SSDD Hits the Road...

Hey there, sunshines, I’m heading out of town for a long-awaited (and much-deserved, if I do say so myself) vacation. I’ll be back in touch in time for the second game against Chicago. Until then, I’ve set up some stuff to auto-post during my absence. I don't expect to be online at any point, unless I decide to text in some tweets if I see anything ridiculous. I recently did a mini series of Q&As with some of the Wings bloggers who live overseas. They’ve got some great stuff, and I’m pretty excited about the "project." Guilherme from Red Wings Brasil will be kicking off the series bright and early tomorrow morning for your reading pleasure. The Wings’ marketing team wasn’t kidding when it proclaimed that Hockeytown has no limits.

Hall of Famer Steve Yzerman...

That has a pretty nice ring to it, eh?

The Captain finally took his rightful place in the Hockey Hall of Fame last night. He's been enshrined where all hockey fans will whisper his name in awe like we already do here in Hockeytown. Where parents will hold their kids up to his plaque and reverently tell stories about the feats they saw him accomplish. His status as a legend is fully cemented now, not that we didn't know that already. Stevie really has reached the "finish line" of his playing career, but you and I both know better than to think that his legacy won't continue to influence this team, this town, and our hearts and minds.

He delivered a wonderful speech that was everything we’ve come to expect from him over the years. It was humble and delivered with just a touch of nervousness from being in the uncomfortable spotlight. Instead of reflecting on his accomplishments, Stevie instead showered praise on those who surrounded him. It was a classic Captain moment, and yet another fond memory of Yzerman that I'll be telling my grandkids about someday. I’ve already had my say about how I feel about this even that’s been so long in the making, but there’s been quite the round of tributes popping up around the Wings’ blogosphere, and, I have to say, some of them really knocked it out of the park.

First up is the Chief’s entry over at Abel to Yzerman. Honestly, if you read nothing else this decade, read this post:

There are players who’ve been voted in who probably felt it was owed to them. There are “captains” who stayed too long, wore out their welcome in at least three different cities, loved the attention, begged for it, thrived on it, then missed it so much created ways to keep their name out there....like inventing a “leadership award” and finding a hygiene product to sponsor it. There are others who’s spectacular play earned their admission to the Hall, but their lack of character made you cringe to consider their place among the greats like Howe and Beliveau.

Steve Yzerman? He’s never felt like hockey owed him jack squat. And his character is spotless. He is the icon of our age. A hero in a time when defining one is nearly impossible.

So we’re gonna go ahead and break the glass tonite. We’re gonna smash it open and take him out. We present our Captain to you because he’s always been bigger than just one town. We’ve all known how lucky we’ve been and we’ve been stingy. Frankly, if it was just about us, we’d keep him to ourselves. But, it’s not and we know that. We owe it to Steve Yzerman, against his wishes probably, to let him wear the C for an entire sport, not just the red and white.
…
Four years later the legend was cemented with every shuddering rise from the ice. If you’re a Wing fan you look back at that playoff run and you hear stories of the kind of pain he was in and it brings tears to your eyes because you feel like he did it for you, individually. That’s the effect Yzerman had on Wing fans. You just felt like when he won, he willed it for you. And when the time came for credit and adulation, poof....gone.

But he’s ours no longer. Tonite he becomes hockey’s. And it’s a gift hockey had better be grateful for. Hockey had better stand on its feet tonite and understand that there can be only one. There has never been, and never will be, another Captain like Yzerman. No one has withstood the kind of pain he did, or led as well. Nobody. As Captain Norris said in a comment earlier today, the Hall had better be ready to be humbled.

He’s been ours for nearly three decades, hockey. Tonite we present him to you and the Hall becomes his keeper.

I know. I wish I could write like that too.

This is from On the Wings:

That’s all I can say. There’re more reasons why I love him, but I cannot put them into words. He has a quality. If you are a Wings fan, you know exactly what I’m talking about. And you cannot put it into words either.

He’s Steve Yzerman, and he’s my captain. He’s The Captain.

Exactly. I’m pretty sure that no words we could come up with would do Stevie justice. It’s just not possible.

Detroit4Lyfe brings us this little quote:

If you're a Red Wings fan, you know how hard it was watching Red Wings games following Yzerman's retirement not seeing #19 glide down the ice. But I came to realize over the past four years that Yzerman's not gone. There is an aura about him that will last eternally. He has forever stamped his legacy on the Detroit Red Wings, permanently in a way that will never fade, that we'll never forget.

