Bob Duff: Franzen back on ice Out since suffering a concussion Jan. 6, Detroit forward Johan Franzen has been partaking in informal skates at Joe Louis Arena.

Wow, I didn't expect that. He's always been a bit slow, but if he could play net front role on the third or fourth line and then and on the 2nd pp unit, that'd be great! I remember in all of our mock lineups he never once appeared. So adding a potential 20 goal scorer ( maybe more if he exceeds expectations ) for nothing, and adding size to the lineup is awesome!

Bob, I feel like we missed a headline opportunity.

"Mule On Ice" or something like that.

Its great to see him making progress

not only for the sake of getting something out of what were paying him, but also it really is scary to think he could have permanent brain problems that effect his life outside of hockey and its good to hear hes getting much better

with all that said, what happens if he DOES in fact return from LTIR and makes the squad? are we then not forced to make a trade? his contract puts us over the salary cap.

who would go? Im thinking it would be tough to move a guy like kindl at this point, if Ehrhoff isnt signed why would someone take kindl?

were about 1 Mil over the cap as of now

Sometimes i wonder what the past six years would have been like for u guys had u went all in on hossa instead of this bum. When is his contract nightmare over?

Sometimes i wonder what the past six years would have been like for u guys had u went all in on hossa instead of this bum. When is his contract nightmare over?
- Jordy8

honestly we did go after hossa, we could not afford what he wanted, Franzen came at a cheaper price than Hossa, had we signed hossa to the same contract chicago offered, we would be handicapped to sign other young players, which in the long run i believe to be better, obviously chicago continues to be better than us, but i dont think thats solely because of hossa, they have toews and kane in their prime vs datsyuk and Z declining, and a MUCH better D corps.

I dont think Franzens contract is a nightmare, its a low cap hit

Sometimes i wonder what the past six years would have been like for u guys had u went all in on hossa instead of this bum. When is his contract nightmare over?
- Jordy8

I'm really sick of this debate, because there isn't much of one.

Going into the 2009 off-season the Red Wings had a difficult choice; Re-sign a 40-goal scorer who didn't produce much of anything in the playoffs; Or re-sign a home-grown talent to a ridiculous hometown discount who lit the world on fire for 13 goals in 16 playoff games in 2008, and was a P/GP player in the 2009 playoffs (oh, and scored 34 goals during the regular season, too). Although Hossa is a better 2-way forward (Franzen is no slouch), the Mule makes life difficult for goalies and defensemen in their own zone. What did we want or need at the time? We had elite 2-way forwards out the rear-end. What we didn't have, outside of Holmstrom, was an offensive threat in the crease (Cleary was good at it for 2-3 years).

And are you seriously going to compare contracts..? Less than a $4M cap hit until he's 40, or a $5.25M cap hit until he's 42. Guess which man has which contract?

If it wasn't for Hossa sucking horse s**t in the 2009 playoffs we could have repeated for the second time in 10 years. Waste of $7.45M dollars.

Franzen is and has been a much better and more consistent player than most Wings fans give him credit for, and it's unfair to blame Wings management in 2009 for failing to predict that head injuries would cause him to miss so much time.

That said, Hossa at $5.25 is a better value than Franzen at $4, even when healthy.

I believe if Franzen would've stayed healthy nobody would've made the comparisons they do today.

Let's look at regular season stat lines since Hossa moved to Chicago.

Franzen: 308 GP, 104 G, 122 A, 226 Points
Franzen averages .34 goals per game and .74 points per game

Hossa: 397 GP, 147 G, 190 A, 347 Points
Hossa averages .37 goals per game and .87 points per game


Now for the playoff comparison

Franzen: 44 GP, 13 G, 17 A, 30 Points
Franzen averages .30 goals per game and .68 points per game

Hossa: 96 GP, 18 G, 50 A, 68 Points
Hossa averages .19 goals per game and .71 points per game

Hossa has clearly been the better regular season performer. He's played in more games and averages more goals, assists, and points. When you factor in the playoffs Franzen has been the better goal scorer while playing with less talented players but Hossa is the better playmaker.

If you base this on the "when healthy" scenario the difference in money can be justified and you can also argue that Franzen at 1.32 million less is the better deal (when healthy).

With all of that said, I cannot believe I just did this much work to defend the Mule. He's a guy I haven't been a fan of since the 07-08 season. Honestly, I did all of this to see how much better Hossa has been statistically when compared to Franzen.

