The Yzerplan Failed, So It’s Time For Plan Z In Detroit

When Steve Yzerman took over as Red Wings general manager in 2019, the state of Michigan embraced him as the man who would return their hockey team to glory, or at least clean up the mess Ken Holland left behind. Some of that was nostalgia for the time he was the Wings’ captain, helping them hoist three Stanley Cups. But it was based on something more tangible, too: Yzerman was coming from Tampa, and the Lightning’s team-building in the 2010s was of the finest caliber. For his entire hockey career, Yzerman had been nothing but successful. Then he came back to Detroit.

Wednesday’s news that Yzerman is stepping down as GM was a huge surprise, if only for the timing. If a team wants to make a change, they almost always do so right after the season is over and, crucially, before the draft and free agency begin. Yzerman got deep into this offseason, which has not been a rosy one for the Wings, and now he’s getting out. You can make some educated guesses at the reasons why, but they still aren’t entirely clear.

Any GM whose team holds the longest active playoff drought in the league, as the Red Wings do, has to be on the hot seat. This is especially true in Detroit, where fans got used to winning during a streak of 25 consecutive playoff appearances that started while Yzerman was a player and ended well into the salary cap era. The last few years of that streak were just perfunctory cameos, and Detroit’s reliance on old and expensive vets eventually bottomed them out. But the hope was that Yzerman could recharge the roster through a series of Tampa-esque drafts. That hasn’t happened.

After the first few years, you could see, in the right light, something intriguing being built, with foundational pieces like Moritz Seider and Lucas Raymond entering the fold. But after the lottery, the drafts have mostly been barren. In the last three seasons, the Red Wings have hovered on the fringes of the playoff picture, but they’ve never quite strung together enough points to grant them access to the first round. If you wanted to look on the bright side, you could note that the Red Wings won more games this past regular season than the Western Conference champion Vegas Golden Knights, who did not have to compete in the NHL’s toughest division. But after all these wasted years, Wings fans no longer possess the patience to celebrate hypotheticals. By year seven of the Yzerplan, the Red Wings were supposed to be good, not technically kind of OK.

One man in particular is reportedly tired of waiting, and that’s team captain Dylan Larkin. The local boy who became the face of the franchise, Larkin’s 11-year NHL career has seen him grow into an all-around great center who’s notched 30 goals in each of the past five seasons. He signed an eight-year extension in 2023, but in the time since, his relationship with the stagnant franchise has been passive-aggressively testy, and maybe even outright hostile by usual NHL standards. Not unlike a few other players from the U.S. Olympic team, Larkin (who has a no-movement clause) is now unhappy in his current location. Earlier this summer, he reportedly gave the Wings a comically short list of contenders he wanted to be traded to, and Yzerman seems to have spent his summer trying and failing to find a worthwhile haul from GMs who’ve already drained a lot of their future capital trying to win right now. In the absence of any major transactions, Larkin’s dissatisfaction has dominated Detroit’s offseason, and without any other rumors to explain the sudden change in personnel, it’s an obvious candidate for why Yzerman might be leaving at such a strange time.

I am a Red Wings fan who owns two jerseys, and they sport the names Yzerman and Larkin, so this is an unfortunate way for the piano to tumble back down the stairs. I believe Stevie Y’s reputation in Detroit will recover once the team breaks the playoff drought, but I can’t begin to predict when that’ll be. My concern is that a franchise known for loyalty and tradition promotes from the existent front office to fill the job, bringing up another ex-player from a bygone era who will again lack a certain sophistication when it comes to player evaluation. (I want someone who wouldn’t touch Ben Chiarot with a 39-and-a-half-foot pole, in other words.) It’s not going to be a quick fix. The most beloved player of the last 50 years couldn’t restore Hockeytown to its old self. The most beloved player of the last decade still wants out. But it’s been bad enough for long enough, and in too-familiar ways, that Red Wings fans can perhaps find some solace in surrendering themselves to the unknown.