It won’t fade because this organization simply won’t let it. And neither will we fans.

Kukla’s article on NHL.com said this:

Yes Steve, you have crossed one finish line, but I am sure there are many of those lines ahead of you. People say the first race they win is the one that is most remembered, and as a fan of the Detroit Red Wings, I must admit, that holds true.

You thrilled us, Steve -- we named children after you, we have hockey shrines built because of you and now we anticipate your next race and assume you will finish first again.

You made our dreams come true, you brought happiness into our lives and provided us with memories we can pass on to younger generations.

It is our time to thank you, Hockey Hall of Famer Steve Yzerman, for all that you have done for us.

I’m not going to lie, I’ve considered the name Steve for my future firstborn child. Boy or girl. It doesn’t matter.

And two final quotes, this time from A2Y’s Live Blog of the induction ceremony (Of course we live-blogged it. Why wouldn’t we?). So now Steve Yzerman, our Captain, sits amongst the greatest of the greats, forever to be cherished by all:

The Pantheon. That tiny sliver of Hall of Famers whom even the other Hall of Famers stand in awe of. Steve Yzerman, Gordie Howe, Ted Lindsay, Nicklas Lidstrom, Terry Sawchuk. Absolute legends. Wayne Gretzky, Brett Hull, Bobby Orr, Mario Lemieux, Rocket Richard. Players for whom the Hall just doesn’t seem adequate. --monkey

Followed quite poetically with:

The ancient Greeks had no problems whatsoever with the concept - there are gods, demi-gods, and mere mortals.

Demi-gods don’t rise to the level of gods, but they are more than mere mortals and have some of the same qualities of gods, just not as many or in such a large quantity.

Gods and demi-gods alike are in the Hall of Fame, but that doesn’t mean they are all exactly equivalent. Just that they are alike in being so far above others that they deserve special recognition. --Baroque

There are more excellent posts at Bingo Bango, Nightmare on Helm Street, The Production Line, The Triple Deke, and Winging it in Motown. The Freep also had a couple of good articles, as did the News.

And now for your viewing pleasure:

It's Time to Celebrate the Stevie...

(No snark today. This post is all heart.)

Well, this day has been inevitable for quite some time now. Tonight the greatest Captain in all of sports officially takes his place amongst the hockey royalty in the Hall of Fame. The three years since his retirement have really just been a countdown to today.

I can’t believe it’s been three years since he hung up his skates for good. There’s still a little part of me that expects to see him out there taking a key defensive zone faceoff late in a game. Can you honestly say that you don’t briefly see Yzerman every time a Wing uses his stick to prop himself up as he gets to his feet? Or whenever you catch a glimpse of the C on Nick Lidstrom’s sweater? I was born in 1986 not long before the NHL season started that year. When Stevie retired, I had literally never seen another player wear the C for the Wings. I honestly worried that I wouldn’t feel the same about the game after he retired. My hockey fandom was incredibly tied up in my love for the Captain, and on top of that, I was living in Florida at the time, completely cut off from the hockey world (my access to games was limited and I pretty much cut myself off from it in order to stay sane.). I wondered if I would feel the same way I had before when I came back to Michigan. Obviously, it wasn’t an issue since I’m here writing this blog. But that’s how much Steve Yzerman meant to me as a fan of this hockey team. In my mind, he wasn’t just The Captain, he was the Red Wings.

When I first got into the game, I was drawn to the speed and flashy moves of Sergei Fedorov. I quickly came to realize, though, that Steve Yzerman was more my style. His public approach to the game was very similar to the way I approach my life. And I don’t think I’m alone. He’s the kind of guy we can identify with here in Detroit. We aren’t flashy. We don’t seek the spotlight. We’ve had our share of disappointments and setbacks, but we haven’t given up. We may never be the biggest city or the most respected or the richest or a popular destination, but that’s not going to stop us from trying. And here we are hobbling along with the auto industry barely staying afloat and hearing about a friend or neighbor or family member who lost their job on a daily basis, surviving by determination and heart alone. So it’s no wonder this area fell head over heels for Steve Yzerman.

I can’t think of another leader whose personality came to embody a team in the way that The Captain’s did. This is even more amazing because of how understated Stevie’s public persona was. Even with the veritable all-star team that the Wings fielded in ’02, there was never any question that he was the guy. And that year, when expectations were higher than ever, he led the way. On one leg.

