Joseph's in a real dillema, look at all that has happened to him in the past year:
He gets traded to the wings and many canadian fans are heart-broken and angered... next he leads the wings into the playoffs where he loses to the mighty ducks of anahiem, next when the season ends he gets the news hashek is coming back, now hes looking for a team to go too. All this in one short year, who wouldv'e guessed it?
I knew Joseph wouldn't stick around long. He doesn't suit that organization at all. He belongs on a team where management puts up with poor play and doesn't do anything about it, ala the Leafs. Detroit expects exceptional goaltending and Joseph is unable to produce. Maybe he felt pressured to succeed and prove the Leafs, who knows.
i am not trying to steal legaces thunder but many of those games were played agansit low placed team. Legace should be a started but when youa re in a tough position you need to go with experience i know there isnt alot of wings fans in this forum but hasek is an amzing goaltender
The relative calm of the Detroit Red Wings' preseason will come to a screeching halt early next week, because that's when goaltender-without-portfolio Curtis Joseph is scheduled to arrive in Motown.
The doctor who performed minor ankle surgery on Joseph in August has cleared him to begin skating on Tuesday, so that is when the Red Wings expect their $8 million-a-year-odd-man-out to don his pads and join Dominik Hasek and Manny Legace in one of the most uncomfortable goaltending controversies in NHL history.
For the media in both Detroit and Toronto, it will be like turning vampires loose in a blood bank.
Controversy.
Tension.
Uncertainty.
You couldn't make up stuff like this.
How will Joseph react? What will he say? How will Hasek handle it?
Knowing Joseph, he'll probably take the high road for public consumption, but those who really know him say he's extremely angry, bitter and disappointed.
And who can blame him? A year ago, he was like a lottery winner, signing a three-year, $24 million no trade deal with the defending Stanley Cup champions. Coming off a first-round playoff exit a year later, Joseph is guaranteed his money but little else. He also has no idea where or when he might end up with another NHL club.
And it's not as if the Red Wings are relishing the situation, either. Joseph's ankle surgery destroyed whatever chance there was of trading him quickly in the off-season. Unless Detroit's shellacking of Felix Potvin and the Boston Bruins on Wednesday night gets Boston GM Mike O'Connell to fall off Jeremy Jacobs' wallet, there is currently no market for Joseph.
The Red Wings are sure to expose Joseph in the preseason waiver draft, but there will be no takers. Not at $8 million a season. The Red Wings' only course of action then is to get Joseph in camp, get him in game shape and play him enough in the regular season to show the Bruins or New York Rangers or any other team that he could be the solution to an early-season goaltending problem.
Joseph will be lucky to get in four games a month. Legace, a good soldier who knows his place in Detroit, will just sit tight. Hasek will do his thing, but heaven help him and the Wings if he stumbles. How long it takes to move Joseph will depend on what goaltending leaks spring up around the league.
In other words, this may take awhile.
In the meantime, it's bound to be a media feeding frenzy, especially when you consider the Wings close out their pre-season schedule with a home-and-home against none other than Joseph's old team - the Toronto Maple Leafs, on Oct. 4 and 5.
The Detroit goalie Hasek let in 3 on 18 shots against Ottawa in the Sept 30 3-1 loss. Maybe they should consider playing that Curtis Joseph guy. He seems to have a lot of experience and is quite a bit younger than Hasek. He used to play for Toronto.
the wings haven't had a good season record for the past 5 years. You can't judge a team or a player by team exibition games, if smith and lewis or holland for that matter didnt think that hasek was trong enough to play they wouldnt have signed him. If thing go sour with hasek they have legace to back him up, maybe at the begining of the season you will see manny in net while hasek is getting his feet net... but we will find out next week
i think they should play cujo at least a few games, to somewhat showcase him and keep him in game shape in case another team loses a goalie to injury or the goalie they slated to start faulters.
Hask, Cujo, or Legace
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