Detroit Red Wings Will Make the Playoffs in 2015-16 as Usual

For the fifth consecutive season, the Detroit Red Wings are in a period of transition. For the first time in a decade, Mike Babcock is coaching a different team which has the Red Wings adjusting to a new coach. Though hiring Jeff Blashill will ease this transition, there are still a plethora of questions with the Red Wings.

The biggest story of the offseason was the loss of Babcock, but this won’t pose a problem as Blashill is familiar with a lot of the players. The Red Wings will employ a similar system so expect the team to play the same way. There won’t be any negative recoil from losing Babcock. As for the team, they decided to re-sign younger stars Tomas Jurco, Teemu Pulkkinen and Gustav Nyquist to ensure that they remain a similar team from 2014-15.

The dramatic change that took place however, was the Red Wings’ free agency moves. They had some of the best signings of free agency, locking up Brad Richards and Mike Green to solidify their forwards and defense. Green was an amazing signing as the Wings needed him to improve their defense. However, these signings forced them to let go of free agents Stephen Weiss, Erik Cole, Daniel Cleary and Marek Zidlicky. Losing Zidlicky will hurt their defensive depth but the addition of Green makes up for it.

As most fans know this team hasn’t missed the playoffs in a quarter of a century. No team would achieve this feat without a great philosophy for the organization. So despite losing Babcock, the Red Wings have enough smart minds to make the playoffs. Also, the addition of Green will help out the power play so I expect this team to score more goals. The younger players will have another year of development, so there isn’t an excuse for this team to miss the playoffs in 2015-16.

Although Pavel Datsyuk will be injured for the start of the season and the Red Wings don’t have any cap space, there are several other teams putting up with the same problems. Also, Jimmy Howard could return to form after two subpar seasons which will result in this team having a higher PDO. Having a higher PDO means more pucks bounce favorably, and in the NHL, a couple of lucky wins could make the difference between making the playoffs and not.