The Wings are 15 games in and lost all three of their games last week. This last week sucked. Next week brings four games. Three of them are against division rivals and the final is against Vancouver. This could be a big week for the Wings.

With that, we're going to take a look at the roster from an individual standpoint on a good/bad/neutral perspective and see what kind of trends are working out. We'll be doing this on a week-by-week basis. Everybody will get a good/bad/neutral rating based on what they've done this past week and what we can expect from them for the coming week.

They'll also be ranked in order of strongest-to-weakest in their category.

The Forwards

The Good

1. Pavel Datsyuk - Datsyuk wasn't terribly impressive against St. Louis and missed Anaheim's game. Still, he's good compared to everybody else, not necessarily compared to the best-possible Pavel Datsyuk.
2. Tomas Tatar - Two goals this week and nearly a third. He's cemented his place on the Wings lineup in my humble opinion... meaning that he'll be back in Grand Rapids before I finish this senten...
3. Cory Emmerton - Emmerton played as high as 2nd line center this week and did well in his time there. He drove play the right direction.
4. Drew Miller - Miller scored a goal and was a big part of the Wings PK going 7/8 on kills this week.
5. Patrick Eaves - Eaves only got into one game and I think he played extremely well. I'm hoping that the only reason he's not in every night has something to do with his health, because otherwise I think he's earned it.

The Bad

1. Danny Cleary - Cleary very certainly looks like he's trying hard, but the guy's got Charlie Brown luck going on right now. Nothing is working right for him and that's hurting the team.
2. Valtteri Filppula - Filppula got called out by Babcock and followed it up with a less-than-impressive performance. Not a good week.
3. Damien Brunner - Two points in three games was pretty good for Brunner, but some defensive miscues and turnovers really cost him.
4. Gustav Nyquist - Excuses abound for him, but Friday was the second time he was given a shot to play for the Wings and the second time he's failed to impress.

The Neutral

1. Henrik Zetterberg - Zetterberg's PKing work makes up for what was not very good 5-on-5 play this week.
2. Mikael Samuelsson - Sammy had one game and wasn't impressive, but that one game was also shared with the two worst forwards as of right now.
3. Justin Abdelkader - Abby played decently, but he was part of Friday's benching and wilted a bit against tougher competition.
4. Joakim Andersson - He brought the effort, but didn't pull the results.
5. Jordin Tootoo - I still like Tootoo, but he didn't do much to make his mark on games this week.
6. Darren Helm - All politics as Helm is the highest-rated of the hurt guys who didn't play last week.
7. Johan Franzen - Bet it hurts more than your hip to be ranked below Helm, huh Mule?
8. Todd Bertuzzi - We miss you, toothless meanie.
9. Jan Mursak - I hope you're healthy enough to play for Slovenia in the Olympics.

The Defense

Injuries

The Good

1. Jonathan Ericsson - Ericsson is still the most-solid defender the Wings have right now. His decision-making and physicality continue to be positive.
2. Jakub Kindl - I thought Kindl played well enough in the first two games to avoid a benching on Sunday, but apparently Babcock disagreed.
3. Kent Huskins - Huskins' one game was 15 minutes worth of unspectacular and mostly-invisible defense. Exactly as expected in his role.

The Bad

1. Niklas Kronwall - Still waiting for Kronwall to take over a game offensively if he's not at least going to play dominant defense. Until one of those happens, he's going to get failing grades.
2. Ian White - White had an absolutely awful game on Friday with puck decisions. For an offensive defenseman, one SOG isn't good enough.

The Neutral

1. Brian Lashoff - Lashoff looked like a rookie with promise again this week. "Pretty good...for a rookie" is only about a neutral overall, as there were a few too many defensive zone miscues.
2. Kyle Quincey - Quincey would have been rated in the good category if he got more than one shot on net in the last three games.
3. Brendan Smith - I'm looking forward to his return.
4. Carlo Colaiacovo - Him too.

The Goalies

The Good

1. Jonas Gustavsson - The only Red Wings goalie to get a win this week. I don't care that it was on his conditioning stint in Grand Rapids.
2. Joey MacDonald - Good as in "good luck in Calgary, Joey."

The Bad

1. Jimmy Howard - He didn't crack a .900 save percentage in either of his chances this week. Ouch.
2. Petr Mrazek - His GAA doubled after this week. DOUBLED!

The Neutral