Red Wings: All-North America or All-World Team?
By John Manzo
Recently, the Detroit Red Wings social media team posed a question. Which Red Wings lineup would you choose? All-North America or All-World.There is such as thing as a stupid question.
I know I’m a little late to the party, but last week I noticed the Detroit Red Wings social media team asked its followers one of those “which would you choose” questions.
In this particular instance, it was which Red Wings lineup would you choose, All-North America or All-World.
https://twitter.com/DetroitRedWings/status/1250132014063325193
Highlights from the North American lineup include Steve Yzerman, Gordie Howe, Brendan Shanahan, Chris Chelios, Chris Osgood and a few others.
Now let’s get to the CVS Pharmacy-style receipt list of All-World names who’ve once dawned the winged wheel. These names include Pavel Datsyuk, Sergei Fedorov, Henrik Zetterberg, Marian Hossa, Nicklas Lidstrom, Niklas Kronwall, Tomas Holmstrom and many more. You see the tweet, you know the list.
It’s not surprising how much better the All-World lineup is compared to the All-North America one, even with the greats like Yzerman and Howe on All-North America.
I mean, for goodness sakes, there was a documentary about the team’s “Russian 5” lineup! That’s not even including the likes of Datsyuk, Zetterberg, Holmstrom, Dominik Hasek and more of the 2010s era of Gustav Nyquist, Tomas Tatar and Petr Mrazek.
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I will say, the defensive pairings between both are somewhat equivalent, and even goalie. It’s the forwards for the All-World lineup that make this a route.
Igor Larionov, ah, The Professor, manning a line with Tatar and Jiri Hudler as your fourth would run circles around Gerard Gallant, Norm Ullman and Dino Ciccarelli.
None-the-less, it’s amazing to see these two lineups split, once together forming some of the best hockey NHL fans had the pleasure to witness.
Specifically for Detroit, the fans were spoiled. Playoff appearance after playoff appearance, Stanley Cup after Stanley Cup, to what it is now.
Yzerman remembers the good ole days, now let’s see if he can bring them back.