OT- Conklin will not return for Wings

This is exactly what the NHL wanted; they instituted the salary cap specifically to penalize the Red Wings. This year, they went even further by rigging the playoff schedule to penalize the Wings by not allowing them to heal some injuries and finished the job with terrible officiating in the finals, especially in games three and four. You would think that an original six team would get a little more respect from the league office, but they have done nothing but sabotage the Wings for a long time now. If they win their fifth Cup of this era that they deserve next year, they will, in spite of Bettman's "work" in the other direction and lack of integrity, end any argument that they aren't THE dominant team of this era. Sadly, I don't think the league will allow the Wings to beat Pittsburgh because they want to turn Crosby into another Gretzky.

This doesn't have much to do with the cap. Conklin might have been in line for a small raise but they had basically the same cap number this year. Jimmy Howard is out of options and can't be sent back to GR without some other team snagging him up.

tater!!! i know your down in florida and that sun has probably fried your brain, but what you have just typed is complete BS. the wings are at the top end of the salary cap and that is not the doing of the NHL that is the doing of the RED WINGS. there is a reason why the wings didn't make to many moves during the regular season. this is because every time they would want to send a player down to grand rapids they would have to be put waivers and then have to clear them before going to GR. the wings have handcuffed themselves with the salary cap. as for your other shots against the NHL they are just idiotic. do i think in the back of my mind that bettmen does stuff on the shadey side? yes. but why would he want to screw over his biggest cash cow he has? you do know that where ever the wings play it's an automatic sellout, right? face the facts in games 3 and 4 the wings got out played by the pens and in game 6 they had more than enough chances to win that game. and lets not even talk about game 7 since i've never seen the wings play so flat. as for the start cup finals, the GENERAL MANAGERS voted to play back to back, and there was some confusion over how long of break there would be. the pens got 3 days and the wings got 2 in my eyes that is pretty even. when did you want the finals start this week? the sad part is down there you don't get CBC so you don't get to hear about all of this when CBC interviews ken holland and steve yzerman before the start of a couple of games. sooner or later the wings were going to have to bring up howard. you also have to remember the wings do have another goalie playing over in sweden i believe. so tater can you please go back to defending michigans honor on the mlive.com and Freep.com message boards???

It's odd that 25-11-2 is considered backup duty. 38 games seems like splitting time fairly evenly. In any case, Conklin is a damn good goalie and I hope he starts next year wherever he goes.

I don't see why they didn't at least give him an offer. Howard hasn't shown in his brief playing time that he is anywhere close to being a good NHL goalie. The Wings should have at least offered Conklin the same salary and let Howard go.

Conklin played great last year and saved the Wings when Osgood was on his little mental vacation. If Osgood does the same thing next year, then we are going to need another goalie to step up and fill that void. Is Howard good enough to do that?

Here's an update on the Wings free agent situations along with some other big names: http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?entryID=4291734&name=lebrun_p…

Jimmy Howard anyone?

that I saw on ESPN that we are probably not resigning Hossa either. That doesn't shock me and I'm actually happy with that as long as we get some other free agents.