As the latest round of career eulogies goes out to mark this occasion, there is a lot of focus on the ’02 Cup run as the epitome of Stevie’s career. It surely was a highlight, but in my mind there are other ways to define him. I think of him being the guy sent in to win an important faceoff late in a game. I think of sitting on my family room couch as my Dad, just a few months old when the team won the 1955 Cup, tried to hide his tears as The Captain hoisted Stanley for the first time in ’97. I think of him coming back from a ridiculous knee surgery because he still had something left in the tank. I think of standing in the lower bowl of Joe Louis Arena in my bright red #19 jersey clapping until my hands were red the night he scored his 600th goal. I think of the way a picture of him hoisting the Cup can still bring grown men in this city to tears. I think of seeing him play an exhibition game at Yost during the lockout and sticking around to sign autographs for all of the junior players and some of the NHLers too. I think of sitting in the upper bowl in December of 2005, knowing that I was moving to Florida and that he would probably be retiring soon, watching every shift he took and wondering if it would be the last time I saw him set foot on the ice in person. I think of standing on a concrete barrier, craning my neck to catch a glimpse of him during the ’02 parade. I think about trying to explain to my roommate why I felt the need to watch the replay of his jersey retirement ceremony that they showed last month even though I had a mountain of homework, and only being able to point to my misty eyes because I couldn't find words. I think of the way he almost shies away from all of the praise and attention that continues to come his way. I think of the love that transcends the traditional fan/player relationship that the people in Detroit have for him.

Steve Yzerman is and always will be my favorite player of all time. And I couldn’t be happier to see him entering the Hall of Fame tonight. I was lucky to grow up watching Stevie here in Hockeytown, and his is the standard by which I will measure every other player who dons the Winged Wheel. The odds of anyone living up to them are pretty slim.

Why We're Still Hockeytown...

I found this poll on ESPN (You have to vote in the first poll before it lets you go on to the next one. At present, it's the fifth one.).


It’s asking which sport has the brightest future in the US. MMA won. This makes me sad for humanity. I’ve never quite understood the fascination with this, but maybe I’m not meant to. Anyway, at least hockey beat soccer. I was amused by the fact that the only states that hockey “won” were Michigan, Minnesota, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and Vermont. The only state soccer won? Washington. I was also quite proud of the fact that Michigan had the highest percentage of hockey votes (by far), and was the only state in which hockey topped 50%. As of 1 PM, we were leading the next closest state by 10%. And to think that people were saying that we should lose our title as Hockeytown. It just goes to show that we do things a little better here in the Mitten.

The other day, I had a lot of work to get done. Naturally, this meant that I spent a lot of time on youtube procrastinating. Whilst flipping through the massive amounts of hockey-related videos out there, I came across these two beauties. They’re pretty much standard tribute fare, but if you’re like me, you need all the help you can get to make it through the off-season. If nothing else, they'll give you your daily Steve Yzerman fix.

Also, I finally got a chance to watch the Burn Notice from June 25th, and there was a pretty awesome Wings reference in it. Anyone remember Stacy Roest? It’s at about the 25:30 mark over at Hulu.

There’s not a whole lot else going on in the Red Wings universe. Snapshots has had some great recaps of the prospect camp (Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4), and it’s always fun to read about the guys who could be the wave of the future. Make sure you check that out if you have the time. They’re rather lengthy, but worthwhile.

The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, Part Two...

The bad:

This just gets more and more fun as it goes on. Stay tuned for the Ugly coming up soon. Why do I like this part better than the good? Do you really have to ask? Let's face it, it's a lot more fun to make snarky comments and mock things than to praise them. I'm not sure what that says about my personality, but I can assure you, it's nothing good.

