BERGGREN OUT, DETROIT’S DECEMBER, & RED WINGS’ NEEDS – Winged Wheel Podcast – Dec. 18th, 2025

BERGGREN OUT, DETROIT’S DECEMBER, & RED WINGS’ NEEDS – Winged Wheel Podcast – Dec. 18th, 2025

Welcome to the Wing Wheel Podcast, the number one source for news, analysis, and discussion on the Detroit Red Wings, the NHL, and all things hockey. Here are your hosts, Ryan Hannah, Brad Krisco, and Evan Lopsinger. So when we started this podcast, the Red Wings made the playoffs, >> right? They were a playoff team. After that, they just lost to everybody. Then eventually the Red Wings would just lose very critical games to teams that they were trying to get into the playoffs against for many seasons. Now the Red Wings just lose to Western Conference teams. So, I would say this might be the best iteration of the Red Wings we’ve seen in almost 10 years. >> I hope this is some kind of like pendulum bell curve thing where they are just losing to fewer and fewer teams. It’d be nice. >> We’re going to have the same number of losses, but it’ll just be to Western Conference teams. The Atlantic and Metro Division record is going to be outstanding. I do think it’s exceptionally funny that they won the first game against the team that they couldn’t solve at all this season and the goalie they couldn’t solve at all this season and they lost to the team on a backto-back playing however many time zones across the country and that’s the one that Brad was at. Sorry Brad, I do feel bad for Hank, but I watched that game. I was like, “Yeah, of course they’re playing like this with you in the stands right now.” >> That’s okay. Hank’s entire experience was made before the game started cuz I kind of had a feeling that’s how that game was going to go. >> Yeah. >> Everybody thought the Islanders game was going to be the postroad trip hangover, you know, bit of a slog fest. Turns out they were just able to delay it by a day. That’s It was nice to see that they could score on Ilia Sroken and score like more than a couple times on Ilia Sroken. But yeah, you you watched that game yesterday and you’re like you don’t say it is what it is because I mean Utah would have had even more of an excuse to be tired, but one of those ones where you’re like, “All right, it is what it is.” >> The hangover hit in the afternoon. >> Much like the Red Wings, we’re also dealing with a little bit of the hangover. A couple of us are sick, one of us sleepd deprived. So bear with us this episode, but Evan’s going to carry. He told us they all >> get in my backpack. carry us up this mountain. >> Hard carry. All right, folks. Welcome to the Wing Wheel podcast. Here to talk to you about all things Detroit Red Wings hockey, the world of the NHL, and lots more. I’m one of your nasely hosts, Ryan Hannah. >> I’m Brad Krisco. >> And I’m Evan. >> On this episode of the Wing Bale Podcast, we are going to be recapping the two Red Wings games that have happened since last episode, the win over the Islanders and the loss against the Mammoth. And then we’re going to get into, you know, just how good of a start this is to December for the Red Wings and how far back you have to go before you find a start as good or better than this one. We’re going to get into the news of Jontan Barren leaving for the St. Louis Blues via waiverss as his time in Hockey Town comes to an end. And then we’re joined by Pashant Ayer to discuss a couple topics and ongoing discussion about the Quinn Hughes Simon Edmonson trade that never was saga. Pashant’s campaign for most cider to get more recognition not just for the Norris but potentially even more than that in his exceptional season and more. And then whatever else we get into before overtime very quickly. If you want to support the show and allow us to do everything that we do, patreon.com/wingedwheelpodcast. If you want to join the Dubdub club, you get access to benefits like our bonus overtime episodes which record right after these main ones. We let loose, we have fun, you get thoughts with Evan, you get the bloopers, the outtakes. It’s a really good time. You also get access to our Patreon exclusive Discord, which is a fantastic community, and you’re automatically entered into all of our giveaways. We give away two tickets to every Detroit Red Wings home game, for example, directly to our Patreon supporters. So again, patreon.com/wingedwheel podcast. All right, the Big Bad Islanders finally went down. I don’t know what it is with that team, but even at the start of the game, I was like, is this really going to happen again with Sroken just making up for any moment where the Islanders aren’t completely outplaying Detroit and they’re going to beat Detroit for, you know, yet another embarrassing loss, but third times a charm. Detroit hung on. They battled through the game until they they found a crack in the armor against Sroken and made no mistake about it to close it out. It was still a close affair. It was a 3-2 game and you know the Islanders came back and tied it 2-2 but Alex Dbrinket with the heroic goal game winner late in the game on the power play. His second goal of the game. It was a big relief in a game where you’re like, it doesn’t matter that you didn’t beat the Islanders at the end of the season because they’re not an Atlantic team and they’re not a rival. There’s no context here. But it like in a season where the Red Wings have had a couple weird teams have their number like the Islanders and the Sabres. You’re like, it’s just nice to know that they can beat these teams. Important win and one that was honestly kind of unexpected for me. >> Yeah, we’ve seen a lot of talk prior to the game about the post roadtrip hangover and this game feels like a trap game and everybody wasn’t wrong, they were just early. But it was an interesting dichotomy between the two games because I I would still argue for long stretches of both games. The Red Wings did look like they had that hangover and it did feel like the trap game and a lot of guys weren’t clicking, a lot of guys weren’t going. But sometimes in a game like that, you just need your key players to make something happen. you know, Sandine Pelica pulls a goal out of nowhere to tie the game in the third and then obviously De Brinket decides that all right, it’s my time to shine, steps up, gets a couple huge goals and that was the difference in the game. Not that the Islanders or the Red Wings massively outplayed each other in either way, but it just didn’t feel like a crisp game from either team, but the Red Wings key players stepped up a little bit more than the Islanders. And in the Utah game, conversely, those guys were quiet. >> Didn’t notice them all night of the Red Wings big guns. It felt like Cider was the only one who had a good game. But it’s a National Hockey League. If you can keep it close, >> and you got someone who can shoot the puck like Brinket sometimes. That’s all you need. Yeah, I think we’ll get to the the Mammoth game, but I agree that it felt like a tired game against the Mammoth because it was like all of the Red Wings best players felt like had a really off night. Whenever that happens, you’re like, well, it’s not like everyone lost their talent overnight, so likely this team is just a little bit belleaguered. But going to the Islanders game, Detroit was actually down one- nothing heading into the third period. There was just the one goal from Heinman through the first two periods. And you were sitting there wondering, is Sroken just going to be Siroken yet again? Is this like a Vaselki type where very rarely do you put a lot past this guy? First goal of the game, Axel Sandine Pelica, his fourth of the season. I think it was just Lucas Raymond on the assist. But that was a kind of a sneaky filthy little goal. Like that’s a a confident offensive player. And we’ve talked how many episodes in a row now of Axel, Cindy, and Pelica activating offensively, his his confidence in that part of his game shining through more and more. And you can see why people have been excited about ASP. He’s been fun to watch, man. And that was just a that was a guy who knows exactly how good he is offensively, stepping in and making that confident like just he practically picked that puck up and just gently placed it above the goalie shoulder. >> It’s a tough angle shot for him too, right? like he’s a righty so he his stick’s almost on the goal line and he’s able to roof it above Siroken’s shoulder like he misses that spot that puck’s in either in the 14th row or it’s going around it’s a breakout pass for the Islanders. So we’re really watching ASP’s confidence grow and grow every game. That’s that type of goal you don’t usually see a lot of rookie NHL players making and you definitely don’t see a lot of NHL rookie defenseman make. >> He’s feeling it like he’s there’s a a lot of people who wrote ASP off too early. It’s like first 30 games of a defenseman whose defense isn’t like the absolute calling card of his game. Not that it’s bad, but he’s an offensive defenseman. Like that’s what he will be when he pans out and is, you know, more of a force in this league. But people wrote him off after the first 30 games cuz he had his struggles that were expected for a guy of his size, his kind of play type, his strength at this age. And it’s like, I don’t know how many times you need to see young star players come through the league and go through the normal paces before we stop writing people off like this. And it’s I mean the timing of it is funny when he was included in most mock trades for Quinn Hughes, but it does feel a little bit like oh okay you want to get rid of me that that you know easily. I’ll show you exactly why the Red Wings have been excited to have me in their system this entire time. So great for Detroit especially if they add another dynamic offensive element consistently from their back end. Alex Debrink scores his 19th of the season. Later on the power play from Cider and Raymond. Another kind of like clinical power play goal where the the puck was moving really well which was impressive cuz no Patrick Kane this game. John Leonard was called up from Grand Rapids which we’ll talk about in a little bit. But really good puck movement and Debrink makes no mistake firing that puck home. For my money the hottest stick in the NHL right now. And it looks like the Red Wings are really benefiting from not just, you know, their their topline players, but Alex Debrink continues to make a another push for Team USA late in the game here. He scores his 19th. Scott Mayfield ties it up 2-2 and then late in the game to break it again from Cider and Raymond scores his 20th of the