{"id":535687,"date":"2026-04-02T00:40:24","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T00:40:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/535687\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T00:40:24","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T00:40:24","slug":"quick-hits-are-the-red-wings-in-a-culture-crisis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/535687\/","title":{"rendered":"Quick Hits: Are the Red Wings in a Culture Crisis?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hopefully, your emotions (and eyes) have settled if you watched the entire game against Pittsburgh<\/a> last night. What an absolute toilet show.<\/p>\n

The Detroit Red Wings continue to display their lack of killer instinct in must-win games. It\u2019s almost like they\u2019re fully content with letting March get the best of them. What the hell, guys? Do you even enjoy playing this wonderful sport? You\u2019re staring at the longest streak of playoff-less seasons in the league, and you just\u2026keep laying eggs? Shame.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m out of words for it, honestly. At this point, it\u2019s very clear that this isn\u2019t a coaching or talent issue. No, there is a full-blown culture crisis in the Red Wings locker room. Todd McLellan is trying. I mean, how many times does the guy have to put his players on blast? Whether it\u2019s calling some guys \u201cjust jerseys,\u201d claiming that players are \u201cletting off the gas\u201d because their captain is back from an injury, or saying that he doesn\u2019t know why he needs to extract competitiveness<\/a> out of his guys, it\u2019s just so very clear at this point that this goes beyond what a coach can change.<\/p>\n

No, this is a front office and on-ice personnel issue. How do you fix it? I don\u2019t know. Do you have to get rid of some players? Probably. Does there need to be a change in the front office? Possibly. All options should be on the table. I\u2019ve seen rumors<\/a> about a possibility of Steve Yzerman moving \u201cup\u201d in the front office, making way for a new GM. I don\u2019t hate the concept, but I certainly don\u2019t have a ton of trust that they will bring in the right person for the job. If you\u2019ve read WIIM long enough, you know that I\u2019m a little sour on the idea of filling the front office with franchise legends. The novelty has worn off. I don\u2019t need it any longer. If there is to be a shakeup in the front office, I want people from outside the organization. Fresh opinions that can help steer this ship out of the shit-storm they find themselves in. Having said that, I still don\u2019t actually think Yzerman\u2019s current position is in jeopardy, but the seat is hot.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m probably overreacting a little. There\u2019s still hope (I think?), but you\u2019d need a magnifying glass to find it. \/rant<\/p>\n

So, I gotta ask. How do you feel about this? Obviously pretty bad, right? No one has the perfect answer, but I am curious.. How would you fix [gestures widely at the Winged Wheel]? <\/p>\n

In other news\u2026<\/p>\n

Wings Sign Top NCAA Goalie Prospect<\/p>\n

Hey, a little good news! Trey Augustine has inked his three-year entry-level contract<\/a> with Detroit. He will report to Grand Rapids on an ATO for the rest of the season. Sucks that Augustine\u2019s college career ended with another disappointing exit from the NCAA DI Men\u2019s Hockey Tournament. The South Lyon native is onto bigger things now.<\/p>\n

Ovechkin Continues to Make History<\/p>\n

Not Red Wings related, but Alex Ovechkin has officially reached the 30-goal<\/a> mark for his 20th season. Insane numbers, man. Truly one of the best to ever do it.<\/p>\n

Up Next for the Red Wings\u2026<\/p>\n

@ Flyers \u2013 Wednesday, April 2
@ Rangers \u2013 Saturday, April 4
vs. Wild \u2013 Sunday, April 5
vs. Blue Jackets \u2013 Tuesday, April 7<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hopefully, your emotions (and eyes) have settled if you watched the entire game against Pittsburgh last night. What…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":535688,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5101],"tags":[599,93,5137,5,4,3358,5138],"class_list":{"0":"post-535687","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-detroit-red-wings","8":"tag-detroit","9":"tag-detroit-red-wings","10":"tag-detroitredwings","11":"tag-hockey","12":"tag-nhl","13":"tag-red-wings","14":"tag-redwings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116332332702557109","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/535687","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=535687"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/535687\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/535688"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=535687"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=535687"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=535687"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}