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Duff can prepare his speech for the End Of Season Dinner. Should be scheduled soon.

It has to be so demoralizing to see the kazillionth example of hockey decisions that are not about winning.

without the dinner and nice gifts

I just cut my lawn again, North of Buffalo.

Couldn’t watch live. Watched the recording. If Ruff and his staff feel any urgency to win games like this one, against an inferior team that played the previous night, had to travel, and had a practice session in the morning, they failed to convey it to the team. The Blues out skated, outplayed, and wanted the win more than the Sabres. Sure, we were missing parts of our top lines, but two of our top scoring forwards failed to perform with only 2 SOG apiece. We can’t win if we don’t score. UPL was not sharp and his tripping penalty with a few minutes left was careless and beyond stupid. How will Ruff respond to this team failure? How will Adams respond? How will the players respond? Big road trip ahead.

So how was the meet up, the pub, the food, the talk? Never mind on the game.

These guy don’t care enough it very obvious. Has anyone ever benched besides 19&22.

Hoo boy. Should? Trap game? The Buffalo Sabres? Wow. But I wouldn't be surprised if our entitled players think that way. Lyon was holding up. .915 save percentage through a decent sample size. UPL in goal is a mystery... well, maybe not. Terry ain't gonna pay all those clams to a backup (and I'll bet a hundred smackeroos that TP is the kinda guy who says clams). 10 home games, 82 point pace. They are not for real so far.

I can still golf, weather matters.

The final nail in the coffin. The thread this morning reads like 12 days of xmas. The Sabres got shut out / Blues were back-to-back / full morning practice / Kyrou healthy scratch / Baaaackup goallieeeeeee / 5 hit posts / 70% puck battles lost / all this was at home / a brand-new Sheevyn thread .... and while wearing the goat head uniforms!

I was done the day he was hired.

As you noted, this was a fraudulent "coaching search" that fooled no one. Everyone who had a penny's worth of sense recognized that the hiring process was an undisguised charade. It was lame to even try to call it as anything other than for what it was i.e. an owner's hire. The disqualifying issue isn't that Ruff was selected as the HC. It was that a critical hire, like the GM hire, was made based on the whim of an incompetent and hubristic owner. It isn't a surprise that when an organization acts in a third-rate manner that the end product is third-rate. Ownership matters!

Is throwing yourself under the bus = credibility?

It’s too early in the season to overreact to how a single game or two impacts the standings. They simply have to avoid two losses in a row and they need wins, not OTLs. They can’t fall into the same old bad habit of accepting losses or this will unravel quickly This team takes periods off, sometimes entire games off. They lose to teams they should beat. The outcome of the Blues game was predictable. All the signs of a trap game were there The Sabres are poorly coached. They start slow, they finish slow. The top 6 is a shambles right now, but even without the injuries it is not that good. The center spine is a weak. Josh Norris was a big and stupid gamble that a GM with 5 straight losing seasons should not have made. Thompson and Dahlin are not doing enough. I fear more inner turmoil is brewing Goaltending will be the key. History says Lyon will not hold up. History says UPL is not good enough. We have seen Ellis once and he stole a win yet he can’t get back on the ice.

....and in the goat head uniforms.

I don’t think there is a single GMKA fan left on this board. He has failed miserably and this is the ONLY team (i.e. owner) in the entire NHL that has still allowed this disaster (GMKA) to keep his job. The fish stinks at the head, so all fingers point to Pegula and his indifference to the fans.

I don't think so but that's not the point... Don't take it to extremes. How many times in the past... Decade? When things have gone bad pegula is nowhere to be found in Adam's has to sit in front of the reporters and take the tough questions... While his answers hardly ever stray from something like... Terry is a great owner and the rest of us just have to do better... Or some version of that? I haven't noticed things like that happening.... certainly to the extent they happen here... Around the rest of the NHL.

Stop looking in the mirror. You'll be fine.

Time for a speech from Terry, to KA.

Everyone needs to know this. T-Pegs is the new OSP (we’ll have to come up with something other Golisano’s old nickname). He is pinching every penny he can. He won’t pay anyone that isn’t with the team. Sort of understandable but in today’s sports world, it’s not a realistic plan.

If they come back from this road trip in last place in the conference, I'm ready to blow things up. Yeah it's early. Yeah they have injuries. Yeah they could still get back into it, but emotionally with regard to this team it's not fun anymore. And I'm the person that for the last few years... Once they have been out of things... Have said that I can enjoy the team on a night-to-night basis, just hoping to enjoy a single win. I think I've moved past that. There is all this fear about losing Dahlin, losing Tage, losing Tuch... Well guess what? Every other team in the NHL has made the playoffs since Buffalo has, and they've done it at some point without those guys. I'll give them this road trip. But if they don't do well on it... At least another tear down and rebuild, hopefully with different decision makers, can give us something to look forward to even if it's years away. With this team, that doesn't seem to be there. Hope. Right now.... Especially if this road trip doesn't go well... I'd feel like an idiot if I still hung on to some hope with this front office and this roster. Up until last night I nervously watched every home game hoping the arena would be filled... Hoping that the fan base is supporting this team. A switch went off last night where now I'm hoping for an empty arena to force some kind of major change. This road trip for me is not only the season... It is the short to medium term referendum on the entire franchise.

KA was an owner's hire. From a qualification standpoint, it made no sense. From the owner's perspective, he got exactly what he wanted. He hired someone in his organization (business side) who had numerous discussions with on how to cut costs and save him money. A plan was drawn up to start over again, replacing the more expensive core players with cheaper newly drafted players. It was the standard model for most rebuilds. The argument shouldn't be about whether the "rebuild plan" was right or wrong because that was the approach that was decided on. Even if it was the wrong approach to take, that doesn't mean that it couldn't have worked reasonably well by year five if implemented properly. Anyone who has been in the work world knows very well that it doesn't matter what the "plan" is, whether it is a smart or foolish plan, that it will not work when carried out by incompetents. So where are we now five years into the KA tenure? We are still a flailing franchise that is spinning its wheels and getting nowhere fast. Within the Pegula ownership era it has been noted for its best players wanting out. And it shouldn't be surprising that its current best players will be on the verge of wanting out of this fiasco situation. What's the lesson to be learned? Ownership matters.

Are there NHL GM’s routinely throwing the team owner, their boss, under the bus?

That is literally my point. Lindy is a "fine" coach. But the best coach the Pegula/Adams were ever going to actually hire. Could you hire a better coach then Lindy? Sure Was Pegula/Adams going to hire a better coach than Lindy? No. This is a group that has whined and cried and given up under what 3, 4 head coaches now?

Imagine having somewhat decent goaltending to start the year and then making the decision to insert UPL and flushing it down the toilet. Also, Tage looks terrible. He desperately needs a center that can drive play and create chances for him.