season. first Redwing to 20 and beats Siroken on a play where, you know, a little bit of a scramble play for Sroken, but late game heroics and Cat has been absolutely unreal. >> One of, if not the leading American goal scorers in the NHL, when you talk about, you know, his bid to make the the US team, like he is riding a a hot stick now. And imagine where he’d be if he didn’t have the the atrociously cold start he had to the season. Like we could be talking leading the league in goals right now. Like he’s taken his game to yet another level. And it’s not like he’s getting lucky goals or whatnot. It’s all just purely based on hard work and just elite level skill. Yeah. Unfortunately for him, one of the other players he’s competing against in terms of like, you know, guys who weren’t necessarily considered locks, although I think Robertson is by now, but he’s tied with Robertson to be tied for fourth in league scoring. But hey, he’s on the first page of NHL leading goal scorers for Red Wings and for Alex Debrinka like, you know, a race seven games and he is one of the hottest players in the NHL. >> Yeah. And that winning goal, I saw Islanders fans trying to blame Siroken for that goal. He literally put that puck on a second opportunity cuz I think it was Pulock had a good first shot block on it. Literally could just fit the puck. I I think if the puck’s a quarter of an inch taller, that doesn’t go in. Like it was an insane shot. I think I saw an angle where it looked like there was an initial deflection off an island or like a small redirect as well. It might have I think I think it actually was Pulock was still reaching in there a bit but even so just the not catch and release but the first shots blocked. Okay, just grab it and just unload it again. It’s hard for Seroki like it’s hard to reset like do those micro resets for goalies like he was expecting a shot it gets blocked. He’s obviously thankful for that but now he’s got to reset and get that angle again and he’s got fortunately has Alex de Brinka taking that second shot again. So I mean Debrinka beat him fair and square like can’t blame that on Siroken. Like that was just a a perfect shot. >> Siroken kept them in that game for a good portion of it too. So, it’s not like the Red Wings, you know, unloaded 40 shots on them. The shots were 2118. Neither goalender came out with a phenomenal save percentage, but still. So, Detroit beats their Demons. They beat the Islanders. And again, Cat hits 20 goals on the season. First Red Wing to do it as of now. So, after the Mammoth game, 47 goal pace. You know how he didn’t score for his first eight games? Since then, he is scoring at a 61 goal pace. That’s pretty good. >> It’s not bad. I I understand like, you know, every good goal scorer is going to have stretches where he’s going to be scoring at like uh 55, 60, 70 goal pace for like, you know, small sample size, but 27 games to be scoring at that pace is a pretty decent sample size there. I’m not saying Cass’s going to hit 50 or 60 goals, but he’s on a 47 goal pace right now and the puck is going in. you like it is a special thing when your team has a guy who is just in that flow state and Red Wings have that advantage. Lucas Raymond a casual three assists that game. Moder with another couple assists again. Axel and Dean Pelico with a really filthy little tuck there and it was a feel-good game for the Red Wings in the end. So another night where after the game they are at the top of the Atlantic saying that more than halfway through December was a very surreal thing. Like this is no longer haha we’re just posting this while we can enjoy it. This is oh th this is a real thing and the Red Wings are up amongst the teams that are making it with a significant amount of the season played heading into the Mammoth game. the Mammoth on the road road road trip travel, you know, a a physical game the night before. We were like, “Okay, this should be the one that the Red Wings win.” And just didn’t shake out that way. 4-1 loss. Not a lot going right for Detroit. As we alluded to before, it was a game full of miscues, mistakes. I thought the offense looked disjointed and sloppy. The power play really looked like it was missing Patrick Kane compared to the first game. It was the Red Wings best players I felt had a really tough game. Everyone from Edmonson to Raymond to Lurin to I know you said you know had a good game but even moments cider Talbot really struggled in net compared to Gibson the night before who won his sixth straight start. Like it was just one of those efforts where you’re like okay execution was bad all around. You’re not excusing anything, but whatever it is ailing the entire team, try to minimize that. You understand if it happens on the second half of a backtoback, you’re at home, the other team is also, you know, has the same conditions against them. So, it’s not the best excuse in the world, but the whole team looked off last night. Utah didn’t look good either, and I don’t know if that makes it better or worse for the Red Wings. I think that’s where goalending made the difference. Yeah, Vamela had a hell of a game. And actually, one small thing about Vamela is his puck handling completely completely ruined the Red Wing stump and chase. They never got close to recovering a puck cuz he was starting the breakout before the defenseman even got there a bunch of the time. And yeah, it was disjointed is probably the best word I can use to describe the Red Wings that game. They were mentally just making a ton of mistakes, not seeing things, you know, 10-ft passes they’re putting into the feet of their teammate. I remember, and this is maybe the moment I knew the game was lost. There was a scramble draw on a power play that kicked out to Raymond who was like on the high side of the circle but towards the front of the net like prime shooting area and the Utah winger just completely went to the wrong spot. I think he was diving into the circle or something. I didn’t see where he went, but to maybe help out on a scrambled draw and Raymond was just wide open for an A+ chance. Turned around and fed it to Sedra at the point and I’m like, yeah, he’s just not mentally there. And Larkin made a couple of similar passes and just at no point in that whole game did it ever look like the Red Wings felt comfortable doing almost literally anything. like puck on their stick. They were a disaster. You wonder if it’s like the lack of practice and the travel and, you know, whatever it might be. Like there’s an accumulation effect there, which is why it takes a while to manifest in how the team plays, but eventually you do see the effects of it. You’re never going to be able to pin like the exact math of like, okay, that game’s going to be bad because they had, you know, this amount of travel and that amount of games played before. It’s it’s a very human sport and sometimes the guys just don’t have it. And they’ve won games like this where it wasn’t, you know, Vamela on the other side and Gibson or Talbot had a better game for Detroit, but still it was all of them. Like it was all of Detroit’s best players and just silly mistakes. Even like, you know, the first goal, I think it was, Edmonson had the great breakin and the puck kind of got fired back the other way and as happens a lot for the Red Wings, like you know, you make a bad play offensively after a good play offensively and then the other team gets a break going the other way and then Edmonson with a little bit of a baby giraffe moment coming back and kind of scrambling to get back in position, skates past the puck, misses the coverage and Utah just bangs it home. When Detroit looks bad, it’s the other team is left kind of unbothered, unabated in the high danger areas, in the slot, and they just bang home rebounds or or get really clean looks on a struggling Detroit goalender. Like, that’s almost a universal this season what it looks like when Detroit’s struggling. >> For me, it was just an an execution game. like whether it’s executing a game plan, e, executing assignments like in the the the play you just described, like I don’t think he expected Cam Tablet to kick out a goal line shot to the middle of the ice. Fair, but it happened and you got to be looking over your shoulder to see. Yeah, there’s one of the best players on Utah in the slot. You got to you got to cover him. It they’re miss they missed Patrick Kane big time on the power play last night. And I know they still got one on the power play from from Finny, but everything was just very disjointed. Execution was off. It’s one of those games where it’s like, all right, we just need a light skate the next day. Just reset a little bit. You know, gentle reminders that you can shoot the puck when you’ve got it in the home plate area. Just >> unless >> sometimes you just need those sort of like mental >> Yeah. >> Just reset the switch a little bit. Unless you’re Michael Rasmmanson with the puck in the home plate area and you’ve got Dylan Larkin on the back door. Oh my god. I think I texted in the chat saying, “Did Ras just look off Larkin on a twoon-one just to miss the net on like it was one of those moments too where the angle he was coming in on that twoon-one was directly in my line of sight. So you you had a really good angle as to what he could see. He was shooting at nothing. There was nothing there. Like that was the worst shot selection he could have picked. >> He was actually just dumping the puck in to establish the for check. >> Honestly, it kind of looked like it. >> The company man right there. >> Yeah. >> Anyhow, it it wasn’t like that was one play. The whole team looked bad. Detroit loses 4-1 and it was a a small, you know, mark against what’s been a really great December for them, which is what I want to talk about now. But very quickly for more context, John Leonard was called up as we mentioned before. Patrick Kade upper body injury. He was announced that he’s day to day, but would be missing those two games against the Islanders in the Mammoth. So, Leonard, who was the leading scorer point scorer for the Grand Rapids Griffins, one of the leading point scorers in the entire NHL, rewarded for a fantastic first chunk of the season. And, you know, credit to a lot of the listeners and patrons and and Grand Rapids Griffins fans who have been like, why aren’t you talking about John Leonard more? And Leonard to that point had played like, I think 60ish games in the NHL, 17 or so points. And we always said like, yeah, he might get a look depending on, you know, injury and the depth, but he seems like one of those guys where you bring him