Imagine with me if you will...which is more important to the Red Wings future, a top 12 defenseman or a top 25 goal scoring wing? If you look at the remaining teams in the West, all of them (except Nashville) allowed fewer goals per game than Detroit in the regular season and NONE of them average more goals per game. To me, that means we need to be stronger in our own zone and the neutral zone. Only Phoenix was worse on the PP and all of them were better on the PK. So adding a PP and PK defenceman seems to be the primary goal for the front office. I've added a chart after the jump that details the cap for the next 4 years:

The chart below breaks down the cap hits for the next 4years on the left and on the right has the lines for each year. I tried to keep between $800K and $2M of cap space for each season. Based on my belief that the immediate need is for Suter rather than Parise, I signed him. But I'm a big fan of going after Jordan Staal to C our 2nd line for '13-'14. There's a couple open spots (7th D in 13-14, 14-15, & 15-16; 4th line W in 14-15 & 15-16) that will need to be filled depending on FAs and GR play. Originally I had highlighted any signing I had made in a different color, but I don't know how to do that on here so I used italics instead.

Obviously there's a lot of speculation here, but based on Red Wings promotion I think our chances are good. I know some people are down on Kindl, but I think he's a steal at $883K and could be had for under $2M after that. He'll be a solid 5th/6th pairing but I don't think he'll ever be more than that. So why not keep him. I'd let Hudler test the market. If he gets a good deal, let him go. I think we could get someone else for $4M or less to play with Hank and Flip. Helm will make a great W in a couple years when Sheahan is ready to be a full time C in the NHL. Yes, I bumped the Datsyuk/Zetterberg line down in '15-'16. They'll be slowing down by that time and not top line anymore.

I don't know of any team that has this kind of depth. We're in good shape inside our organization. If we get another diamond in the rough ala Datsyuk (6th rd) or Zetterberg (7th rd) or even Ericsson (9th rd) they could jump ahead of someone easily.

I don't know about you, but I like what I see.