Franzen, Datsyuk, Quincey, Green, Smith, Richards, Miller, Pulkkinen. That's our list of injured players SO FAR this season, and it's looking pretty similar to every other season we've been playing lately. Every year, we get hammered with injuries like this, and the players never come back 100%.

When is enough enough? How many seasons in a row do we need to get plastered with big, long-term injuries before we finally decide to get an enforcer or someone big and aggressive that will protect our players? I know the league is trying to move away from that sort of player, but in the meantime we have been getting absolutely pulverized by almost every team we play for the past several years.

Every team that plays against us knows they can just tee off on whomever they want with little to on repercussion, because our only answer to anything like this is the odd fight by Abdelkader or Smith, which does nothing to dissuade other teams from lining up our players for huge hits.

You want to know why Datsyuk is always getting injured now? Because he's played his entire career as a living bullseye with nobody to protect him. He's not made of glass, he's made of freaking titanium that is finally showing wear and tear and breaking down after like 15 years of constant abuse.

Is this what we want for our young players now too? Larkin has already been lined up for some big, cheap, dirty hits, (elbow to the back of the head by Colborne for example) and LUCKILY he's been okay so far... but it's only going to get worse.

You think Arizona would have kept teeing off on our players like they did if we had someone out there who was a physical threat to them? Someone who they were worried would go after Duclair or Domi when they went after our guys?

TL;DR -There is absolutely NO reason not to pound every single one of our players into dust every time you play us, because we have no answer whatsoever. The Wings need to get a physical threat out on the ice to dissuade people from injuring our players, otherwise we can expect shortened and stunted careers out of our young stars.