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They still had a lot to say about who bought the team and the future plans of the team.

These are the numbers I was referring to earlier: https://moneypuck.com/goalies.htm It's interesting that UPL generally also ranked low in the "above expected" categories, meaning that even with the poor defence factored in, he's not making enough saves.

A rank in 30s would just mean you're average. I think the problem is how badly things fell off across the board. He went from slightly above average to very good in most categories last year to below average in everything. I've dug up some actual numbers: 24/25 Games started SV% > .900: 45.5% (Below 50th percentile) 23/24 Games started SV% > .900: 64.7% (90th) 24/25 Save percentage: .887 (Below 50th) 23/24 Save percentage: .910 (70th) 24/25 High danger save percentage: .769 (Below 50th) 23/24 High danger save percentage: .830 (86th) 24/25 Mid-range save percentage: .873 (Below 50th) 23/24 Mid-range save percentage: .893 (52nd) I mean someone could run the actual numbers, but I wouldn't be surprised if he put up his 2023/24 numbers last year, the Sabres are in the playoff mix. Now I recognize that's not all on him, but it's pretty hard to underestimate the impact good goaltending would have on this team. The over/under .900 number is huge. James Reimer had 8 games over .900 down the stretch and just 3 under. Not coincidentally, the Sabres went 1-2 in the unders and 7-1 in the overs.

Totally agree... this is a nothingburger to me...

I'm really curious to see whether Peterka is more Sam Reinhart or Miro Satan.

What bothers me about UPL in your excellent description of his game is his mental fragility. The critical trait for goalies is the ability to handle adversity. There is no question that our overall defense was inadequate, lacking structure that included too many lapses. He reacted to the poor defense in front of him by getting into bad habits, such as lunging and flailing when the play was scrambling around him. As you noted, when he plays a more composed game with an economy of movement, he is very effective. Entering this season, I consider him to be the most important player that will determine how the season will play out.

Your answer is Sam Reinhart. NHL teams in general sign players to deals like this with the assumption the player will be overpaid at the start of the contract and underpaid at the end of the contract as they develop. The Sabres in particular also have to deal with the issue of attracting/retaining talent as one of the league’s less attractive markets and are more sensitive to the realities of “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush” than, say, Vegas. Those are your big picture contextual answers. As to Power himself the tools and the pedigree are obvious; it’s also pretty clear after two years of watching him train, practice and interact that they regard the person as someone they are comfortable investing in long-term. When they signed him Power was coming off his second season with these statistics: ES points 26 icetime 1880 Corsi 52% GF% 53% xGF% 47.2% These are Power’s peers at the time of signing their second contracts. Luke Hughes ES points 28 icetime 1506 Corsi 56% GF% 52.8% xGF% 55% Jake Sanderson ES points 15 Icetime 1687 Corsi 50% GF% 47.5% xGF% 49.2% Moritz Seider ES points 24 Ice time 1833 Corsi 45% GF% 48.6% xGF% 42.7% Rasmus Dahlin (bubble season) ES points 12 Ice time 1211 Corsi 55% GF% 43.6% xGF% 50.7% Seider $8.5m and Sanderson $8m signed similar deals to his. We’ll see what Hughes gets soon. Dahlin signed a bridge for $6M which (with inflation) represents roughly what would have been the alternative to what Power signed. I’d also point to the deals signed by the likes of Miller and Provorov this summer under the growing cap as a sign of things to come and a warning of how $8M is not going to be what it was, very soon. None of that changes the fact that Power regressed in the 1st year of his 2nd contract while his peers continued to develop. We’ll see if that is a blip, or whether he bucks the trend and fails to emerge the way most players of his pedigree tend to, and the way he was on track to in his first 2 seasons. Bringing it back to Reinhart. There's an example of a high-pedigree guy who wasn't an immediate star and the Sabres did not lock up. Fear of repeating that mistake has to be a motivator. Your question was what did they see in him. There’s an answer. The contract still has 6 years to prove its worth.

Personally, expect you're misreading UPL. He's a guy that needs to know everybody on the team believes in him in order to believe in himself fully AND when things start to go bad he hasn't figured out how to get out of his own head. That year he finally showed that he could be what he was in Juniors prior to the hip surgeries, he did 2 things he hadn't consistently done as a pro. He kept himself more upright in his butterfly taking away the top of the net like big goalies are expected to do. AND he moved post to post explosively and didn't overshoot the far post which personally hadn't seen him do at all as a pro. (He mght've done it on occassion, but not when this kid was watching.) As he continued to do those things, the crease was his and his play was on a positive feedback loop. Near the time that Levi's college season was coming to an end, he started to falter some, and by the time the season had ended he'd played himself back into the #3 role and didn't move back up from there on his own merit, rather he got the starter's job back by default. And about the time Levi got some starts again in the NHL, UPL's play started to tail off again. IMHO, UPL's issues are primarily between the ears. And won't expect him to figure them out for good until he demonstrates he's actually figured them out for good. But IF he does do that, the team probably is good enough in front of him to make the playoffs with that. Even with the same awful coaching we've watched for so many years.

