The Detroit Red Wings finally found a deal that they liked when they traded Jason Williams for Kyle Calder in a three way deal involving The Flyers and the Blackhawks.

http://sports.espn.go.com/nhl/news/story?id=2780911

I like they got a winger but the trade is not a move that makes me think the team is that much better. I hope that Ken Holland doesn't think he is done because Calder is hardly a gritty, shit kicking Power forward that the team needs. I think Calder has only a handful of games of playoff experience, so that really makes him a crap shoot if he can help the team when it matters, which is why team make deals at the deadline.

I hate Bertuzzi but I could at least feel like Holland wants to win, despite the risk it would be given his health and lack of playing this season.

The only thing that makes me feel good about the move is salary wise, we didn't lose cap space since Williams was on par salary wise with Calder. So there is enough room to get a bigger name still .

There's no way this is the only deal that Kenny makes. He's got to have something else ready....

Yeah, he's still after Guerin, and the guy from the Islanders. He thinks the price will come down today with no time for St Louis to play hardball anymore.

I like the move. Williams was a finesse player and we needed more grit. Don't know muc about Calder, but he did lead Chicago in scoring last year. He's had a bad year in Philly, but maybe he'll turn it around here.

At least the Wings will win the Calder Cup now.

Isn't the Calder Trohpy for Rookie of the Year? What's the Calder Cup for?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calder_Cup

Even if this is the only move that Ken Holland makes, its still an upgrade IMO.

Guerrin is now in San Jose. There goes another option.

FUCK.

What's a Red Wing?

Bertuzzi

Even if this is the only move that Ken Holland makes, its still an upgrade IMO.

Now that we have Bertuzzi I still like the Calder move. He is a lot grittier than Willams and he seems to really step up his play when he has to. That's the kind of guy you want going into the playoffs. Now if only Bertuzzi is healthy come playoff time, I will really like the moves we made.

And Calder scores less than 2 minutes into his Red Wing career.

Even less than that, if you count ice time. He came right off the bench and scored in his first shift. Crazy.

Looks like that worked out so far then.

Interesting read:


Wings had eyes on Calder
Left-winger almost came to Detroit in an offseason deal, but GM wouldn't trade Williams.
John Niyo / The Detroit News

DETROIT -- Here's a few things you might not know about Kyle Calder, one of the Wings' newest acquisitions.
His first NHL nickname was "Kid Chaos" in Chicago. He's a distant relative of former Canadian prime minister Jean Chretien. Oh, and he almost was traded to Detroit last summer.
That last revelation is one that surfaced last week, after the Wings finally decided to part with forward Jason Williams in a three-way deal with the Chicago Blackhawks and Philadelphia Flyers. In return, the Wings picked up Calder, a hard-nosed winger they hope will help them in the playoffs.
"He's a guy that we've had on our radar screen for a while now," Wings general manager Ken Holland said.
Indeed, the Wings were among a handful of teams interested in Calder last summer when the Blackhawks -- with Calder filing for arbitration as a restricted free agent -- decided to put him on the trading block.
"But in the end," Holland said, "we weren't prepared to give what they were asking for in return."
And what was that asking price?
"Actually, they wanted Williams," Holland said. "Jason was coming off a breakout year. They called to say they were going to trade Calder, and I said we were interested but that I wasn't willing to give up Willy. I tried to do something else."
Plan B
Instead, on Aug. 4, Chicago shipped Calder, who'd won a $2.9 million arbitration award two days earlier, off to Philadelphia, in exchange for center Michal Handzus.
The trade -- or the decision not to trade, in the Wings' case -- proved to be a bust.
Handzus, in the final year of a contract that pays him $2.1 million, has missed most of the season because of a knee injury. Williams, who signed a two-year deal worth $3.6 million last summer, struggled with injuries early and hasn't come close to matching the career-best numbers (21 goals, 58 points) he posted a year ago.
The same is true for Calder, who also was coming off a career-best year in 2005-06 with 26 goals and 59 points. He had nine goals, 12 assists and was an NHL-worst minus-31 in 59 games this season with the Flyers, the league's worst team.
"It was a tough situation," said Calder, a fifth-round draft pick by Chicago in 1997. "We just kept finding ways to lose."
The Flyers' losses are the Wings' gain, it seems. Holland actually talked to Philadelphia GM Paul Holmgren a few weeks ago about a deal for Calder, "but he was looking for bigger draft picks than we were prepared to give," Holland said.
Yet when he made the routine phone calls to other GMs around the league Monday morning -- the day before the NHL trade deadline -- Chicago's Dale Tallon again inquired about Williams.
"I said that we weren't really looking to trade him, but that the one trade we would consider would be this trade for Kyle Calder," Holland said. "I told him, 'If you could get Calder back, we could do that deal we talked about last summer.' "
So Tallon did that, reacquiring Calder for defenseman Lasse Kukkonen and a third-round pick, before completing the deal with the Wings.
"We're hoping a change of scenery is what he needs," said Holland, who had Calder on his roster -- and was impressed by what he saw -- as GM of Team Canada at last year's world championships. "We like him because he's gritty. He's sort of like (Tomas) Holmstrom, you know? He goes to the corner, he goes to the front of the net, he goes to all the hard areas."
Grease is the word
"Greasy" is the term coach Mike Babcock used last week to describe Calder, who is the same size as Williams -- 5-foot-11, 180 pounds -- but enjoys a more physical game. Asked for a definition himself, Calder laughed.
"Just hard work, I guess," said Calder, who has a goal and three assists in his first three games with Detroit. "I wasn't the best player, wasn't the fastest, wasn't the toughest. It came with a lot of hard work and a lot of grit -- going to the net, doing the little things that go unnoticed but are a big deal."
That's what he'll be asked to do for the Wings, whether it's on the second line flanking Robert Lang -- "Since Calder got here, (Lang's) got more energy," Babcock said -- or perhaps even in a checking-line role at times alongside Kris Draper and Kirk Maltby.
"We think he's a playoff-type performer, he just hasn't really had an opportunity," Holland said of Calder, whose lone playoff season came in 2001 with Chicago. "Kyle's always been one of the leading guys. We think he's going to be most effective in a supporting role, which is where he fits here."
If it proves to be a good fit, he might stick around.
"Definitely, you're thinking about beyond this season," Calder said. "But you don't want to get too far ahead of yourself. You've just got to focus on the task at hand."