The Wings might not be an elite team now, and may not be for a few years, but to call them an incompetent franchise is laughable. They're clearly in a transition period, but when you lose the second best defenseman of all time and another two good defensemen in Rafalski and Stuart the team is going to have a period of being less good than previous.
They have young players that are making an impact NOW, and have young players that will be ready to make an impact in the next few years.
Tatar, Nyquist, Sheahan, DeKeyser, and Jurco are all contributing now.
This coming off season we will hopefully be unloading Cleary, Bertuzzi, Samuelsson, Eaves, and Quincey leaving room for either a UFA guy or another young gun or two to come up.
Teams that built for the long haul are going to have dips at times, but the Wings ARE competently run.