--I'll start with the obvious: Game 7. This one needs no explanation. It's going to take a while to get over that one.
--In a related note: Max Talbot. I passed a street named Talbot yesterday, and I shuddered. I twitch when I hear someone say the name Max. At one point a few months ago, I was checking out at Target and my total was $34.70. I had to add a candy bar just so that number wouldn't show up on my credit card bill. Seriously. I think metro-Detroit area psychiatrists are going to be overwhelmed by an epidemic of Max-Talbot-induced neurotic disorders. And yet, I can't find it within myself to hate the man. That's incredibly strange considering how feisty I generally am, but it's probably a symptom of my recently acquired psychiatric disorder. At least I'll have good company when they finally throw me in the loony bin with all of the other die hard Wings fans.
--The penalty kill. All season long, this was an absolute disaster. And the worst part was that no matter how many hours I spent attempting to find a rational explanation for why it was so bad, I never quite found an answer. With their great defensive corps, combined with the top two-way forwards in the league, there's no reason the Wings' PK shouldn't have been number one in the league.
--The spectacular disappearance of the Wings vaunted secondary scoring during the Finals. I was betting on the Wings walking away with the Cup because I figured the stars would cancel each other out, making it a battle of the third and fourth lines. It turns out that I was pretty much right. The problem was that Pittsburgh's depth guys managed to get the job done when it mattered most whereas the Wings' didn't accomplish a whole lot. Part of me hopes that they all spend their summers wallowing in misery like I am.
--I keep waiting for a day when a player, disturbed by Pierre McGuire's lack of respect for personal space, finally cross checks him right out of his little "cubicle" between the benches and into the stands, where drunken fans will proceed to polish his head and spill nacho cheese all over him. Seriously. Has he never been introduced to the concept of a "bubble?" Watching his interviews made me shudder for the sake of the players involved.
--The NHL's officiating continued to decline in quality. I've already ranted about it in several different posts, so I'm not going to waste my time again. It's almost disgraceful at times. Suffice it to say that the NHL is the laughing-stock of professional sports leagues.
--On the subject of officiating, the failure to call Pittsburgh's too many men on the ice penalty still blows my mind. We'll never know for sure if it had a significant impact on the game or not, but my God. You'd like to think that the NHL would make sure its referees could count at least up to double digits before they were hired. And if it's true that instead of calling the penalty, they warned the Penguins to get their extra guy off of the ice, well, now we're opening doors to paths that I don't even want to think about.
--There's this guy named Cabbie who does interviews with the players. I have no idea how he got this job, but it makes me sad when I think about the number of really bright people I know who are unemployed. Even if you ignore the Terminator effects he used to spice up this interview with Nick Lidstrom, watching him grope the Swede toward the end did damage to my psyche that will never be quite undone. I would pay good money to know what was going on in Lidstrom's head at that moment.
--On the subject of Lidstrom, the quasi-suspensions he and Pavel Datsyuk received for not attending the All Star game were an absolute joke. Especially in light of the number of "automatic" suspensions that were overturned by the league during the playoffs. It's not that sitting out a game in the middle of the regular season was all that serious. If anything, it was probably good for them to get an extra couple of days to recuperate. It was the principle of the matter, and when people wonder why there are so many conspiracy theorists amongst the Wings' fan base, they need look no further than things like that.
--Then there was the loss of Mrs. Hockey. It was a sad day for everyone in the hockey community, and especially those of us in Hockeytown. Obviously I didn't know her, but I can't help but think that we would've gotten along. I've always liked trailblazers like her, and especially women who weren't content to just stay home and cook and care for the kids.
--Pavel Datsyuk's Dr. Rahmani ad. I love Datsyuk. I really do. But every time this ad came on, I couldn't help but laugh at the poor man. Please, Pav, next year, find something better to shill for.
--That 7-6 loss to the Penguins during the regular season. This remains one of the most spectacular third period collapses I've ever seen. Thinking about it still makes me a little bit angry.

On a more personal note:
--There is literally no one happier that the playoffs are over than my poor puppy. All through the playoffs, I seemed to come up with new and more humiliating ways to torment her. Due to my boredom as I waited out the break between the first and second rounds, one night I decided it would be a good idea to give her a haircut. Let's just say that there's a reason I'm not a dog groomer. At another point, my brother dug out his Al the octopus stuffed animal with velcro tentacles and strapped it around her back so we could take pictures. After attending a game during the third round, we brought our red and white pom poms home and stuck them in her collar, again to take pictures. During the Finals, I dressed her in my old Shanny baseball-style jersey and spent half an hour trying to convince her to chew on her squeaky penguin toy. I don't think I've ever seen anything as pathetic as when she curled up on the floor in miserable defeat because the jersey kept tripping her. All this was on top of us trying to train her to bark when the Wings scored. The poor puppy did not deserve any of this.
--One of the games I went to this season was a loss to Colorado. I know the rivalry's dead and all, but I came into my own as a Wings fan during the heat of the Wings-Avs rivalry, and a little part of me will always carry that with me. There's a reason I have a framed picture of Darren McCarty beating Claude Lemieux to a bloody pulp.
--Then there was the fact that I gave away work shifts (aka turned down money) in order to watch playoff games. Not that I would've been mentally functioning if I'd been working, but the teeny tiny rational part of my brain keeps reminding me how stupid that was.
--Being at the Hockeytown Cafe, again in the City Theater, for yet another potentially Cup-clinching loss. I don't think I'm ever going to go there for a playoff game again. Especially not in the Finals.

