Taro T

That rare trade that BOTH teams lost.

Of course they had Metsa with Geersen today, so we can hope but not too much.

Pretty sure Peter Dinklage is taller than Danforth. 😉

Johnson's better than Clague. Shame he's the one getting taken out of the lineup for Metsa to get his shot.

Lyon was a 50-50 shot. They'd either get the Swamp Cats version or the Wings. For once the coin landed heads. (At least for now.) Seems all you have to do to get this version of him is keep the guy he's backing up out of the lineup for a month or 2. 😉

Wonder just how hard Ron Francis is laughing every time he gets done having a conversation with his buddy Kevyn on the phone or facetime or zoom or whatever?

Union would have a problem with it if they sent him down with an injury or illness that he had aquired while on the big team.

They hosed all 3 western teams (LA, California, and Vancouver). Vancouver played in the Smythe, LA in the Norris, and the Seals in the Adams. Guess they didn't want to hose Minny, KC, nor St. Louis by putting them in an all Pacific division. And they did kind of split the footprint between the 2 conferences. The Adams (Buffalo, TO, Boston, and CA) was with the Norris (Moe-ray-all, Washington, Detroit, Pittsburgh, and LA) in the Wales Conference and the Patrick (NY, NY, Filly, and Atlanta) were with the Smythe (Chicago, St. Louis, Minny, KC, and Vancouver) in the Campbell Conference. So the Wales got the Eastern Great Lakes teams plus Washington, Moe-Ray-All, and Boston and the California teams; the Campbell got the Central TZ teams; teams near Joisey; Atlanta; and Vancouver. Everybody except those 3 were either in the Eastern or Central Time Zones and there were only 4 in even the Central Time Zone. Everybody was East Coast or Great Lakes and NOBODY wanted 3 trips out west. Back then, much like now, the owners really didn't care whether or if their rivals could compete. Heck, if Vegas didn't give $500MM to join and Seattle even more, they'd've been just as successful out of the gate as all the other expansion teams that came before them.

It was a fun game to be at. The people around us were pretty incredulous at the Sabres only having 3 shots through the entire 1st period. Yeah, but after Quinn's "shot" found the back of the net, though they did have chances, Tuch's shot hit the post, the one where Benson was setting a screen went off the side of the net, another really quality chance bounced off the D-man in front, etc., etc.. 2nd period was one of the most fun to watch in a long time. Not sure what the total shots for the period were, but late in the period, the Sabres had taken 18 shots and the Otters 17 in that stanza after only getting 3 and 8 respectively in the 1st. Place was the loudest it'd been in a while too; that there were probably only 10k-11k people in the building made it that much more impressive. The lower bowl was close to full, but there were a fair number of empty seats in the 200's and the 300's had a lot of emply seats at both ends. Thought except for pretty much just standing around trying to play the puck on the Otters PP goal that Power played well. He had a pretty big check in the 1st; and courtesy of the sharp Otter unis that you could barely pick out the #'s of from the nosebleeds much less the names, took a moment to realize it was Cozens he hit. Cozens seemed to take exception to Kulich, he was running him any time the 2 were on the ice together. Timmons has been refreshing to see in the lineup - didn't know we were allowed to have stay at home D-men that don't go running around their own end looking for hits well away from the flow of the game. Thompson and Tuch both seemed much more engaged this game. Maybe they're finally getting their heads out of their bippies. Weird that people were unhappy with Kulich; he started out on the wing on the 4th line and ended up with Benson and Tage. Didn't really see anything noticable either way in his game other than how his linemates changed. Saw Danforth take the puck to the leg on the 1st shiff of the 2nd and him struggle to get around; could've swore he had 1 more shift after that but apparently he didn't come back out for the 3rd. Team was noticably faster than in their previous 2 home games. They need to find a way to still keep that up against the heavier game that the Swamp Cats will play. As pretty much everybody else is, really liking Doan. He seems like he'll be in the mold of a Marcus Foligno; hoping he gets there. McLeod's and Quinn's best games by far of the young season. Hope they can buid on this game. Still not sure why there was no interference call right before the Otter's 3rd goal. Dahlin got knocked to the boards behind the net and his man ended up all by himself in front of Lyon to make it a 2 goal game. That was probably Ruff's best timeout in a long time. Settled them down and before the 3rd was 3 minutes old, they had their 2 goal lead back and the 3 goal lead shortly after the 4 minute mark. Again, fun game to be at. Not sure why nobody wanted to score the 8th goal. Glad the puck finally worked to Kulich. HE wanted it.

The Otters were literally playing like the Sabres, going so far as to add to their repertoire that stupid 80' dropback pass on the PP on about their 3rd PP.

It didn't cost them the game, but that 4th goal last night was entirely on Lyon. Felt the 1st MacKinnon goal the other night was on him too, but hard to fault a goalie too much when he has to move across the net and the shooter is MacKinnon. Other than those 2, not much he could've done on any of the others. He got the 2nd one covered last night and the ref's hands went up as if he'd blown his whistle and then they decided on replay that he didn't have it covered long enough. Not faulting him on that one.

Shades of Chris Drury. Though doubt the problem with this one was Pegula leaving an agreed to contract sitting on his desk for a few weeks before getting around to ok-ing it.

Charlie Finley and the Gund brothers were the owners; both sets were horrible hockey owners. (Their 1st owner was bad too. His name escapes at the moment.) There was a bumper sticker in Minnesota in the 90's. People don't kill hockey, Gunds kill hockey. They failed in Oakland, Cleveland, AND Minneapolis of all places, before going back to the bay area and eventually selling. (Htf do you get run out of Minnesota when running a hockey team? Well, they figured out a way.) And, yeah, this is about the best time to have to play the Swamp Cats. Hopefully they can pull it off.

