For anyone who hasn’t seen the Chrysler commercial from yesterday, do yourself a favor and scroll down to the bottom of this post and make that happen.  The clinching line in the spot, which is so fantastically well done, is “this is the Motor City and this is what we do.”

I’ll get to the hockey component of this in a minute, but before I do, just a quick word here on that ad.  The best part for me wasn’t the slick looking new ride or the fantastic images of the city.  It wasn’t the pitch-perfect narration or the star power.  It was the underlying tone of defiance about a minute in where “he” cites the city’s STORY…the one that folks elsewhere aren’t reading in the papers or hearing in rumors generated by folks who have never been to Detroit.

I’ve lost most of my ability to claim any Detroit cred.  My family moved out when I was 15 and I’m not going sit here and say that I’ve felt what’s happened the past decade with the same emotional or physical proximity as everyone still living there.  I live in Austin now, a town that’s about as un-Detroit as it gets.

…but that spot stirred something in me, as I am sure it did in anyone with a connection back to Southeastern Michigan.  It’s the answer to all of the assholes that we’ve had to put up with over the past ten years talking about our hometown being the murder capitol…or the unemployment leader…or any other trite slights they can regurgitate from some talking head.  I fully appreciate a native Detroiter griping about things happening in the city…the politics, the potholes…those lines originated before I was hatched in Dearborn.  Residents have the the right to do that and ex-pats can dabble in that territory every once in a while.  What I can’t stand though is someone who’s ripping off a line they can’t actually explain…who has never seen the city for himself…who doesn’t have any personal connection to a city that I am so proud to be from.

I tend to fumble around for a response when I hear that kind of stuff.  I try to keep it polite.  I try to not jump down the guy’s throat.  I hold back the visceral response that I’m really feeling, which is to break a beer bottle over their head.  I know that doesn’t “advance the conversation.”  This commercial said a lot of what I’ve rambled through inarticulately for years, and for that narrative, I’m damn grateful.

Making the turn here, the other thought I’m centered on today is defining “what we do” as a hockey team.  It’s getting pretty damn tough to pin down lately.  In years past, it was easy to bake our gameplan into a album cover-length description.  We held down the shot count.  We controlled the puck.  We leaned on a puck moving defense to both cancel out an opposing team’s elite forwards and get our own offense moving.

I’m having a hard time doing that today.  If I had to bake our “style” down in 30 words, I’m not sure where I’d start.  We’re giving up goals in bunches.  We’re seeing significant lapses on defense.  The goaltending is fine some nights, inadequate in others, but in either case, it’s working a lot harder than it used to.

We’re running out of excuses.  For every Cleary we get back in the lineup, we lose the right to talk about the missing talent.  Pavel or not, is anyone going to tell me with a straight face that we don’t have the talent to beat Columbus?

That Chrysler spot solidified a storyline for where our city is, where it’s headed.  It was clear and concise.  It was accurate.  I’m hoping that a month from now, a similar sense of identity emerges about our team.

Damn it feels nice to beat some Eastern Conference ass, doesn’t it?  Raise your hand if you were dreading having to come into work today and eat a season’s worth of words chirping about how the Eastern is our doormat. If we’d somehow choked away that Montreal effort on Friday or come out flat against the Devils on Saturday, we’d be doing JUST THAT this morning. We’d have to talk about how since 2000, there have been five Eastern Cup winners. We’d have to look at the Eastern’s history…their hoarding of just about every team we’d like to see more than once every seven years…how the NHL stats “leaders page” is getting owned right now by L’Eastern goons. Our first little tilt against the Eastern was a disaster. it was almost laughable.

Instead, today we get to come in and gloat a bit. We can look at the standings from our perch atop the Western and Central and smile, knowing that we handled our business. Still, I want more. I don’t just want the team stats, I want the individual accolades. Call me a non-Wing-loyalist…a guy who won’t talk the company line…but damnit, I want a scoring champ on this team. I want a golden toilet. I want my Oompa Loompa…and I want it now.

…but I’d settle for a hat trick. Coming off our curly fried triumph, I can’t help but wonder which Wing is going to cash that offer in. I’ve tried to LOGIC my way through this, but I just can’t get there. My head is telling me that, as the guy who’s been a goal short of the hattie more than any other Wing this season (3 times), Hank is the guy. Mule is another logical choice here. We’ve seen what the man, Mulestached or not, can do when he sets his mind to it.

The sentimental guy in me thinks it’s going to be Cleary, because he’s having one of THOSE seasons. Wouldn’t surprise me one bit. The guy I keep coming back to though…and I admit, there’s no logic in this…is Scuttles. Here’s why:

The Braintrust at the Wings has a habit of making us all look like assholes. I won’t go through the full catalog of times I doubted a Holland decision and ended up looking like a fool. Don’t have enough hours this morning before the meetings set in. If you need a perfect case of that though, just look at the aforementioned Loins. A year ago we were all wondering what the hell was wrong with the guy. I was questioning if he was anything more than a glorified Patrick Eaves…a solid defensive player with distant offensive upside that was usually dormant.

