Embed from Getty Images With some nice prospects in the pipeline but more needed, Detroit Red Wings general manager Steve Yzerman felt the quickest way for a turn around was icing a bad hockey team. So a tanking by design has worked well in this suspended NHL season. When the season picks back up and closes the Red Wings will know their draft lottery slot.
Quinton Byfield, Alexander Holt, Lucas Raymond, Alexis Lafreniere, there is a really good chance one of the prized prospects will be wearing a Winged Wheel after the NHL draft in June (or whatever will be the draft makeup date or month.)
Steve Yzerman was not lying when he said the Detroit Red Wings would not tank. He is dead against it. However, Yzerman did not say he would field a team (except for the young core players of Dylan Larkin, Filip Hronek, Tyler Bertuzzi and Anthony Mantha) that were just not good. In other words this seasons version of “The Yzer-plan” was to let it sink naturally. Check.
The Red Wings and their general manager hold nine draft picks including six picks by the third round. Steve Yzerman wants to add talented young prospects and is armed to do so.
It is safe to say the Detroit Red Wings will be improved after the draft. They also will have a lot of much needed salary cap space. For a rebuilding team it is not wise to spend big money on big names. First the core players need to be identified then players can be added to give support or help the team make a playoff push.
It is a process that can seem long. That said, the Red Wings do have talent, a couple lottery drafts and they will be right back where fans expect them to be, the NHL playoffs. Yzerman said he understands what is expected in Detroit “playoffs and Stanley Cups.”
There is little doubt he will deliver. The right now is not fun. But it is fixing to be fun again. This years draft will set the tone for when the Red Wings pull out of the rebuild and begin to ascend to the top again.
