Detroit Red Wings Preview: Riling Up the Fan Base

If Detroit Red Wings coach Jeff Blashill wanted to get Anthony Mantha’s attention, I’m sure he succeeded. If he also wanted to get Red Wings fans talking, mission accomplished.

In the words of Mickey Redmond: Holy Jumpin. Twitter was afire with  anti-Blashill or anti-Mantha rhetoric which then escalated into trade destination conversations. The healthy scratch of a key player, especially one who is a primary goal scorer, is absolutely a fair thing to question. It’s fair to have speculation as to why, from bre

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aking team protocol, or to maybe being on the trade block.

Heck, I wrote about it, especially with the long and bumpy road Mantha had to even get the regular ice time with the big club. But I also cannot see how an organization, who just committed millions of a dollars on a four-year term would just up and deal him. It wou

ld have to be a massive offer, and I just don’t see that.

I  didn’t really realize just how divided the fan base was. There are fans who feel Mantha is overrated–which I cannot fathom. He’s streaky, and he’s had bad luck with injuries. Last year is

proof of that. If there’s anything this team needs, it’s consistency, growth, and winning. It’s still a rebuild, but the long losing streaks are tough to sit through.

One last thing–if there’s any further evidence that a loss of ice time or healthy scratch is just about getting someone’s attention and nothing more, lets go to Torts!

Maybe Yzerman could deal Mantha for Laine straight up?

A few other Red Wings observations:

Thomas Greiss notched his first win as a Red Wing, casting 36 shots aside in Detroit’s 4-1 victory.

Givani Smith will hopefully be back in the lineup again after his Gordie Howe hat trick. He showed exactly what he’s capable of, and his first goal of the season was a product of a great forecheck causing the turnover.

Smith is asked about the Gordie hatty and wasn’t even aware of what it was. But I love how he answers the question after he’s pressed to talk about his performance.

If the same tenacious effort carries over tonight, there could be similar results. There were stretches of the game where the Red Wings dominated play. After giving up an early goal in the third, they didn’t get rattled and responded with one of their own thanks to Robby Fabbri.

Another game of taking few penalties and actually seeing defenseman move up on scoring chances (Marc Staal!), and maybe Red Wings fans will be talking more about winning streaks instead.