Who got better?

The Wings have basically brought back their team from last season, with the exception of Brian Rafalski (retired) Ruslan Salei (free agent) Mike Modano (free agent, possible retired) and the possible retirements of Kris Draper and Chris Osgood.  They will be bringing in free agent defensemen Ian White and Mike Commodore and rookie forwards Jan Mursak and Cory Emmerton, and possibly a free agent goaltender to back up Jimmy Howard.  All of these are fairly boring, low key moves for fans remembering players like Brett Hull, Chris Chelios, and Dominik Hasek coming to Detroit.

Several other Western Conference teams have had more exiting offseasons, bringing in, and in some cases shipping out, big names.  Does that mean that they're better teams, or that better means that they passed the Wings?  That remains to be seen.  Thanks to capgeek.com for the salaries.

San Jose:
Gained: Martin Havlat, Brett Burns, Jim Vandermeer,
Lost: Devin Setoguchi, Dany Heatley, Ian White, Ben Eager, Jamal Mayers, Scott Nichol, Kent Huskins, Niclas Wallin, Kyle Wellwood (still unsigned)

Vandermeer for Huskins is basically a wash.  Burns for White is an upgrade, assuming Burns concussion issues don't return.  How big of an upgrade will depend on Burns health and how White performs playing for Detroit.  Havlat for Heatley and Setoguchi, losing two top six forwards to get one back, is a big downgrade, at least in the regular season.

The Sharks are losing 74 goals from last year, including two forwards who were regulars on the penalty kill in Mayers and Nichol.  The players they brought in scored 41 between them.  There will be at least 2 other forwards added, and they have almost $5.6 million left in cap room.  With couture replacing Setoguchi in the top six, the bottom six is weaker, and in the playoffs a team's third and fourth lines are often the difference in a series.

A large chunk of that will need to be set aside for raises that winger Logan Couture and defenseman Brent Burns will likely command this year when they become free agents.  The transactions between the Sharks and Wild did land them a solid scoring winger in Havlat and a young up and coming defenseman in Burns, not to mention cap room they got from the Heatley for Havlat trade, but at the cost of losing Heatley, one of their better young forwards in Setoguchi, having to let Ian White walk away and sign in Detroit, as well as a first round pick and top prospect Charlie Coyle.

Some of that lost offense will be made up by Logan Couture and others hopefully stepping into bigger roles and producing more, and some will be negated by the improved defensive unit replacing White with Burns, but not all of it.  At best, this is a slight upgrade after you take what they lost into account, and if Burns has more concussion issues or leaves as a free agent next summer -he will be unrestricted- it's a huge step back.

LA Kings:
Gained: Mike Richards, Simon Gagne, Colin Fraser
Lost: Wayne Simmonds, Michal Handzus, Ryan Smyth, Alex Ponikarovsky

Richards and Gagne are huge upgrades at forward, although losing top penalty killer Handzus will hurt them there.  Increased production from young defensemen Drew Doughty and Jack Johnson, assuming restricted free agent Daughty is re-signed, will give the blue line a boost.  The Kings issues surface when you get beyond their top two lines and top pair defense.  They got 82 points form top d-men Johnson and Doughty and 62 points from the other 7 players who played there last year.  The Kings hope that Gagne can bounce back from injuries that made his goal totals dip to 17 goals each of the last two seasons after scoring 30+ four of the previous five seasons.  Out of the remaining returning forwards beyond the projected top six, they only got 38 total goals.  If the younger players in that group can't produce more, or if they can't bring in outside help, the Kings will be in trouble as it takes more offense than that to win the Cup.

Vancouver Canucks:

The Canucks return virtually their entire roster from the Western Conference Champs.  The one major loss was defenseman Christian Ehrhoff, who saw his rights traded twice before signing with Buffalo.  That loss will likely fore Alain Vigneault to play Keith Ballard, who was banishes to the pressbox for his lackluster play and apparent clashes with the coach, despite a relatively hefty salary cap hit.

The Canucks biggest issue could be in goal, where the highly paid Roberto Luongo is beginning the start of his new long term contract.  They'll sink or swim with him since he is basically untradeable with that contract.  If his play in the playoffs doesn't improve, they simply will not be able to win the Cup.  Ditto for the Sedin twins who disappeared against Boston after being Hart contenders in the regular season.  The Canucks are probably the most dangerous team to the wings chances of making it to the Cup finals.

Chicago Blackhawks:
Gained: Rostislav Olesz (and his bad contract), Andrew Brunette, Daniel Carcillo, Jamal Mayers, Steve Montador, Sean O'Donnell
Lost:: Brian Campbell (and his bad contract), Tomas Kopecky, Troy Brouwer, Jassen Cullimore, Jake Dowell, Chris Campolli (un-signed RFA)

It was another eventful offseason for the Hawks.  The best news is seems to be losing Brian Campbells' big contract, one that he had no chance of earning, but it might not be as good of a deal as it looks on the surface.  Because they had to take Rostislav Olesz's contract, with 3 years left and a cap hit of $3.125 mil per year, they get a forward who has never scored more than 30 points and only managed 17 last season.  Although Campbell has failed to produce as much as was hoped offensively, he did lead the team in +/- last year and was a solid second pair defenseman.  He is replaced by Montador, a player who has never scored more than 26 points and played under 20 minutes a game for Buffalo.  Other than the increased cap space, this seems to be a push on the ice.  Other than that, the offseason was about getting some cap room and shuffling role players.

Although the Redwings didn't make any moves, with improved health and improvements from several players, they should be a better team.  These other teams made more moves for the most part, but they are not necessarily better teams because of it, they simply made more exciting moves.