Dylan Larkin asked to be out there. That's the fact, straight from his own coach, and it turns the TNT crew's whole sermon into noise.
Friday night, Detroit moved Larkin to a non-roster injured reserve spot while his trade request hung over the team, then introduced him with the scratches before puck drop against the Rangers. The video board showed the former captain in street clothes, and the building let him have it. By at least one report, running the whole roster and scratches out there before puck drop is standard practice for home openers. At the first intermission, Paul Bissonnette looked into a camera and said, "I think we can all agree it was a bit bush league by the organization. They knew what they were going to expect for the fans raining down the boos." The panel went further, floating the idea that this would scare free agents away from Detroit.
It's a clean story: a cruel front office parades its wounded captain in front of a mob. It just isn't true.
Todd McLellan said it plainly after the game. "Well, Dylan, today, being part of the team, he wanted to be out there for the ceremony," McLellan said. "So let me make that real clear." He added that Larkin's reasoning was about his teammates: the other scratches, the guys who aren't dressed, shouldn't be left out of the ceremony either. So Larkin stood with them. Granting a man his own request is just respecting what he asked for.
Say Detroit should have protected him anyway: quietly kept him off the presentation, spared everyone the scene, because a team that looks this dysfunctional struggles to recruit. That would have meant overruling the player to save him from a crowd reaction he'd already told his coach he was willing to take. Larkin said it himself at camp, before any of this: "I asked for a trade from the Detroit Red Wings as the captain, and actions have consequences, and I understand why that decision was made, and I'm going to be professional about it." He doesn't regret the request, knew the booing was coming, and chose to face it anyway. A television panel decided he needed saving from his own choice.
The free-agent angle is the weakest part of it. No agent is going to steer a client away from a cap-space market because a crowd booed a guy who publicly asked out. Players read the room better than that. They know Larkin demanded a trade, handed over a short list of teams he'd accept, lost the captaincy he'd worn for six seasons, and still wanted to stand with his teammates. That's a guy owning a decision.
None of this clears the Ilitch ownership. Fans chanted "Sell the team!" at owner Christopher Ilitch after the Rangers scored on the power play, and a team that got shut out in its own building while a permanent GM search drags on has earned every bit of that. The anger at the top of the organization is fair. The anger TNT aimed at the introduction isn't.
Larkin asked for the trade, and he asked to stand with his teammates anyway. The only people treating him like he can't handle the consequences of his own decision are the ones who spent an intermission pretending he didn't make it.