I can see it in my head now though.

A month…maybe a week from now…we’re cracking the keyboards hailing the Scuttles signing, talking about how Holland was a genius for seeing something in the kid and bringing him back to the Land of the Free. A Scuttles hat trick would be the perfect FU to all the assholes, myself included, who’ve rambled (on TP:60 and elsewhere) that this just isn’t working…that we need to swap him out (for Aaron Downey? yes I said that) or ship him elsewhere.

Hat trick or not, I think Hudlah is getting closer. He’s working hard out there…he’s getting more minutes…and you notice him doing things every once in a while that remind you of a man who’s trying to work his way out of a funk. He’s not there yet, but we know that buried deep in that stripper-enchanted little mind, there is a man who’s capable of ratcheting 20 goals/season. That little goal scorer…nestled beneath a hundred hookers and thousand bottles of champaign, surrounded by Van Halen-like piles of cocaine and whiskey…he’s in there somewhere. I know it.

More importantly, Babcock knows it and that’s why Hudler’s getting every chance to prove his mettle on this team…every chance to work his way out of this slide next to our top line forwards. It’s all a perfect setup to make us look like fools. Don’t be surprised when it happens.

Interested in the bar’s opinion here though.  Who do YOU think it’s going to be?  Anyone want to man up and put down a marker on a man and a game?  ”Foreman goes down in the 9th”…something to that effect?

There was a period in my life when I was never wrong. …or at least I never had to own up to being wrong. This glorious time lasted roughly 5 years between 2005-2009 and was defined by an existence I now label “offensively single.” As I’m now…like the rest of TPL…in a 9+month defensive pairing with a fantastic woman, I’m finding that…on occasion…I need to own up to things I jacked up. In the spirit of the Monday Morning Pessimist, I’m going to go ahead and call myself…and a good chunk of you all, dear readers, onto the carpet for being a bunch of assholes.

This morning, I was reliving the Saturday night magic against the Avs and I got another glimpse at Bertuzzi’s ripper to start off the scoring. It was a gorgeous goal. The kind of thing we might have expected out of the fella a few years back (during the first stint with the Wings maybe?), but one that we don’t count on these days. His role is to go to the front of the net, be a big body and make life easier for the guys he’s paired up with.

It’s a role that he’s accepted and run with, and you could argue that Bertuzzi is one of the most valuable players currently on this team. Last year, we consistently dismissed his shining moments as a factor of the guys he was playing with.

“My sister, God bless her, could rack up a half a point per night with Z and Flip.”

I’m pretty sure that is verbatim.  From me.

Fifteen games into this season though, it’s the other way around. Bertuzzi…renamed Thunderchief by the He-MacRostie over the weekend …is now the guy getting OTHER players off the lam.  Next to Pavel, I’m not sure there’s another player on this team you’d want on your line if you were a talented player (sit down, Doug Janik) on a slump.  Good things seem to be happening around Bertuzzi and that’s reflected in his numbers:  3G, 4A +11.

On the flipside of this equation is Mike Modano…another guy inked over the past year – and for a similar amount – but one whose signing was met with a far different reaction.  I’m not going to spend much time here beating “Livonia native Mike Modano” up, but I will say this – I doubt that he’s got a defined role on this team beyond someone who comes in every once in a while during the regular season to spell a guy who’s injured or sluimping.  Come playoffs, I see a bigger role for Mo, but as it stands right now, he isn’t worth shit on the 4th line and he’s not good enough to supplant anyone on the first two.  That leaves him competing with 3 other very good players for 3 spots on the 3rd line.  Not a great place to be when you’re posting 6 points and a -3 despite ample time on the PP to “find your groove.”

Getting back to me being an asshole though, think back to our reactions when we inked Thunderchief versus Willa.  When we were dining Willa…waiting for her to make up her f’ing mind…all of us sat around like drunk high school cheerleaders waiting for the big moment.  We wavered a bit as the process was drawn out, but in the end, we were there with our skirt hiked up to our navels, happy as hell that Mo was coming to Detroit for $1,750,000 per year.

When Bertuzzi signed for a cool $2,250,000, most of our were disappointed.  A handful of us were outraged.  The remainder chalked it up to a down market where we didn’t have the bankroll to bring in a legitimate stud.

It’s funny how that all turned out, isn’t it?  Here Bertuzzi is, playing his ass off and making it VERY hard to hate the man…defying the expectations…shutting up all the assholes who said that he’d never permanently simplify his game like he did in the playoffs.

…and there Modano is doing, well, nothing.

Consider this my mea culpa.