up for a few games when you need to and send him down when you need to. And he might still be that player in the end, but they brought him up to to replace Patrick Haynes spot for those two games, which had implications we’re going to talk about on the other side of the break about Yante Barren, but credit to him. They trusted his offensive ability, his playmaking ability, and what he’d been doing in Grand Rapids. And it was cool to see him rewarded. I thought that was a really nice kind of moment to show how great things have been in Grand Rapids, and how big of a part of that Leonard has been. Leonard actually got his first Red Wings point on the goal from EMTT Finny. The only goal last night for the Red Wings. Power play goal, as Brad said, a little bit disjointed. Andrew Cop did some great work down low. Literally down low on his hands and knees. Had an almost hand pass that Utah I think smartly decided not to challenge. Went to John Leonard who was a little bit surprised that the puck came to him. Stumbled, fired it to Finny and Finny buried it. But yeah, I I thought that was cool for John Leonard. Nice moment there. Yeah, if you want to have a good culture and a good organization, you got to reward the guys who deserve it. And not that John Leonard looked like anything special last night. Not that he’s ever going to be a huge point scorer in the NHL. When you have the type of season he’s had, yeah, you want to give the guy his flowers. And if that’s two, three, four, five, six games up with the big team, depending on injury, maybe more, you got to do it cuz players in both rooms know when stuff is happening that shouldn’t. And I don’t know if there’s many players in the Grand Rapids room who would say, “Yeah, that guy isn’t the first call up if something happens. >> He he absolutely earned it.” >> Has more points than his brother in this season. So, >> we won’t we won’t look at what leagues those points have been accumulated in, but he is clearly the superior brother. >> Healthier, too. >> Yes. >> That’s That’s a tough That’s That’s not even nice of me to say. He just got He got drilled. >> You make those mistakes once. >> That’s right. The Red Wings in December are 62 and one if my math is right and they have 13 points. I was very careful to only call out how good December was going when they reached a certain amount of points. The last time they reached more than 12 points, so they reached 13 points or more in an entire month of December was 10 years ago >> in 2015. >> Oh my god. >> The Red Wings still have six games left to play. When I first raised this, they they reached 13 points with seven games left to play. Obviously, the Mammoth lost last night, went off the board there, but 2015 was the last time they had more than 12 points in a month. And Detroit has that, you know, through 18 days in December so far. Still six games to play. Six very tough games. A quick look ahead here. It is a atrocious schedule. You have Washington home and home starting in Washington. Both of them matinea games. You have Dallas at home. You have Carolina on the road. So that’s already two very tough teams there. You have the Leafs. And then you have Winnipeg Jets on New Year’s Eve. So it’s not going to be an easy task, but Detroit so far is still already doing things that they have not done since, as Evan mentioned at the top of the show, the beginning of this podcast, 10 years. And depending on how many more points they can stack, you can be going back as far as, you know, 2009, 2008 even. But even if they lose out the rest of the month, this is still their best December in 10 years. That’s how good things have been. >> Or is that how bad things have been? >> Both. Everyone’s response to this was, “This is both awesome and extremely sad. >> We survived.” >> I still don’t know how. >> I don’t know either. That’s that is a pathetic amount of points. >> Do you think the Red Wings are basically the Grinch and for years and years and years they hated Christmas, but now their heart. Okay. From 2015 to now, how many season, not counting 2015 because we know they they finished well that month. How many of those years did they have north of a 500 points percentage between 2015 and this year? >> Like in December? >> Yeah, in December. >> One. >> None. I was going to say I’d be surprised if it wasn’t zero. >> I just said one because I had a feeling it was zero. >> The only reason I thought it might not be zero is like was there a co year where they only played like two games or something? >> There was a year where they played no games in December. So 2016 462 a 500 points percentage in 2017 375 250 didn’t play 44462 367 429 >> Did you say 250? >> I sure did in 2019 they went 39 and0. >> I feel like you’ve just you know those teams that they’re like oh they’re hard to play against but they’re actually just bad. It’s like I feel like you could have just been one of those teams and probably got better than that. >> This is the silliest thing I can say because I know you won’t do it, but go back and listen to what we were saying back then. Maybe that’s what we were asking them to do. >> Regardless, you know, it’s not just a Brinket scoring at an insane pace and making another case for Team USA. It’s not just, you know, Lucas Raymond stacking up a casual three assists. It’s not just the John Gibson sixgame win streak. It’s the entire Red Wings team right now is finding ways to win. And if you need more proof that this team is meaningfully different than previous seasons, like the proof is in the pudding. They still have to put it all together. We’ve seen them fall from greater heights than this. The Atlantic and the East is extremely tight, but so far by every measure, they are better this year than they have been in the past. All right, we’re going to take a quick break and when we’re back, we’re going to talk to you about Yantimon Bergrren. First a word from our sponsors back after this. Let’s be honest, bad coffee should be worthy of a major penalty in a game misconduct. If you’re still drinking burnt, stale stuff out of a giant plastic tub, I’m telling you, it’s time to upgrade. Coffee cult, that’s the real deal. 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You get to try new coffee and it’s not another pair of socks. That’s coffeeults.com code WWP. Go get the good stuff. Farewell Johnny Burgers. It was fun. >> We’ll miss his boat. >> Poor guy bought a boat. That was one of the funniest things. I don’t know why it was so unreasonable in my mind, but I’m like, why did Barren buy a boat? Not that it was a a stupid decision. I mean, if I was making millions, I’d probably do something like that, too. But I was like, it just it didn’t mesh in my brain. I was like, Barren doesn’t really scream boat guy to me. >> He doesn’t strike me as a guy on like a Saturday morning. He’s got the the back of the boat open, you know, with a with a wrench fixing things type of guy. doesn’t really scream morning guy in general. >> No, he’s he’s got zooi energy. >> Didn’t Gustoson call him out saying it wasn’t even his boat? >> About half a boat, >> right? >> Half a boat. >> Bought it with a friend. >> And then someone asked him if it was a fishing boat and he’s just like, “No, I’m scared of fish.” >> Honestly, one of the goofiest, most likable dudes, personal interactions with him, like you only need to meet the guy once before you like you understand why he’s so liked in the dressing room. So long and short of it, you know, if you’re wondering why it was Leonard who got that opportunity on the second line, Barren the kind of the writing was on the wall by that point. We had heard earlier in the season that Bergrren was interested in leaving the Red Wings if he didn’t get a bigger opportunity and as the season has gone on and he hasn’t stuck, that kind of noise grew more and more. Heard that he had, you know, a request to to find another team. Obviously, you know, you can put this together on your own, but I do believe Steve Eisman shopped him around. That situation wasn’t found for Barren. They placed him on waiverss and unsurprisingly, a player of his offensive ability, a team’s going to take a flyer on him, and the St. Louis Blues claimed him, which ends his time in Detroit. So, just a a small bit here on Berrren. You know, I I kind of come in the middle of a lot of, if you read the responses to, you know, a post about Barren getting waved or claimed. I fall somewhere in the middle of people saying, you know, he can’t do anything and he was like useless as a depth player and just, you know, isn’t an NHL guy. And then there’s people who say, no, no, he just needs one more chance or if he just gave him like topline minutes or whatever it might be with better offensive players. I think he’s a guy with real offensive talent like NHL level offensive ability. I think you you can always break down his like per 60 stats and then consider who his center have been and you know understanding he’s not a guy who can drive a line and if he’s had you know poorly offensive aligned centerman it it just was never going to go well. I think that’s all well and good. It just, you know, like there are certain elements of the game where you have to be able to play off the puck or play within a system or at least, you know, 150 feet of the ice a little bit better and that just never really stuck for Bergen, even though he did see progress. So, I don’t think he he found a spot in this team in a concrete way. And I don’t really know that I would have made any different decisions if I was any of the previous Red Wings coaches or current Red Wings staff. But I do believe he has the tools in him to potentially I don’t know if I bet on it, but potentially stick in a bigger way in a fresh opportunity. >> Yeah. Like he was the classic case of not well-rounded enough to hang in the top six, but not defensively good enough to hang in the bottom six. So, he was kind of the word misfit is not a nice way of putting it, but he kind of just never found his spot with the organization. And it’s unfortunate because then he goes down to Grand Rapids as a good a a good team player, lights the AHL up. They’re like, “All right, he’s coming back up full of confidence. This is the moment.” And it just never really came to fruition. So it I think everyone was well aware that this moment was coming, whether it was via trade or via the waivers. So the fact that he gets another opportunity somewhere else. Hopefully he can get into a good spot there, it just never really the the spot never really materialized in Detroit. >> I am curious what the trickle down effect of