Part One: The Good
Part Three: The Ugly

Life Goes On...

After my little love-in with myself over my superior taste in hockey teams, I thought I was done for a while. I'm actually surprised to discover that I still have the desire to write about it. I guess it shouldn't be that much of a shock considering how hard it's been to get me to shut up about hockey since I was about nine.

After writing my last post, I went upstairs and buried myself in the TV for a couple of hours. And then all of a sudden, I heard some pleasantly familiar sounds. I looked out my window, and there, in the middle of the street, were four kids playing street hockey. It made me smile. A couple of hours later, I took my dog for a walk, and two blocks away in the back of my subdivision, was another group of kids just setting up a net in the street. The thought that at this time next year I'm going to be searching for a job in a place where this wouldn't be completely normal makes me sad. There's just no place like Hockeytown.

There's been a lot written over the last couple of days implying that this is the end of the Wings' dominance. I disagree. Just like I've disagreed with every article that's been written at the end of every year for as long as I can remember. Between the core of talent they have locked up long-term, the flood of rookie talent they've got lined up, and the enduring brilliance of Ken Holland, there's absolutely no reason that we can't expect this team to make deep playoff runs for years to come. Do you honestly imagine Henrik Zetterberg, heir apparent to the C, retiring in 12 years with only one Stanley Cup ring to his name? Yeah, I don't either. Even now, I firmly believe that the Wings would've come out on top but for their injuries. I know people will say that that's petulant and sore-loserish, but it's true, and I'll stand by it no matter what. I also believe that the Wings would've run right through any other team in the Eastern Conference this year if they were at 100% (or even 80% for that matter). The Anaheim series was by far the toughest battle that any team faced in the playoffs, and there's no way you can convince me that scratching and clawing their way through that mess didn't take its toll on the boys. It might not be next season, or even the one after that, but the Wings will be back. Mark my words. The boys aren't going anywhere.

There's also been some disappointment expressed that they blew their chance to secure their dynasty. I don't buy that crap. I was sold on the whole dynasty thing after 2002. The fact of the matter is that, with the exception of maybe the Lakers, the Wings have been the most dominant professional sports franchise in the country for the better part of my lifetime. And if people aren't willing to recognize that now, then one more championship wouldn't have made a bit of difference anyway.

Bless You, Boys...

On the day in which GM filed for bankruptcy, I felt the need to write about how much the Wings actually mean to this city right now. A run like this is transformative to an area that's going through tough times. I've seen it time and time again.

In 2006, my family was struggling to get by financially. On top of that, we lost my grandmother that September. We were, for the most part, utterly miserable. But the Tigers' World Series run gave us hope. It was something positive to focus on; something to look forward to. We sat and watched almost every game of the postseason together, and while those few hours a day didn't make our problems go away, they gave us a brief release from the depressing grind that our daily lives had become. The Tigers lost that year, but they helped get me and the rest of my family through the toughest few months of our lives. Even though they didn't win, they were a blessing to our family. If that sounds irrational, you probably don't belong reading a sports blog. Every time I think about it, I can still picture all six of us crowding around our one TV that got antenna reception watching the World Series while Ernie Harwell's voice took me right back to my childhood summers. It still gives me chills.

The same thing occurred last year with the Wings. While the metro area wasn't in nearly as bad of a shape financially as it is right now, we were mired in the Kwame Kilpatrick scandal. It was a disgrace, and we once again found ourselves as a punchline for comedians who could never understand us. Things had taken on an "us vs. them" aspect as suburban folks almost universally called for Kwame to be deposed while Detroiters seemed to view criticism of him as a knock on all of them. And then there were the Wings. They united us once again. They gave us common ground on which to come together. It did nothing to change the political realities that we faced as a region, but it sure made us feel a lot better. I was at Joe Vision the night the Wings won, and after the game, my friend and I were walking to the Joe parking garage, and we found ourselves weaving through traffic running and screaming with hundreds of strangers as cars honked their horns and people leaned out of windows to give us high-fives.

