u/UtinniHandsOff2

I guess that's why they call her Lisa McCosplay.

Buckle in folks. This is going to drive the Yzer-haters wild but I think it's important for us to take a step back and ask ourselves a very important question that has been overlooked for far too long:

Has Dylan Larkin been the biggest hurdle to the Wings getting good again?

That might seem like an obviously farcical question but I would like to present the case that his lack of leadership and maturity have been just as detrimental, if not more so, to this team's success than anything else. What if it's actually been Dylan Larkin that has been holding back the Yzerplan all along?

When Yzerman took the team over in the spring of 2019, Larkin was coming off of a 73 point season with a -6 rating. It would be FOUR FULL SEASONS before Larkin would reach 70 points again while posting a cumulative -68 +/- over that time. In those years, only TWICE was he a + player (23-24 he was +5 and this season he was +3), and neither time was before he signed his contract extension.

I think its very likely that Yzerman was SADDLED with Larkin and if he could have, he would've moved the kid back then. That wasnt possible though. They had just moved into a new arena, had ended their playoff streak and Dylan was the hometown kid everyone had heaped expectations on. So he can't move him, but he CAN make sure that he doesn't overpay. Stevie negotiates a fair deal (considering Larkin was never a 100 point player) to keep him here but isn't willing to break the bank for him because he doesn't believe in him to that degree. By all accounts, this rubbed Dylan the wrong way and his actions over the next few seasons show friction.

Now, despite the Yzer-haters claims that he hasnt done jack shit to make this roster better, Stevie goes out and gets Debrincat to play with his re-signed center. Then he goes and gets Kane, another guy to play with Larkin. And the results? They fail to make the playoffs AND Larkin throws his GM under the bus in the media for not "doing more."

"But Stevie never built a good enough team around Larkin!" people will say. Is that true though? Look at all of the guys who he signed or traded for who IMMEDIATELY started producing the second they left Detroit. That's an indication that either those guys did not fit the system or that there's something cancerous in the locker room that is preventing the guys from bonding and playing together as a team.

Most people would have totally assumed that it was coaching. No one loved Blash and Lalonde seemed out of his element at times, so that might've been a fair assumption. But then they bring in Todd McClellan (again showing Stevie is willing to shake things up, contrary to the haters claims). The results? The same.

So at this point we've got to acknowledge that the team has tried bringing in THREE coaches, a carousel of players who have found their footing elsewhere and some offensive weapons for Dylan. The results? The same.

When a problem persists despite making many changes, maybe the problem is the only constant. That leaves us with Yzerman or Larkin as the only really 2 constants since 2019.

Yzerman's track record, well, he built the powerhouse that is Tampa Bay. He has won at the top level of competition in the NHL and the Olympics. The team he built was in first place and in the driver's seat to make the playoffs this year before Dylan's typical March swoon. His track record, before his tenure in Detroit, speaks for itself and there's no denying that winning is part of his pedigree, which is why the failure of the Yzerplan to deliver has been so maddening. We'd also be remiss to not acknowledge that the thing that really helps bad franchises turn around quickly - a generational talent at the #1 overall slot - was robbed from him through the bullshit lottery.

Now lets look at Dylan's track record. Until he won the Gold medal this year, he was, in affect, a constant loser. Never won a Natty in college, didn't win anything in the AHL and hadn't won shit at the NHL level. He's never scored 100 points and after his rookie season, he has only been a + player twice. Much has been made of his lack of 5v5 scoring down the stretch so I don't think anyone would argue that his offensive production (67 points this year) is going to be irreplaceable.

Now, with all of that said, you might still be thinking "well, he's just one guy and Yzerman didnt give him the players to play with! this roster stinks!" And I'd argue that LARKIN and his LACK OF LEADERSHIP on and off the ice are directly responsible for the poor performance of this team, especially when you consider how many guys have turned it up after leaving.

Hockey, more than any other sport really, relies on chemistry. When the chemistry in that locker room is good, when the guys are playing hard for EACH OTHER and care about representing the logo on their jersey because they are a TEAM, the results on the ice speak for themselves. When they dont? Likewise. And its pretty obvious that under Larkin's tenure as the captain, that this team was NOT inspired by him and probably didn't even like him.

Want proof of that? How many times did he take a cheap shot after a whistle over the last few seasons? How many of those times did one of his teammates put a stick in the offending player's ribcage? Who was really standing up to defend him? Hank, Nick and Stevie's teammates would've tore your head off before letting you put a finger on them. Larkin's teammates? They don't seem to care one bit.

And it's hard to blame them. When the rest of the roster was back at practice, ready to try and end the playoff drought, where was Dylan? In Miami, getting shitfaced. But hey, he earned gold, he deserves one day of celebration, right? Sure, except the next day he flies to DC to muck it up with the most polarizing political figure of the day. It's a full THREE days after guys like Mo and Raymond have gotten back to practice that your Captain joins you.

Then there's his willingness to air his greivances in the public eye without caring about how it might effect team chemistry. There's just SO MANY instances of his immaturity and lack of leadership that it is very conceivable to me that other players in that locker room looked at him and saw what we should all see now: a soft little whiny diaper bitch.

Tell me, how many guys are going to give 110% effort when their Captain can't even give 100%?

This is probably the best thing that could happen to this franchise right now, only its about 3 seasons overdue. Stevie can finally clear house of the remaining soft ass Ken Holland draft picks and finally construct a roster that is FULLY, from top to bottom, on the same page.