this is going to be because again as Ryan’s talked about this just felt like a favor toren more than anything else. I don’t think anybody in the organization hated him but he like Evan said he just didn’t really fit anywhere in the lineup. Now with him gone, that’s why you have Leonard up, but the Griffins are so damn good. You don’t want Leonard up the whole season. >> And you have Kane and Appleton injured. >> Yeah. And so the the depth takes a bit of a hit. And we’ve seen the Red Wings utilize, you know, the guys who have been in and out of the lineup, Sod Blan, Bergen, whoever, a lot because of injuries throughout the year. So there will be some ramifications for this. But again, we talk about the culture of the organization and why little things like this matter because the Red Wings could have easily said, “We need the depth. You’re going to play one of every five games and it is what it is.” But he’s been in the organization for seven years. They knew he wasn’t going to get a chance. Not fair to a guy to just sit there and sit there and sit there and sit there. So, St. Louis is not a good team this year. Maybe he gets more of a chance there. Not that I’m expecting him to pop off for 50 or 60 points, but if he can stick on their third line, that could turn his whole career around. And in the future, other players will see, okay, yeah, this was a bad situation that the organization handled well. They didn’t sewer the guy. They gave him a chance. And again, it’s it’s not any one of these little instances matter that much, but they stack up over time. And that’s how your organization gets a reputation, good or bad. And yeah, it suck. The real losers here though are the Red Wings social admin team because he was gold man. >> Their depth has dropped significantly because of the his departure. >> Every hilarious social media post that they’ve had or video that they’ve done, I’m pretty sure 90% of them have been surrounded around Barren. One of my favorite quotes of all time. Did you ever see the one with him and Valeno and it’s just Barren in the background? He eats with his hands like a gorilla. >> Yes. Oh, he’s such a funny dude, man. He’s like perpetually just got like zoomy little toddler energy. So like that that’s a dude I really do wish him the best in St. Louis. And I mean you know no matter what you think of him I think you can agree that like that’s a guy who still has the offensive tools in one way or another. And so if you can make it stick in a team that needs different things for example or it really like everyone knows sometimes you just need a fresh start you know you’re a different person in a different job sometimes and if that’s where his heart was set and that’s what the Red Wings wanted as well it seems like it could be a win-win all around. You’re not happy to see you know the Red Wings lose a player for nothing but that’s the reality of the NHL. You’re also not happy to see two first round picks, two second round picks, three third round picks, a fourth round pick, a sixth round pick, and a seventh round pick turn into absolutely nothing for the Red Wings, which is what the 2018 draft class was. Ken Holland, and Tyler Wright’s final masterpiece with the Red Wings. Zadina, Valeno, Bear, McKisac, Regula, Barton, Elias, O’Reilly, Bratstrom, and Kevin Mackey all turned into zero current full-time NHLers for the Detroit Red Wings. Ryan O’Reilly won a Stanley Cup. >> You’re going to trip people up with that. A different Ryan O’Reilly. >> That’ be quite the center depth the Red Wings would have if they had Ryan O’Reilly. >> I wish it was that Ryan O’Reilly, but it’s unfortunately a different Ryan O’Reilly. A good amount of games played. You know, Zadena played 260 odd games. Valenos’s played 334 in counting. Bear has played 170. Regula’s played 42. But that draft class, it cannot be emphasized enough just how bad that was for the Red Wings long-term outlook. The 16, 17, 18 draft stacked on top of each other. It if anybody really truly wants to know why the rebuild took so long, that’s why I buy the Ken Holland it’s 10 years to rebuild quote. The reason I don’t buy that is when you whiff that badly three drafts in a row, that is three years your organization is not progressing in a rebuild because rebuild is centered around prospects. Yeah, it takes 10 years for you and you keep hiring Tyler Wright. This is a question pose a little poll for the fans. Who was who was screwed over harder? who was, you know, derailed further in terms of impact on their team. The Red Wings by taking Zadina over Hughes that year or the same Holland Wright combo going to Edmonton taking Borgo over Walstead. I think it’s Edmonton because they’ve got the best player in the world and their problems seem so obvious to me and the solution was literally in their fingertips if they if they so decided. But it selfishly seeing Quinn Hughes and seeing how catastrophic the Philip Zadina experiment was. I think the answer is both. >> Here’s where I’ll be generous to the Ken Holland era. I’m going to say the Oilers one was worse because like Evan said, the need was so painfully obvious at the time for the Oilers. Everybody just assumed they were going to take one of the goalies if one of the goalies got there and then to trade out of it. At least with 2018, Holland and Wright can fall back on the Zadena fell to six. That felt like the obvious pick at the time. Valeno fell to 30. That felt like an obvious pick at the time. Even Barren was a firstround prospect in a lot of public rankings. So him still being there in the second round felt like a somewhat obvious pick. Now it’s their job to know better than the general public, but none of them were seemingly bad picks at the time. Every Red Wings fan was hyped after the first two rounds. the Oilers situation was so frigin obvious. >> So you’re trying to outsmart, you know, logic and reason there. It was so obvious that they were like, “No, no, this is a trap. We need >> We need another potential scoring winger. That will solve our problems.” >> You know, we’ve gone to the queue and missed a player we should have taken because we took a a you know, fake highscoring player from the queue before. It hasn’t worked for us the first 10 times, but maybe number 11. This is the one. >> That is the end of the 2018 draft class in Detroit. And >> not even an asset to show for it in trade return cuz what was it? Perlini was the return on Regula. So that even ended up being nothing. >> Yeah, I don’t know. Well, I don’t know. What did Valeno turn into? Is you can go like far down some trade trees. I’m sure you can find something. But all in all, >> well, I guess Valeno’s in the John Gibson trade tree a little bit cuz technically Morazzic was in that deal. Still, like that is a it’s a big fat zero at the end of the day on the scoreboard. So, farewell Johnny Burgers. Best of luck. Okay, right now we’re going to jump into a conversation with our good friend Pashant Thy, our local analytics guru, host of Expected by Whom, and Wing Real Podcast contributor to talk not just potential Quinn Hughes deal that never was, but also Moider and more. So back after this. Well, Pashant, your prediction is that people are going to be upset after hearing our conversation. And I don’t know necessarily that that’s true, but definitely based on the discourse, I imagine people are going to be passionate after they hear, you know, our discussion on the whole Quinn Hughes saga. So, are you ready for this? You know, I think I’m as ready as I can be for a conversation like this. I I think I’ll just steer very clear into the sad stats moniker that I have obtained and just come up with another dissenting opinion that people need to be mad about. Well, that was the thing is, you know, we we talked about it, you know, when he was got traded to Minnesota and our takes on, you know, the the value of the deal for Minnesota and Vancouver and what the equivalent deal would have been for Detroit based on, you know, what we’ve heard from the situation and just doing some rough math and, you know, I thought it was a good discussion, but I also looked at the conversation we were having in our group chat and I felt your opinion was poignant and not necessarily represented in that previous discussion on the main show and I was like, well, let’s let’s get a a diversity of opinions here and really flesh this thing out because this is a big one. Like Quinn Hughes going to Minnesota is a big one and I think it’s important to dissect this from especially from a Red Wings perspective in terms of would this have been worth it. So, let’s just jump right into it. Obviously, I’m joined here by Pashant, Wing Wheel podcast, contributor, host of Expected by Whom. And Pashant Quinn Hughes being traded to Minnesota obviously was a shock, but what was your initial reaction on the value that Vancouver got in terms of Ze Buouham and the pieces that they added in exchange for Quinn Hughes? Yeah, when you consider the situation where essentially it seemed like from everybody’s perspective, Quinn Hughes moving was a foregone conclusion, you have to be impressed to a certain extent of what Vancouver was able to recoup. Um, particularly knowing that it wasn’t a scenario where you could just sign Hughes and then deal him immediately, similar to what, you know, Carolina was able to do with Nico Rottman at at the deadline last year. This was a scenario where a team is going to have to make a move for Hughes, be unable to sign him to an extension because he’s not eligible to to sign one till the following year. They really have enough assets to pony up for a 26-year-old Norris Trophy winning defenseman. So, when you look at what the Conucks were able to get back and and Buen, who’s not really the the piece, I think Marco Rossy is doesn’t get enough credit for how talented of a player he is, but he he’s essentially a 60point, you know, player already. Whether or not you believe he can stick at center, move over to the wing, I think you you’ve got really good pieces. You got an established middle six, potentially top six forward in Marco Rossi. You got arguably a a top two at at best, maybe top four at worst defenseman in Bouam, a wild card in Ogran, although I don’t think he’s going to amount to much at the NHL level. And then you were able to pick up a first round pick as well. So overall from Vancouver’s perspective, you added pieces that help you contend today. You add pieces that’ll develop into potential star players if all works well in Buou and you added a wild card in Ogrren who maybe you know pans out into something over in Vancouver