest to goodness vacation in the UP at the end of the summer.
Eh, it’s not a real honest-to-goodness UP vacation unless it involves swimming in Lake Superior right after Halloween, climbing Breakfast Roll in the ungodly pre-dawn gloom to watch the sun rise, and rowing across a lake up in the Porkies to go to a sauna with a bunch of naked hippies.
...
God, I hated my childhood.
Posted by AndrewFromAnnArbor from Fortress Europe on 07/18/10 at 03:31 PM ET
And yet, rabbit stew might have made it all worth it…if I hadn’t been raised vegetarian.
Still, congratulations to your nephew, Baroque—quite an achievement! My five year-old nephew will probably never be able to ride a bike, training wheels or not, due to a wonky optic nerver. His balance is still pretty terrible. I’ll get him on the pea-shucking posthaste.
Let us know when the nephew learns to fake to his backhand before switching up and shooting top-shelf blocker side.
Posted by AndrewFromAnnArbor from Fortress Europe on 07/18/10 at 03:35 PM ET
I think the decision to play was made already, and what has yet to be decided is which team is offering the better place in management when he does retire.
Posted by HockeyTownTodd
Definitely not Detroit then.
Posted by Osrt on 07/19/10 at 08:22 AM ET
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“Coming down too hard on McCosky? Maybe. But he’s a Digger now and coming down too hard on the DD’s is a staple too. So which is it Chris? Is it about the money, or not?”
Posted by stonehands-78 from the beginning ... a WingsFan, on 07/17/10 at 10:31 PM ET