Agree that a better GM would've found a way to upgrade the D and not send out one of their best goal scorers for about 70 cents on the $. But IF Adams uses the rest of that $5MM in cap space he gained through that deal to add another top 6F, the trade gets much closer to being equal value.

Adams makes no sense at all, he tries to upgrade the defense by getting tougher and by getting more on the defensive side yet does nothing to actually improve at goalie, he picks up a backup journeyman to go along with what should be our backup goalie in UPL. This season will most likely be over in November like usual.

Isn’t that a bigger problem? Hopefully a change in personnel coupled with improvement with age/experience can reduce some high danger chances, but if you’re ranked 30 something at the basics of the position, then it’s a lost cause, no?

agree here... I think statistically that Goaltending, Defensive improvement and the development of our younger players (Benson, Kulick,Norris, Kesselring, even Krebs, Doan) rings very important here... I think the one intangible thing that is hard to mention, how will this new mix of players gel... with the be a two way team with grit and not get run over night in and night out by teams who are focused and play 60 minutes... sick and tired of the we need 60 minutes excuse... Lindy seems to understand this but was at a clear loss at getting his team to understand this... does the new mix of players allow him to have a greater effect in the locker room... so to me all this stuff is valuable... and important... but the most important thing to me is the will of the team... to quote Zach "sometimes you just have to cross check somebody in the head" not trying to be an old school ogre here... but lets face is hockey is a physical sport that attempts to intimidate... we almost never were the intimidators... and all to often the intimidatees... its not 60 minutes a night... that is an excuse... it is not taking a skate when the puck is in the corner... it being willing to initiate or take contact to control a puck... its your team mates knowing that you are jumping in when its tough and people wont easily take liberties... and to me until that dynamic changes... nothing changes... Talent will carry this team close to .500 (82pt pace) ... the above will get them in the playoffs...

Official the Seneca Nation has purchased the NLL Rochester Knighthawks

Do you think Buffalo will score 30 less goals this season because Peterka is not here? Or even 20 less goals, let's go with that. They scored 269 last year, do you think Buffalo will score 249 goals this year?

Keeping JJP and his 30 goals, while also reducing goals against were not mutually exclusive choices. The only reason we're having this discussion is because the GM wasn't creative enough to find a way to do both.... so now were trying to rationalize it... "other guys will score more", "we didn't need those goals", "he was a defensive liability"... etc etc Facts is it was a ***** trade and the team is worse because of it.

I'd line KA up in the net, and whoever takes the shot that knocks him out first, gets to pick the new GM.

The Sabres have to remove 17% of their goals against. There offensive output is borderline irrelevant without that change. Getting just average gt brings you down to only needing 10% goal reduction. That's how bad UPL and Levi were last year.

My problem with UPL is that he seems to only really be focused when he has something to play for personally. He was really good when he was trying to earn a role on the Sabres full time, and he was really good when he was in a contract year. Outside of that he has been pretty bad, and to me that just says he only really puts in the work when he has something to play for, which is not what I expect from a professional who should want to be their best every game. But this isn't all that uncommon...a lot of players treat it like a job more than something they actually love and only seem to really focus and put the extra work in when they have something to lose or gain personally.

No idea. It didn’t make sense then and doesn’t make sense now. Giving long term deals after one good season hasn’t exactly worked out for the Sabres; namely Cozens, Samuelsson, UPL to name 3 more. Given Power’s terrible defense, I’m still waiting hot his good year.

Evan Rodriguez comes to mind, although I guess he was part of the uppity group with Eichel so it was better to get rid of him too.

I don’t understand what they saw in Owen Power to extend him out at $8M per year out thru the 2030/31 season. Anybody? He’s now an albatross and I doubt you could find another team to trade for him with that deal for probably a few years.

I think there’s plenty of offense to be given from Dahlin if he is given a real partner for once and is unlocked

NHL.com breaks goalie save percentages down into three categories. Too lazy to look up the numbers again, but my memory is telling me UPL ranked in the 30s among 60ish NHL goalies in sv% the “easier” situations and nearly at the bottom in the toughest situations.

I don’t think so. I don’t see a team where the D are making a lot of bad offence-first choices and giving up a ton of chances as a consequence. I saw (in particular) Clifton, Power and Samuelsson making a lot of poor zone coverage decisions and execution. And I saw forwards (especially Quinn and Cozens) too often making a lot of bad puck decisions that flipped the ice the other way.

Does that come at much too high a cost? Is the D too focused on creating offense that they consistently breakdown defensively? Would ten less goals by the D, lead to 20 less goals against by eliminating a significant amount of high danger chances against?