and with the change of scenery. So all that being said, I think Vancouver did about as well as you can knowing that you are giving up the best player in that trade. So, what’s the equivalent trade in your mind that the Red Wings would have made? Because by all accounts, Minnesota was far and above everyone else nearly in terms of the the quality and the level of their offer. So, what would an equivalent be from Steve Eisermanman and the Red Wings in your mind? Not counting, you know, any indication that the Red Wings want to make Edmonson untouchable in this. Let’s put that aside for now. >> Yeah. So from that perspective, if you’re trying to just keep all the pieces the exact same in terms of the position, there’s not really an equivalent deal. You don’t have an NHL forward of Marco Rossy’s caliber that you’re willing to move. You have better and you have worse, but you don’t have in that same tier that you’d be willing to move. And then similarly on defense, you don’t have a left shot defenseman outside of Edmonson that you know again is in that Bull tier. And I think that’s still giving a lot of credit to Boo because he has more time to develop to really reach the levels that we’re starting to see Edmonson reach right now. So if you keep all of that the same, I don’t think there’s an equivalent deal that Detroit makes if you’re talking about NHL middle six forward, potentially top six forward, potential top two left shot defenseman, potential, you know, winger in Ogran that can play at the NHL level and a first round pick. I don’t think you have a comparable deal in terms of apples to apples where I do think Detroit had opport you know had a potential to make things comparable is either one you you know you make your centerpiece Simon Edmonson and this has been a hot button topic but you know if you center a deal around Edmonson what does that do in terms of lowering the cost I think people would be fair to say that of all the players that we just talked about that Vancouver got from Minnesota Edmonson would still be you know probably the best player in that deal ahead of Marco Rossi right now. Now, we don’t know what William’s going to become, but right now I think most would say Simon Edmonson’s a better player. So, arguably the rest of the deal looks a little bit cheaper from Detroit’s perspective. The other path forward if you again were going to be adamant about not moving Edmonson is is there a way to make up value with your goalenders? And now Detroit is in a unique position where while the NHL team seems like it’s struggling to find consistent goalending year after year. You have arguably the top two goalending prospects in hockey right now and Sebastian Kosa who seems to just get a shut out every single time he plays right now for Grand Rapids. And then Trey Austin Augustine at Michigan State who will likely be, you know, with Grand Rapids potentially, you know, next year. So you have two guys that are not far away from being NHL ready right there that are arguably the two best goalie prospects in the league. That’s potentially another way to to make up value. Again, we don’t know what Vancouver really wanted and if the the pressing move was getting a left shot defenseman more than getting a goalending prospect and so that certainly could have dictated what happened here. But I think those were the two ways Detroit could have come up to equivalent value even if it’s not the same positions. So the debate we were having in the the group chat was okay valuewise do you pull the trigger if it’s anywhere close to the reported ask or you know even drawing as close to an equivalent as you you could considering what you just said in terms of you know you’re never going to make it perfectly even in terms of a comparison to the Bouham deal but do you still pull that trigger if it’s you know Edmonson one of Casper Danielson the first round pick and then you can go on the lower end of a you know Bachelnikov even Lombardi Maser maybe or you can go on the higher end of an MBN or a Bear for the the winger equivalent there. Do you make that deal? And I know you were saying before you did some some homework before this guest spot in terms of how that would affect the Red Wings in their projections this season. >> Yeah. You know, I think before tackling that specific question, I think it’s really important to lay out how people make choices and how people make decisions when it comes to evaluating a trade like this in isolation. It’s very difficult to talk about all the different pieces to this, but what this calculation amounts to is risk tolerance and projections and and and really what’s your level of certainty. So, when I look at a deal like this that potentially would include Simon Edmonson, there’s a few things that I’m considering. First and foremost is what’s my timeline for contending? And this has been probably the most contentious thing for a lot of people over the last really season and a half. Are you contending right now when you have Alex Dbrinket on his current contract that expires at the end of next season? So, you have him for the rest of this year and then you have him next year and then he’s a free agent. Are you trying to contend with Patrick Kane on the roster? Are you trying to contend with Dylan Lin, you know, in the midst of his, you know, 8-year deal with the Wings approaching 29 years of age? Is this is this the window that you’re trying to compete? Are you trying to compete in the next 1 to 3 years or are you looking to compete when Morett Cider is in the 26 27 range when Lucas Raymond is in that 25 26 range? essentially the 3 to 5 years from now because how you view that I think ultimately dictates how you like your level of risk tolerance in a deal like this. And so from my perspective I think it makes a lot of sense to try and contend with Dylan Lark and Alex de Brinkat on you know both on the roster both under contract right now and make a push to get yourself into the playoffs. And the reason I think that that’s so important right now is one, you know, Larkin is approaching the the point in time where we know players now start to show depreciation from really their peak value. I think he’s playing the best hockey of his career. I think Alex de Brinket is playing the best hockey of his career, 28 and 29, respectively. I think with those two guys, you’re you’re now looking that they’re probably going to see marginal decreases in their level of performance over the next three years. But right now, over the next three years, you probably have them at 90 to 95% of peak value. And so that’s a huge opportunity to maximize what the contributions you’re getting from them. I think you’re seeing Lucas Raymond and Mort becoming elite elite players. I’ve made a case that Morsider deserves heart trophy votes for MVP. I think Lucas Raymond is one of the top 10 wingers in the NHL. You already have guys there. What you’re really lacking right now is another elite player that can balance out your defense. And so from my perspective, Simon Edmonson is a great player. He’s a he’s a very very good, if not borderline great player at this point in time in his career. Do I think he gets to the Quinn Hughes level? I don’t know. I think there’s certainly a range of outcomes where he potentially gets there. But from my perspective and my kind of assessment, I’m thinking that the likelihood of him ending up in that tier or even the most cider tier is less than 25%. And so now I’m left with, do I have a player that is capable of driving a pair away from most cider? Because as good as that pair has been, we’ve talked at length also about how bad the rest of Detroit’s defense has been. How many goals are given up when Morett Cider is not on the ice. When you look at that, you have to find a way to start winning minutes, you know, away from those. And Cider’s obviously demonstrated his ability to drive a pairing. Can Edmonson do that? Can he do it right now? Can he do it in the next two to three years? I don’t know the answer to that, but I know Quinn Hughes can. And so if I’m taking the perspective that I would like to compete in the next 1 to 3 years, I think your best move is using, you know, people who may get to that level but are not currently there to ultimately push yourself into that bracket. And then the last piece that I really kind of think about with all of this is in some ways you have to improve your team enough to one show free agents that you’re willing to make the moves necessary to make your team better and two to really improve your standing as a destination. I think we’ve talked about this in the past and I can’t remember when exactly this conversation was, but essentially you have to you have to get good enough to start getting the good players more often to come to you. It’s a little hard to out of the blue moon win these, you know, free agent sweep stakes or trade battles, but right now Detroit’s in a position with a deep prospect pool, deep number of picks available. They have all of their picks and now you’re looking at I’ve got four elite players. How can I add to, you know, another elite player here that can help balance out my defensive group, make everybody around him better, and now I could potentially run for 45, 50 minutes a night, one of Moritider or Quinn Hughes on the ice. Um, to me, as as expensive as a deal it would be, I think the opportunity to compete with Dylan Lurin and Alex De Brinkette at their close to max performance was just too much to pass up. >> Does that not leave you though with some concerns about what the configuration would be? Because in my mind, like I I get what you mean. You split up Hughes insider. So you have two elite guys driving two different pairs. But then if you look at what you’re left with, well you have ASP on the right side and presumably you’re not going to play him in bottom pair minutes. But Hugh’s ASP is a pretty small pairing that leaves you exposed defensively and then you’re you’re left with an Edmonson size gap on the top pair. And that’s I think the the math that I was doing in my head of like, okay, no, I agree that Hughes would be an upgrade on Edmonson and would still be worth overpaying for, you know, in a vacuum. But then just doing the the calculus on where the Red Wings are left and then you think about how the playoff game is more physical and, you know, if you get beat defensively, you you pay for it more often. I just don’t know about getting smaller on your top pair left and removing a bonafide option to play with cider. That’s where my mind goes. >> Yeah, I mean it’s a completely valid, you know, point