Two Notes From Last Night's Red Wings Telecast

We tend not to make much mention about the actual broadcasts of Red Wings games around here, but a couple things came to mind.

During our live blog last night, someone noted that Fox Sports West was showing footage of a person in the rafters above Joe Louis Arena. Those who were watching Fox Sports Detroit's broadcast heard exactly nothing about it, but it became very obvious when the play was at the Wings end of the ice that almost an entire section was deserted, and not the "we're late getting out of the Olympia Club" deserted either.

According to a statement released by the Red Wings (but not on their website), three people got up to the fifth floor of the arena. One decided to climb onto a conduit rack (which is clearly not designed to support the weight of a person) and froze there until arena security and the Detroit Police Department could get them down.

While I understand (but don't necessarily agree with) the idea of not showing the fan on the local broadcast, there was no way to not notice an entire section of Joe Louis Arena almost empty, and it would've been nice to have some level of acknoledgement that there was something going on since it was so obvious to those watching it.

Then there's Mickey Redmond. Mickey falls under the category of "Lovable Legend" when it comes to broadcasting games, and I don't think anyone questions his love of the game. But two things last night were particularly irksome:

When talking about the situation involving Los Angeles Kings GM Dean Lombardi's comments on Red Berenson, the University of Michigan hockey head coach and collegiate coach of star defenseman Jack Johnson, Redmond was taking Lombardi to task when he added, "He shouldn't have even been talking to him." Him being Gann Matsuda, the writer on Frozen Royalty, a blog on the Kings. I took from that a shot at Matsuda, probably because he's not one from the "old media" group, and because Lombardi's initial defense was that Matsuda didn't understand the rules regarding whether the comment was on the record or not.

Then, during a moment in which Daniels was talking about players returning from the injured reserve list, Redmond dropped a bombshell: that Andreas Lilja (who has been out for almost a year now from a concussion) could come back next week. Ken Daniels seemed completely surprised when it was brought up. When we heard it during the game thread last night, there was some discussion as to whether Redmond misspoke, but that seemed unlikely because, as he was saying it, he used the telestrator to circle Lilja on the on-screen graphic.

The problem, however, is that Ken Holland told Ansar Kahn that wasn't true at all:

"Nothing has changed," Holland said. "I'm not aware of that (Redmond's comment). He (Lilja) has good days and bad days. Nobody has said anything to me that he's getting close."

I know people love Mickey Redmond, and he brings the very definition of both words when it comes to "color commentary." That being said, the first comment was the kind of thing that reminds me of how close to Don Cherry he can be: arrogant, "not the right way, meaning the old way," offputting. The second one was inexcusably wrong. I don't expect Redmond to know who Kirk Herbstriet is, but I'd suggest he take a moment or two to brush up on Herbstriet's 2007 Michigan coaching "reporting" before he decides to do that again.