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Changes are coming part 2 - the team

March 27, 2023, 7:46 PM ET [8 Comments]
Jeremy Laura
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In my first part of this series I covered a fairly neutral change. The NHL and Adidas have parted ways (effective after 23/24) and Fanatics U will add the game jerseys to their repertoire.

The next change is one that has already been hotly debated this season. Who is going to be the “core” of this team. Cap Friendly shows that Detroit only has 2 forwards signed past 24/25 in Dylan Larkin who just signed a max term deal and Andrew Copp who is signed through 26-27. This year hasn’t been what many had hoped for Copp as the 2nd line center.

It looked like, at the start of the season, Larkin, Copp, Bertuzzi, Vrana, Raymond, Seider and Hronek would be important parts of the continuing rebuild. Larkin, Raymond and Seider are still standing. Copp has had a better second half, so hopefully will have a better year next year. Perron is great to have, but how many more years will he be in it? Edvinsson is a little bit of a question mark to start in the NHL next season but it feels like he’ll have a real shot at the team. If he doesn’t start there, I’d expect a fairly quick call up. Jake Walman has been a pleasant surprise to be sure. I’m avoiding the goaltending topic altogether because I have no clue how that will all shake out. You’ll also notice that I’m not really touching the bottom 6 because it seems like we have Veleno, Berggren, Rasmussen, Zadina, Erne all vying and some may have trade value.

Zadina grabbed a spot with his increased 2 way play a couple seasons back. Veleno and Berggren showed some good flashes and took advantage of opportunity that injured players have opened up. Soderblom looked promising in the first part of the season. It will be interesting to see what this group will bring in the fall (or if any are moved over the summer).

The trades of Bertuzzi and Hronek were hard on the team internally. Larkin especially seemed to wince at seeing Bert leave town. Hronek and Bertuzzi both came with conditional firsts while Bert also came with a 2nd and Hronek a 4th. Yzerman really valued the return. Vrana was basically given away (7th, plus retained salary) but had passed through waivers unclaimed earlier in the year. His exit has sparked a lot of emotion from fans as, when healthy, he was scoring at a phenomenal rate for Detroit.

With Bert, Hronek and Vrana gone, it feels like another soft reset in the midst of a hard reset. Free agency and the draft will give a view of next season’s iteration. I had Detroit as a non playoff team this year, but when does that expectation change? They were in the picture far longer than I thought they’d be this season. Post all star saw a nice little run but post trade deadline saw a team flatlining a bit. My final installment will be about money and TV Deals. Most of you know Bally is exploring bankruptcy, but you may not know that Disney is quietly shopping ESPN. Stephen A. Smith shot out a blurb that his position may not be “safe”. The house of mouse took some heavy hits last year, and streaming went from the main focus to the main audit, and now both Marvel and Star Wars have potential lawsuits after recent firings. I’ll get some more thoughts in the final installment.
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