when you bring it up. Okay, you’re going to split Cider and Hughes. Who plays with each of them? I think the natural answer for Cider at least as you go back to Ben Sherro. You know, this year at least the pairing was was decently successful and and I think with Mo taking his game to another level, he makes anybody around him better. The same question you’d have to ask yourself is who can Quinn Hughes do that with? And obviously when you put ASP next to Quinn Hughes, it’s a little bit of a redundancy because, you know, to the point they’re both very offensive-minded defenseman, like to attack, play a similar style, but obviously Quinn Hughes is doing it on another level. So then you’re asking yourself, are you playing somebody else in those minutes on that right side? Who is that? It’s certainly, you know, you don’t want it to be one of Travis Hamick or Jacob Bernard Docker, but that’s kind of your options at this point. And then if you do that, that ultimately pushes Axel, Sandy, and Pelica down to the third pair. I think there’s a way to do it in terms of distributing minutes and in terms of distributing zone starts and in terms of distributing kind of the quality competition, quality of teammates. It does cause a massive, you know, change to what the Wings have been doing right now. I mean, there’s no way around it. It is it is a radically different way to approach it. And I asked Dom Lucian of the Athletic to kind of run some numbers. And again, this is an approximation more than anything. But you know where the Wings stand right now is in his model, they’re projected to finish with 89.4 points with a 37% chance of the playoff. And I asked him to run the model and say what would happen if the Wings did trade Edmonson as the major NHL piece. And I actually asked them to include Edmonson and Casper just so those two were were off the NHL roster. How does the Wings playoff odds change? And so fundamentally for this year, they don’t change a lot. They move up to 91.4 points, which is just a two-point difference going from Hughes to Edmonson. And their playoff percentage goes up to 46.7%. So just under a 10% bump. But when you think about their likelihood of advancing out of the first round, that improves by only about five and a half percent. Likelihood of advancing, you know, to the conference final, again, only improves by about 2%. So, they are small margins for this year. And a lot of that has to do with how talented Edmonson is. And a lot of it has to do with kind of uncertainty of what Q’s would look like when you bring him to Detroit if you’re playing him with Cider or not with Cider and what those minutes look like and how he’s able to make people around him better. But at the end of the day, it does make the team again slightly better there. That’s not really my rationale on doing it. I think I think it’s just showing that you’re going to give Larkin and Debrink a winning roster while you’ve got them on the deals they’re at while they’re still close to that max performance. And I think within the next three years, we’re going to start seeing them slide past kind of 90% of peak performance. And at that point, not only are you having to replace that dip in performance, you’re replacing a Patrick Kane, but you still are missing another elite piece that really takes this team to another level. And that’s that’s the biggest thing you’re missing in Detroit. I don’t think it’s in the system. I don’t think it’s any of the prospects that are there right now. I mean, certainly we could be proven wrong with how well Eddie Genborg and and Max Plant and some of these other guys have played recently, but I don’t think it’s personally in the system. And I think you’re going to have to find it outside. Right now, these trades, you know, the wings aren’t aren’t getting very deep in the conversations because of an unwillingness to make that move. And eventually, time’s going to pass you by and you’re going to be having to replace more than just finding that elite piece. And and so I think I think at some point you’ve got to push it. You push your chips in. You’ve got to go for it. It’s a big cost, but it’s always a big cost to go for it. It’s the same reason Minnesota did it. They’re further along. Obviously, they also just gave Capri off 17 million. They’ve got Baldi locked up on a nice deal. That’s a big reason for them to go and do it. I think Detroit is in a similar boat. Obviously, I don’t think they’re at the same caliber as Minnesota, but it’s the same rationale of push the chips in, go for it, because otherwise I don’t see how you’re picking up another elite player. >> That was going to be my next question. Barring, you know, things going poorly in Minnesota and trading for Hughes next year from Minnesota, who else is a target in your mind, if anyone? Because I if you’re concerned like let’s say you know things go south for Detroit this year, they don’t make the playoffs and you’re starting to ask questions of like is Larkin going to be happy? That kind of thing. Like what do you do? What are your options if it’s not Hughes next year? >> Yeah. I mean, if it’s not Hughes next year, you’re sort of wondering who is going to make the decision that they they want to trade because really these elite players only pop up in trades typically when they request a trade. We’re not seeing guys really pop up midseason that are elite players unless there is, you know, disgruntlement around their contract situation or their potential future and they’re looking for a new opportunity and and that’s what leads to that. So, if it’s not those guys, I mean, maybe things go south in Columbus and Zach Winsky wants to do it and look for a way out. I don’t personally see that happening, but that’s that’s potentially an option. And then if it’s not a Zack Warky, I’m not really sure of another defenseman, you know, maybe it’s Rasmus Stallene, but again, he may want to force his way out of Buffalo. We’ll see. But if he does, is that again a deal or sweep stakes that you can win? Can you win a Tage Thompson as well out of Buffalo? I mean, these are all really hypothetical because you don’t know how these teams are going to really turn out over the next year and a half. And with how close the standings have been this year, I wonder barring again a contract dispute there being a reason for some of these guys to want out. Certainly could happen. Certainly not out of the possibility, but if that doesn’t happen, then I don’t know how you’re winning either a free agent sweep stakes or winning a a trade decision here, barring someone wanting to force their way to Detroit. See, here’s where my mind goes. Like, everything you’re saying, I don’t disagree with. Like, I It would have been better than not to get Quinn Hughes. That is not a hot take. That’s not a bold statement. It would be in Detroit’s best interest to add a true superstar of his level, and that’s something that they’re missing where the teams who are, you know, almost guaranteed contenders have that. Not only that, because otherwise Vancouver wouldn’t have traded Quinn Hughes, but they have that. That said, I look at how Detroit’s going now and I’m like, okay, if they had, you know, a solid number three guy, don’t even call it a top herring defenseman because I think the results between Edmonson and Cider, no matter where you attribute the source of those results between the two of them to be from, the results are what they are. And so, I’m not worried about adding to the top pair right now. I’m worried about solidifying the top four. So you add a top four like a solid left shot second pair guy. Just your nothing that you’re going to write home about every single day, but a guy when you look at him, you’re like, “God, does he play solid hockey?” I was I keep wanting to point to to Florida defenseman, but every day, you know, this year, I understand they’re not going so well. They make those guys look like superstars. But that’s what I kind of think about. And then you add, you know, two forwards. I think, you know, someone who can play in the top six, although maybe that’s just Emit Infinity developing even further, and someone to play kind of middle six to to bolster your your shooting depth down the lineup. And I think is that a 110 115 point team? Probably not, unless a goalie goes nuclear. But I think that is a really good hockey team. Like I think that’s building on a really solid foundation of what Detroit has now. And I know I’m asking for a lot. and I just asked for three really good players and teams have a hard time finding even one. But none of those guys I’m talking about are even like within one or two or three tiers of Quinn Hughes in my mind. So I do agree that you you lack the Quinn Hughes level guy for the Detroit Red Wings, but I don’t know that I can get there in my head that if they don’t get him, there’s no other way. >> Yeah. And again, I think this is the the fun part of this conversation is I don’t I don’t think there’s a right answer. And also we’re we’re litigating this after this has already happened. You know, this is a thing in the past and and this is just for pure exercise and and nothing else. But from my perspective, you add the elite piece, you can figure out the good. You have the good right now, he’s really hard to figure out the elite. And when I look at Detroit and I say, okay, if you added Quinn Hughes, you now have an elite top three forwards. You have an elite center. You have an elite right winger. You have an elite left winger. You have now an elite Norris Trophy rightot defenseman and an elite left shot defenseman. Now, if we talked about our hypothetical deal that includes Edmonson and we didn’t give up those goalies and Kosa and Augustine, now you potentially have a superstar level player at center, right wing, left wing, right defenseman, left defenseman with the two best goalie prospects in the league coming in. And hockeyy’s long been debated whether it’s a strong link game or a weak link game. And so for those that aren’t familiar with the concept, strong link game essentially means, you know, the more you have the best player on the ice, the more likely you are to win. And weak link game means the the less you have the worst player on the ice, the the more likely you are to win. You know, hockeyy’s I think been argued both ways. I I sort of go back and forth between those two theories in myself, but I think most of the data suggests strong link where having the better player on the ice ultimately dictates that. So if I look at Detroit and you you let’s say you give up an Edmonson, a Casper, a first round pick