Gorilla Crouch

Babs on Filppula

Fil’s hockey talent is maybe matched by his excellent taste in fashion

You could imply what Red Wings head coach Mike Babcock thinks of rookie forward Valtteri Filppula based on the fact he put him on the top line with Pavel Datsyuk and Tomas Holmstrom in place of the injured Henrik Zetterberg. But Ansar Khan talked to Babcock and included the following quote in this blog entry:

“He can really skate, he’s really hard on the puck, he’s got real good instincts,’’ Babcock said. “Now we got to get him to generate offense by taking it to the net, by going to the hard areas, by not always wanting to make one more pass, by actually shooting the puck. When you keep passing it around, you stay on the outside.’’

That was my take in my recap of the game against Chicago this past Tuesday. Khan said that Babcock compared Filppula to Henrik Zetterberg in terms of his ability to hold onto the puck while skating at a high speed through traffic.

George Sipple at the Free Press also has an article on the rookie forward from Finland. Sipple reports that Hank had some advice for Fil that could have easily been dished out by Brett Hull:

“Have your stick on the ice, basically,” Zetterberg said with a laugh. “Just be ready. It’s going to be fun for him to play with Pavel and Homer. Also Homer’s going to get some more pucks now.”

Filppula will play on the top line with Datsyuk and Holmstrom tonight.