{"id":34270,"date":"2018-08-13T21:22:04","date_gmt":"2018-08-14T01:22:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/?p=34270"},"modified":"2018-08-13T21:22:04","modified_gmt":"2018-08-14T01:22:04","slug":"detroit-red-wings-uncertain-about-future-of-henrik-zetterberg","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2018\/08\/13\/detroit-red-wings-uncertain-about-future-of-henrik-zetterberg\/","title":{"rendered":"Detroit Red Wings Uncertain About Future of Henrik Zetterberg"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/nhl-teams\/red-wings\/\" target=\"_self\">Detroit Red Wings<\/a> thought that team captain <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/z\/zettehe01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Henrik Zetterberg<\/a><\/strong> would be ready to go for the upcoming season. However, his long-time back problems have thrown the Swedish forward&#8217;s future into doubt.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Red Wings very discouraged regarding Henrik Zetterberg <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/zFwN0uZh3Z\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/zFwN0uZh3Z<\/a> via <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/freep?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@freep<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Helene St. James (@HeleneStJames) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/HeleneStJames\/status\/1027963784357453825?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">August 10, 2018<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Henrik Zetterberg and His Changing Status<\/h2>\n<p>Red Wings general manager <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/h\/hollake01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Ken Holland<\/a><\/strong> said during a summer golf outing that Zetterberg <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/2018\/06\/13\/detroit-red-wings-welcome-return-of-henrik-zetterberg\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">was planning on playing this season<\/a>. The 37-year-old said told the media that he would be back for his 16<sup>th<\/sup> season with the club.<\/p>\n<p>However, Holland <a href=\"https:\/\/nhl.nbcsports.com\/2018\/08\/11\/red-wings-gm-back-issue-makes-zetterbergs-future-real-unknown\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">gave reporters a health update<\/a> on August 10th. Holland said that he talked to Zetterberg\u2019s agent and the forward hasn\u2019t been able to train like he\u2019s done in past summers.<\/p>\n<p>Zetterberg hasn\u2019t missed a game in the last three seasons after sustaining a back injury during the 2014 Winter Olympics. He\u2019s been a staple of a lineup that has undergone many changes in that time frame. He\u2019s played at least 75 games in a season 10 times in his career.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCertainly, he\u2019s a bit of an unknown in terms of health,\u201d said Holland during the conference call. \u201cHe didn\u2019t practice basically the last two, two-and-a-half months of the season, he just played games.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>A Multi-Faceted Leader<\/h2>\n<p>The Njurunda, Sweden native is still a valuable asset to head coach <strong>Jeff Blashill<\/strong>. Zetterberg topped 25 assists every year since his sophomore season and is very intelligent on the ice. He\u2019s also one of the team\u2019s better penalty killers and eats many valuable minutes.<\/p>\n<p>Zetterberg\u2019s point production has declined over the last few seasons as he only totalled 11 goals last season and scored more than 20 since 2011-12. However, he\u2019s been a locker room leader who has helped players like possible future team captain<strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/l\/larkidy01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dylan Larkin<\/a><\/strong> mature.<\/p>\n<p>Detroit is expected to be in rebuilding mode over the next couple of seasons and players like Zetterberg can help foster the youth movement. He can nurture the next generation of talent looking to get back the postseason.<\/p>\n<p>He currently sits 40 points shy of the 1,000-point plateau and has a good shot of surpassing the mark if he can get back on the ice. The milestone would have given fans something to look forward to in a year that may trudge along.<\/p>\n<h2>What It Means For the Future<\/h2>\n<p>Zetterberg still has three seasons left in his contract with a cap hit of $6.083 million per year. Detroit can reclaim that money if he is placed on long-term injured reserve.<\/p>\n<p>The injury may allow the Wings some valuable cap space because the team<a href=\"https:\/\/www.capfriendly.com\/teams\/redwings\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> is at their limit entering the season, according to Cap Friendly<\/a>. There <a href=\"https:\/\/www.freep.com\/story\/sports\/nhl\/red-wings\/2018\/08\/08\/detroit-red-wings-jimmy-howard\/923541002\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">may be some trades<\/a> to alleviate the salary-cap pressure especially if the team falls out of contention. Players like <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/n\/nyquigu01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Gustav Nyquist<\/a><\/strong>,<strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/h\/howarja02.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jimmy Howard<\/a><\/strong> and others could be available for the right price.<\/p>\n<p>The cap savings could help Detroit out, but losing a leader like Zetterberg could stunt the development of the team\u2019s rebuild.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Detroit Red Wings thought that team captain Henrik Zetterberg would be ready to go for the upcoming season. However, his long-time back problems have thrown the Swedish forward&#8217;s future into doubt. Red Wings very discouraged regarding Henrik Zetterberg https:\/\/t.co\/zFwN0uZh3Z via @freep &mdash; Helene St. James (@HeleneStJames) August 10, 2018 Henrik Zetterberg and His Changing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2352,"featured_media":30850,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,34],"tags":[95,344,296,292,343,817,571],"class_list":["post-34270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-redwings","category-news","tag-detroit-red-wings","tag-dylan-larkin","tag-gustav-nyquist","tag-henrik-zetterberg","tag-jeff-blashill","tag-jimmy-howard","tag-ken-holland"],"modified_by":"Ben Kerr","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2352"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}