Net PK, they're tied for 2nd at 100%. 1 PPG against and 1 SHG for. Only the Rags, who have 0 PPG's against and 1 SHG for are better. The PK has looked good. Having a goalie that can make a save tends to help there. 😉

The ironic thing is, after Tuch hit the post and they were carrying play that next shift, the crowd really got loud for the 1st time that game and then the Otters immediately went down the ice, controlled play for all of about 10 seconds and evened it up at 1 apiece. So, the team got us into it, and the building was loud for the 1st time in 3 games, and then it got very quiet for a bit. Building got loud again in the 2nd. It was a fun one to be at.

That "best in the league" PP had Peterka and Quinn blowing through the AHL with nearly unprecedented for teens stats. When those 2 moved up, the PP regressed SIGNIFICANTLY. And that's even with adding Kulich to the mix. And, btw, until that last year in Ra-cha-cha, he had this guy, you might've heard of, named Peca who was helping him. He MIGHT've made a bit of a difference there.

Not with these players they haven't. But, you knew that. Bob Woods never should've been allowed to leave the building.

Many? Ellis and Appert. Neither of which should be coaching an NHL PP.

Would be perfectly fine with them trading UPL. Give him and the team both a fresh start. Can't see Adams doing that though. BUT should Kevyn get canned, could see that being one of a new GM's 1st moves.

Disagree to an extent. The PLAYERS understand that stuff. The coaching staff are full on idjits. The reason the players were in non-usual spots was the Otters got a clear and then kept pressure on the Sabres outside the zone but the puck got over to Dahlin and HE will actually carry the puck in when it is there. He carried it in and he and McLeod ended up deep with Thompson and Zucker higher and Benson as the last man back. (He'd passed the puck to Dahlin on a SHORT drop pass to start the entry and then was hanging deep (actually outside outside the zone) and pinched to keep the puck in at the zone. Dahlin came into the zone with speed and they had 4 guys all moving with speed entering the zone because when the drop pass happened they were all near the red line not the opposing team's blue iine.) But THAT entry was completely against what Appert coaches and exactly what teams that are good on the PP do.

FLA is Saturday early. But get the sentiment. That'll be a great test. Yes, they're missing Barkov and Tkachuk but they have a lot of other talent on that roster. Do to them what Detroit did last night and maybe people start getting hope back.

Ellis right now is a victim of the schedule, much like the backups were in October of last year. No back to back nights and the starter is playing well and is still fresh as the season has just begun. Had they not been 0-3, Eliis MIGHT've gotten the start last night. But the team was desperate, Lyon is looking ilke the Lyon that came in when Bobrovsky was unavailable, and he's not being asked to play on btb nights, and with it being the very beginning of the season, he's well rested. Would run Lyon for the most part through October unless the horseshoe falls out of his pants before then. Am in no rush to activate UPL, at best he gives us the goaltending Lyon is providing, and activating him forces a roster move to either 3 headed monster or Ellis back to the Blues organization. Will take November as it comes. Expecting even when UPL is back for Lyon to get 2 of every 3 or 3 of every 5 starts. It would be foolish to go away from him while he's hot. But won't expect him to stay hot into December. Would love to see it; but don't believe he's ever stayed hot for more than 2 months. Try to get Ellis a game before activating UPL, but don't believe they have a btb for at least another week and a half, so that may not be doable. It would be good to be able to keep him long enough to force St. Louis to keep him on their roster should they make a claim on him.

OR the Sabres got stupidly lucky on the PP against a team that's now given up 8 PP goals on 17 chances. Only the BJs have sucked worse giving up 7 of 14. 18 teams have given up 2 or fewer PP goals. The Otters have given up 8. Only 2 others have given up more than 4. Sometimes it's good to play a bad team. The Sabres 3 PP goals: Goal 1, Quinn misses the net by about 3 feet and the rebound off the glass hits the goalie in the back and goes in. Quite likely EXACTLY how Appert drew it up. Goal 2, Dahlin ends up below the goal line, Thompson literally against the RW boards, and Benson at the point. Benson saves the puck from getting out of the zone, sends puck low to Dahlin who sets up Zucker almost where he normally sets up but on the opposite side of the net. 2 for 2. Goal 3, point shot hits a defenseman's stick then bounces against Zucker's chest and has enough momentum to get into the net. 3 for 3. The 1st goal isn't going to happen again this year in all realistic likelihood. The 2nd goal SHOULD happen again, but what are the odds that Appert will intentionally have them out of position? Not very likely. And the 3rd goal should also happen again, and with Zucker being the guy at the netfront will happen again, but how long will it take for puckluck to give us a bounce like that again. Would absolulte love to see them start scoring 1-2 PP goals / game regularly. It would go a long way towards making this season successful. But have absolutely 0 belief in Appert.

Your argument was that you don't beiieve McDermott necessarily favors small LBs. This kid adds the support to your argument that they brought in Edmonds as a 1st round pick. Edmonds is a monster by LB standards. Your reply, well, they got rid of him (because he wasn't good; which is why this kid called him the anti-Milano (Edmonds has world class size and speed but has the football instincts of Alan Alda; Milano is undersized as a LB but has incredible instincts.)). Soooo, what exactly is your point?

He also had Tremaine Edmonds (the anti-Milano). So, it's not like he won't try to use larger LBs if they have speed, he just seems to really want LBs that are fast. (Or Beane has a thing for fast LBs; but pretty sure he gets the ingredients the cook (coach) asks for.)