and then, you know, for our purposes, we’ll say we give up a winger, one of the wingers there, you know, maybe a Bellnikov or something like that. I don’t think you have to give up Bear if you’re giving up Edmonson, but let’s say we do that. You still have Nate Danielson there. You have a a plethora of solid wingers in your system still between Genborg, between Plant. Like you have guys that are not only knocking on the door in the next two years, but you have guys that potentially could play top nine minutes right there. On defense, I still think you have one wildcard player and Anton Johansson who I think has shown really well in the SHL this year. And at that point, if you can get him, you can figure out what to do with ASP. ASP, just because you kept him in this deal, doesn’t mean you don’t consider shopping him elsewhere. There are still other teams that need right shot defenseman, and you can use him to potentially fill another uh another need elsewhere depending on your depth. But I think at the end of the day in free agency and in trades, I can much more easily acquire my second and third pairing defenseman and my middle six forwards. I mean, if you just take a look at who was available in 2025 defenseman, you know, people like Nate Schmidt was there for three years, three and a half million. Nick Pervix was there two years, 2.75 million. you have guys that can play those minutes and play them well routinely available in free agency. And so what you don’t have is Quinn Hughes and now we’re seeing less and less of those elite players even hitting the market. And so anytime you get a chance, I don’t know that there’s going to be a next chance. These don’t seem to come up all that often. Maybe there’s another sweep stakes next year if if Minnesota can’t come to a term with Quinn Hughes. But again, it’s still going to be conditioned on whether or not you can get him to to sign. I don’t know. I think at some point you have to take a shot before you lose what you’ve got in Dylan Lurin and Alex Debrink. And if you aren’t going to take that shot, then I’m not sure what the ceiling of this team is. If you’re thinking you’re competing five years from now when those guys are now going to be 34 and 33, not saying they’re old, washed up players at that point, but you’re looking at maybe 75% version of what what they’re at right now. So that’s where I’m at is I I I think these shots don’t come up all that often. Yeah, it’s a steep price, but if you want to win right now with Dylan Lark and Alex Debrinket, you got to do what you can with these moves. And I know a lot of people are going to be like, “Oh, this still doesn’t make him a playoff contender.” You just said it would have moved their projection up to 92 points. Yeah, that’s true. But with the playoffs, hockey is one of the most random sports. The best team does not always win. The best team, in fact, rarely wins. You know, last year’s cup final, obviously, it’s Florida and Edmonton. Those two teams were the third place in their divisions last year. So, it’s it’s it’s not to say that I I think this automatically makes him a Stanley Cup contender, but I think it gives him the juice to not only be in this year, but be in sustainably the next four to five years. And you can fill in the pieces that will go around those elite players because in five years, Quinn Hughes is 31. And I know a lot of the the opposition has been, well, you don’t know if he would resign here. It’s just an expensive rental. No, I think I think one thing people have to remember is you have to take that option off the table. You are not going to let Quinn Hughes get to free agency. You are either going to trade him next year or you are going to come to an ideal with him. It is you’re going to follow the exact same blueprint that Carolina did with Miko Rotten. It’s but but you know in Minnesota’s case they get two shots at a cup potentially if they want or at a bare minimum they get the one shot this year. And when you’ve just added $17 million in Kuro Capri off, it makes a ton of sense. But that’s, you know, that’s that’s the other side of the coin I see is I think if you if you’re going to do this with Dylan Lurin, you got to do it now. These chances aren’t going to come up often. That’s why when we’re talking about who’s next, I don’t know who’s next. It could be a Warren. It could be a Dalene, but it could also be neither of them. And then if it’s not either of them, I don’t know who’s coming up next. I think we have to end this on a positive note. You have done a lot of campaigning in terms of of spreading the good word of what Moider has been doing this season, not just for the Norris. You’re you’re way beyond the Norris Trophy conversation and you mentioned it at the top here. You think Moider deserves by definition of the award some MVP votes in terms of what he’s doing for the Red Wings this season. Best hockey of his career, you know, based on the eye test, but also the underlying numbers. What are you seeing from Morate Cider this season? who’s a complete player. I mean, you find me a player that plays top PK, top power play, and plays the most minutes at even strength. There’s very few of them that are doing that. He’s doing it against the top competition on the team, albeit much lower level of competition than what he was seeing when Derrick Lone was the coach. I think Mlullen has found the right balance to really maximize Mo, but even still, he’s not getting favorable deployments by any means. He’s still getting quite difficult deployment, particularly when you factor in his defensive zone starts. He’s one of the highest in the league in terms of defensive zone starts. All of that being said, you’re seeing this guy produce at an incredible level individually. So, he’s on pace potentially for a careerhigh in points north of 60. you’re seeing him dictate the pace of play and really the the quality of chances that the opposition gets as well as what his team gets with a five on five expected goals for percentage around 60%. I mean 60% was a number we used to reserve for Pablo Datsuk and we haven’t really seen Wings players touch that number and so to have a guy like most cider in that realm that is an elite elite number and then finally when we try to measure all of his contributions you know from all the different aspects of play and we look at these single number statistics such as goals above replacement or expected goals above replacement or net rating most cider is the number one defenseman in goals above replacement and the number two skater. He’s the number two defenseman in expected goals above replacement, number 10 skater. And then by net rating, he was the number three defenseman and the number four skater. And so we’re talking about a guy who’s essentially by all these measures a top 10 player in the league and a top three defenseman in the league. And so I I think when you look at that and then you look at how the wings perform when he’s off the ice, the heart trophy goes to the player most valuable to their team and it’s not the best player. We have a different award for that that the players get to vote on. That’s the Ted Lindsay award. This is who is the player that’s most valuable to their team. And if you took more cider away from this team, the Red Wings five on five goal differential would be similar or is on pace for a similar five on five goal differential to what the 2019 2020 Red Wings did. And I know all of us were thankful that the season was stopped so we didn’t have to keep watching. That’s how bad the Red Wings have been when he’s not on the ice. So all that being said, I think he deserves a hard trophy vote. I don’t think he’s I don’t think he should win it. I think what we’re seeing from the Colorado guys, Kale Mar, Nathan McKinnon, it’s hard to argue, but they’re both on the same team. They’re both exceptional, but they’re both on the same team. And and I think Mo is doing this. Yeah, he’s got Larkin. Yeah, he’s got Raymond. Yeah, he’s got the Brink, but Mo is doing this really as a leader playing nearly half the minutes a game. Just just an absolutely incredible season from him. >> All right, like I said, good to end on a positive note. Thank you so much to Pashant Thy. Always good to have you on the show and to keep the discussion going. Let us know what you think about the the conversation we had today about, you know, value of a hypothetical trade and, you know, your thoughts on how most Cider is playing. And as Pashant said, at some point, you know, this team will will have to make a decision on what they want to do to make themselves contenders. And as they approach those decisions, we’ll we’ll continue to chat with you, Pashant, on the show. for now. Thanks for joining us on this episode. >> Appreciate it. Thanks for the invite. >> We’re going to Overtime. >> Welcome back and welcome to Overtime. Overtime is brought to you by our Patreon supporters. patreon.com/wingedwheelpodcast if you want to support the show. Again, the bonus Overtime episodes, the Discord, the giveaways, all of that and lots more. Let’s take some questions from our patrons. Cider, I barely know her, says, “What are your observations of the third and fourth lines these last couple of games? It seems like Soderblum, not Soder Bloom as he was called last night, is working well with Casper. ASP also seems to be playing with a lot of confidence. Good to see the young guys pick up some of the points burden.” Well, speaking about last night specifically, they didn’t do anything. They were, for what it’s worth, Marco Casper seeing ghost right now. He does not even look like the same player remotely stylistically anything. There was a play where Sergeev was on like a broken breakout for Utah standing still with the puck and Casper just flew by him. Like I don’t remember a version of Marco Casper where he’s not going at that puck a million miles an hour throwing a hit trying to get it. It was bad. I I will say this, they’re not getting caved on their shifts, but they’re also not doing anything of substance. Just J says, “What’s the likelihood that Kosa stays in Grand Rapids for the entire season, building up confidence, and joins the team next season? Both our goalies have their weak games, but are they reasons for all of our losses?” I don’t know if, you know, Talbot keeps playing like this, I wouldn’t be surprised if you do see a co stint at some point. It seems like only one of Talbot or Gibson can be playing well at any given moment right now for the Red Wings, which isn’t sustainable. Like they do need they need one decent goalie and one like sufficient