Franzen has red(ish) hair and looks like a Viking. No way hossa should get picked over him. Plus, that time when he took Kane's mouthpiece out of his mouth was priceless.

With all of that said, I cannot believe I just did this much work to defend the Mule. He's a guy I haven't been a fan of since the 07-08 season.
- RedDog18

The funny thing is that I'm usually the one defending Franzen, but I think I'm still siding with Hossa as the better value. I guess we're both doing a bit of role reversal.

It's not just that Hossa is a moderately more productive offensive player. He's also a much more effective two-way player in general. Hossa is better defensively, he's better at even strength, he suppresses shots against well, he kills penalties (1:33 per game average overall since moving to Chicago, compared to 8 second per game for Franzen).

By contrast, Mule is more of a PP specialist. He's good at what he does, but he doesn't give you much else beyond the points he puts on the board. Hossa does.

when does franzen have to either be on LTIR or on the roster for our cap hit to be officially over ?

when does franzen have to either be on LTIR or on the roster for our cap hit to be officially over ?
- digitalbath

Technically he is "on the roster" even if he is on LTIR; it's just that the Red Wings are able to increase their cap ceiling by a certain figure if he is on LTIR.

The earliest Franzen could go on is the day before the regular season begins. The amount of cap relief Detroit would get would depend on what roster adjustments the team makes between then and now. The best-case scenario is that Detroit gets totally under the cap (but as close as possible to the ceiling) before putting people on LTIR, which would require them to cut approximately $1 million from the current roster.

It's unfortunately more likely the Wings will still be over the cap the day before the regular season, in which case using LTIR would still be legal but would give them a lot less flexibility (as in, they might not even be able to call up a player from the farm without waiving and demoting a higher-payed player from the active roster).

Of course, Franzen could straight-up retire, but since he's got a frontloaded deal the Wings would be subject to cap recapture penalties through the end of Franzen's original contract length.

And all this could be moot anyway, since it looks like there's a fair chance Franzen will be medically cleared by the time the season starts. Unless he takes another hit in the preseason ...

I dont think anyone debates that Hossa is a better player than Franzen.

But, statistically Franzen is closer than he should be = thus making it a bit lesser of a debate by way of who they Wings should have kept. Mule, if people forget was meant to be a depth 3rd or 4th role player...

I think the better comparision would be that Franzen exceeded everyone expecatation's, so much so that he is compared to top 6 players, in this case maybe even a top 3 player vs where he was originally slotted when he started.

I like the Mule. Naturally, his injuries have made the conversation blurry, but I still think when he is in the lineup, he is still a threat shift to shift for the other team.

I dont think anyone debates that Hossa is a better player than Franzen.

But, statistically Franzen is closer than he should be = thus making it a bit lesser of a debate by way of who they Wings should have kept. Mule, if people forget was meant to be a depth 3rd or 4th role player...

I think the better comparision would be that Franzen exceeded everyone expecatation's, so much so that he is compared to top 6 players, in this case maybe even a top 3 player vs where he was originally slotted when he started.

I like the Mule. Naturally, his injuries have made the conversation blurry, but I still think when he is in the lineup, he is still a threat shift to shift for the other team.
- BooBoo997

I also like Franzen and think he gets an unfair rap from most Wings fans. I think after he exploded in the 2008 playoffs people developed this unrealistic expectation that he was some kind of late-blooming Mike Bossy who could pot 40+ goals every year.

When you look at the supposedly "streaky" and "inconsistent" and "only plays hard when he wants to" Franzen's record since then, you notice that he has been remarkably consistent. Pretty much he's been bang on 0.75 ppg and 1 goal every 3 games in every season he's played since he turned 30. He was a little better than that in his late 20s and he's slowed down a little bit now that he's hit 35, but his numbers are always right in that range.

Like I said, I think it's an expectation thing. The guy ripped off a couple of great hot streaks, including a legendary one that significantly contributed to a championship. People saw that and expected they were getting a perennial all-star, but instead they got a good first-liner who was a little one-dimensional. Instead of being happy that we unexpectedly got a really good player pretty much out of nowhere, we trashed him for not being a borderline hall of famer. It was always unreasonable.

Obviously the injuries have significantly restricted his value over the last couple of years, but you can't really blame that on Franzen, either.