During the parade, the City of Detroit float jackknifed as the truck towing it attempted to make the U-turn in front of Cobo. In order to get it around the corner and reattached to the truck hauling it, the parade staff called for people from the crowd to help push it. My brother and I, lifelong suburbanites, ran in from the sidewalk and helped a bunch of strangers, likely also from the suburbs, push the float around the corner so that it could be hooked up to the truck. I thought it was deliciously ironic that, of all the floats, it was the City of Detroit one that needed our help to make it around the corner so that it didn't hold up the parade. I'll also never forget standing in Hart Plaza while the crowd booed so loudly that it drowned out Kwame's speech, even over the loudspeakers. It didn't matter what he was saying, only that he was the one saying it. For the life of me, I'll never understand why he had the nerve to show up at our party, but I don't think I'm meant to. I don't think I want that kind of insight into a mind like his.

And for a couple of weeks in June of last year, we celebrated. While we weren't the ones on the ice, we felt like part of the team. No other city adopts its sports stars like we do. Nobody cares that most of the guys were born in Sweden or Russia or Canada. We don't care. When they pull on a Detroit sports jersey, they become one of us. It felt like we ourselves had won something. We could point to the Wings and say, "See, not everything from Detroit is a screw-up." We may not be able to keep our jobs, or elect competent leadership, but damned if we don't play some fine hockey.

And so we find ourselves a year later, in June 2009. Kwame's long gone, thankfully someone else's problem now. Yet we find ourselves even worse off than a year ago. Both GM and Chrysler have filed for bankruptcy, and Ford is barely hanging on. People are losing jobs left and right, every day seems to bring more bad news, and it seems like there are more 'For Sale' signs than trees in our subdivisions. This time next year, I'll almost certainly be joining the ranks of transplanted Michiganians forced to watch the home that I love struggle for survival from afar. But there are the Red Wings, beacons of hope for as long as I can remember. They're once again serving as a positive distraction to give folks around here a few hours of joy, or at least the occasion to stress about something other than paying the bills.

And, honestly, what more can you ask of a sports team?

You Can't Spell "Wing" Without "Win"...

My favorite part of the media coverage of this series is how the Wings are (once again) being portrayed as the old, slow veterans versus the young, speedy Blackhawks. With the exception of Lidstrom, Rafalski, Draper, Maltby, Holmstrom, Chelios, and Osgood, the core of the team is in their late twenties or early thirties. Z, Datsyuk, Hossa, Franzen, Kronwall, and Stuart are all between 28 and 30. I know that Chicago only has four guys (Huet, Khabibulin, Sopel, and Pahlsson) over 30, but things have changed since the '02 Cup. And as to the speed issue, while Chicago might have greater average team speed, all I can say is suck on this.

UPDATE: (5/18/09 3:04) Mitch Albom agrees with me!

I've also been thinking about the Chicago fans' "Detroit sucks" chants at the end of their Game 6. I couldn't figure out why there was so much hatred there, when I, as a Detroit fan, couldn't care less about them. Then it occurred to me that it's a lot like the UM-MSU rivalry. You see, I started college at UM, and then transferred to MSU for reasons (not GPA-related!) that I prefer not to discuss. While at UM, I learned a deep-seated hatred for OSU. Nobody liked MSU, but it was kind of an afterthought. However, when I got to MSU, it turned out that everybody there hated UM with a passion. I think it was Michael Hart who later compared MSU to a proverbial little brother who UM's just expected to beat. I couldn't have said it better. UM has better, more intense rivalries with schools on their level. Beating down little brother is just something fun to do when things get boring. I imagine that this is similar to what goes on in Chicago fans' minds. The Wings are the better, more accomplished, smarter, better looking, Golden Child of a big brother, and the Blackhawks have to resent that.

I've been doing a lot more reading of "opposition" blogs this year than I usually do. It's always fun to find out how hated my boys are. I love the fact that everyone outside of Hockeytown despises the Wings. I bask in it. Whenever I travel outside the state, I make sure to drape myself in Wings gear so everyone knows that my heart belongs to Detroit. The best part about it is that the Wings are hated for all the right reasons. They've been so good for so long, and accomplished so much in recent years, that it's easy to imagine a level of jealousy and resentment from less-fortunate teams. When in full-flight, the Wings can systematically demolish an opponent in any number of ways, from finesse passing to mucking it up in the corners or the crease, all the while out-classing you at every turn. In a salary cap world and draft lottery system that are designed to create parity and prevent one team from being dominant for too long, the Wings have continuously found ways to reinvent themselves and stay ahead of the pack. I know I'd be bitter if I was on the outside looking at a team like that. This is in contrast to the Ducks (I know, I just can't let it go.) who are hated for all of the wrong reasons; namely, that they're classless goons from the top down.