goalie to continue their formula of success sustainably this season and they’re not getting that right now. So I wouldn’t be surprised if we see a little bit more from from Kosa up in the NHL compared to his just, you know, very tiny stint before. Cletus says, “I was at the Wednesday night game and boy was that a tough watch. The jumbotron said 11 hits total for Detroit at the end of the game and half of those were side on one shift in the third. Why is no one on this team besides two players finishing their checks? And does anyone else think Raymond is definitely not 100%, maybe not even 75%. Raymond at times I think I still see a little bit of the lack of confidence on his shot again. And I don’t know if that’s a shoulder thing or what, but I do wonder how far away from 100% he is. Yeah, >> I could see it. Like I said, I already gave the example of how do you not shoot that puck? Like there was even an audible groan from the entire crowd when that play happens. So, it’s noticeable. Yeah. Like I don’t think, you know, leading in hits means you’re the tougher team or you’re, you know, winning games necessarily more often. Teams that have the puck more have fewer hits. That’s just, you know, logic. But yeah, I mean, Brad gave an example. Even with Casper, some games it looks like they were just doing some flybys. You want to see a little bit more. >> There was more than a few in just the Utah game specifically cuz I know you don’t always see the end of them cuz the camera cuts away as the puck moves. Rasperson Soderblum and Casper had more than a few opportunities on plays where they needed to finish their checks and they just didn’t. All right, next one here. Josh says, “How are we feeling about making a move at the trade deadline this year? I feel perfectly fine moving on from any picks aside from our first rounder. I This isn’t a Red Wing specific thing. Unless you’re a cup contender, I’ve never been a believer in trading for rentals. Now, that doesn’t mean don’t go make trades. Just find someone with some term. There’s always guys of similar talent who are available with one year left on their contract, two years left on the contract, three years left on the contract. Trade. But the Red Wings are still far from a we’re gonna give up a second round pick for a guy who’s gonna play two months and put up a half a point per game. Like they are not in that tier yet. Last name Cider, first name Mo Dickens says, “Question for Evan. Does Bearren get a video tribute when he returns to the LCA?” >> I saw a few people ask me this and I said no. >> You don’t think he gets a tribute? >> No. I say yes, but it’s no game highlights. Just social post. It’s just a social I mean >> acceptable. >> Yeah. Evans RBF says, “Did you see the video of the Oilers celebrating Dry Cital’s a thousandth point right in front of Skinner and Skinner’s just clearing the crease around him? Do you think he should have given Leon a tap or something to congratulate him?” I felt bad for him. >> Just get in there. Just get in there. You know, you were there for most of it. >> If you know what, like I understand it. He just got traded and that’s a special context. If I was on a team and I ever watched my goalie go get in a celebration for another team, there’s cold water being dubbed in his pads before the next practice. >> I feel like Mark Andre Flurry would have went in there. >> And you know, I feel like Mark Andre Flurry would have whacked him in the back of the knee or something. >> He either went in there or he drop kicks him in the chest. >> And I I honestly felt bad for Skinner. I’m like, “Wow, that is like >> that.” Yeah, that did suck right in his face. That was a photographer’s dream seeing that. Did you see the the stats for the Jarry Skinner matchup? Their first game playing against each other. >> Were they the same? >> No. One of them had an eight something save percentage. The other one had a seven something safe percentage. >> Oh my god. >> It was atrocious. >> And the thing is either could be it. The seven something could be for either of them. >> Oh, absolutely. does look like Edmonton made the right trade in that one moment because they got the winning goalie who only allowed four rather than six or whatever it was. >> If I know anything about Edmonton and Edmonton Oiler fans, it’ll just take like one bad stretch for Tristan Jarry and they’re going to be like, “Well, we’re in the same spot we were with Steuart Skinner.” >> They were saying that before Jarry played a game. They they traded for the same goalie. He’s just more expensive. >> All right, last one here. Dom says, “How would you guys feel about trading for Michael McCarron on Nashville? He’s a 66 center that hits, fights, plays PK, and is a Michigan native. Of course, he’s a pending UFA and likely doesn’t have a place on the team next year, but he feels our need for toughness while not being a total liability in other situations. I know we have a lot of bottom six guys, but he could be a decent get. Much love. We talked about him after the Nashville game where the Wings played them cuz we were there and I remember he’s terrible at hockey, but he was noticeable all game because he was such a prick. >> Yeah. Like for that reason alone, like if you took out Michael Rasmmanson and dropped in Michael McCarron, nothing changes on this team other than yeah, someone might actually get punched every once in a while. I’m perfectly fine having a guy like him as like a 13th forward. You slot him in and out. The only reason that I have some pause about adding a guy like that is, you know, the this team has a lot of guys. They did just clear one out with Baragrren and you know you can send Leonard back down but also like if you’re projecting towards the playoffs you’re going to need to add a little bit of of muscle, a little bit of sandpaper and some callous and that wouldn’t be a bad get because you know watching this team in highintensity playoff style games you can still see where they start to fold and you’re going to need to add some resistance to that. So that’s not a bad idea at all. We’ve talked about it a million times. Like, imagine Detroit going up against the last two iterations of the Florida Panthers. The Panthers would identify immediately that they can bully the Detroit Red Wings. And >> it would be a tough watch for Red Wings fans. So, I’m not saying they need to go out and get a bunch of knuckle draggers, but >> teams will identify the the softness, the team’s softness, and exploit it. It’s It’s not as easy as if they were wearing a pair of sweatpants, but if the Panthers played the Red Wings in the playoffs right now, there is a chance that a Red Wing literally gets panced at some point in that series. >> Hell yeah. >> Knowing Matthew Kachchuck and how he plays. Yeah, absolutely. The only reason I you wouldn’t call it a 40 and this is like previous two seasons not this season’s Panthers but like you know if they didn’t have Barkoff that might be that’s just basically the the hockey gods nerfing the Panthers for this year saying yeah no Kachchuck for the first while no Barkoff >> it’s new game plus >> yeah the Florida Panthers and the Kansas City Chiefs getting the same treatment from the sports gods wow you simply hate to see it heartbroken for them honestly I thought the NFL was rigged It is. >> How did they allow this? >> Oh, yeah. Someone messed up the plot. Roger Goodell’s Some people are going to pay for this. >> Okay. >> With their lives, I’m sure. >> There is no shot that, you know, Kansas City isn’t gifted something this offseason. I don’t know football well enough, but someone’s either going to do like a Donic style trade to the Chiefs or they’re going to get some stupidly, you know, Miles Garrett for Chris Jones. >> Yeah. They’re not leaving Mahomes out of the playoffs. I’m not at the NFL scripted guy, but I’m also Yeah, the NFL is not leaving Mahomes out of the playoffs. >> No, they’re just doing this so that when he comes back mid-season next year, wins another Super Bowl, he can win MVP and comeback player of the year. That’s all they’re doing. >> Oh my god. To get already missed me with that narrative. All right, we’re going to wrap up this episode of the Wind Podcast. Thank you all for tuning in. Thank you to Pashant Thy for joining us and thank you to the sponsors of the show. Shout out to Coffee Cult. Code WWP is active. And if you’ve already used it before, it’s changed, so you can now use it multiple times. So if you want to continue to support us and get some of the best coffee that you can buy, use code WWP@ coffeeult.com. Thank you to all of our listeners and our Patreon supporters. patreon.com/wingwheelpodcast if you want to support the show. 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The Detroit Red Wings have already had their best December in a decade, and the month is only halfway over…

Tune in as we start by recapping Detroit’s win over Ilya Sorokin and the New York Islanders, including Alex DeBrincat’s heroics and league-leading goal pace, Lucas Raymond’s 3 assists, Moritz Seider continuing his award-worthy season, and Axel Sandin-Pellikka’s offensive skills on display as John Gibson wins his 6th straight start. Next, Dylan Larkin & Co. fall to the Utah Mammoth as Cam Talbot, Simon Edvinsson, and more Red Wings across the board struggled, and Todd McLellan’s squad failed to execute without the likes of Patrick Kane (though Finnie & Grand Rapids Griffins star John Leonard linked up for a goal). Also, the amazing pace in Hockeytown compared to previous years & what lies ahead for the rest of 2025.

After that, we discuss Jonatan Berggren being lost to the St. Louis Blues via waivers, his request to Steve Yzerman to find him a fresh start, and the failure of the 2018 Red Wings Draft Class by Ken Holland & Tyler Wright (Zadina, Veleno, Berggren, etc.).

We then are joined by Prashanth Iyer to go over the ramifications of Steve Yzerman and the Detroit Red Wings not trading for Quinn Hughes, what’s needed to make the most of Dylan Larkin, Alex DeBrincat, Lucas Raymond, Moritz Seider, Simon Edvinsson, Nate Danielson, Marco Kasper, Axel Sandin-Pellikka, Sebastian Cossa, Trey Augustine, & the rest of Detroit’s future. Also, Prashanth’s campaign for Moritz Seider to not only get Norris Trophy votes, but also Hart Trophy votes.

All of that & lots more before we take your questions and comments in our Overtime segment – enjoy!

Intro: 00:00

NYI Game Recap: 4:10

UTA Game Recap: 14:45

Berggren Gone: 29:10

Prashanth Talks Hughes; Seider: 41:10

Overtime: 1:14:05

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