Taro T

Yes, we DO know it's 14 years. But that was simply a different way of viewing it that really hit home. One more presidential election cycle without a playoff berth and they'll have guys on the roster than weren't even born prior to the streak starting.

Who's he? Guava, Pegula, John?

It TYPCIALLY is. No Spanger nor Sweeting this year. They do still have Weiss, Priolo, Dawson, Robinson, and Martin back there. But those are 2 really important guys (1 of which hasn't been there at all this year) and when the 2nd one went down along with Weiss for a few games is when the 7-0 Bandits started to lose close games. Their D was absolutely lights out on Friday. (Which was a VERY pleasant yet unexpected turn.) There was only a mispositioning on 1 of the goals against, they soaked a ton of shots, and they seemingly gathered every loose ball. They'll need to bring that again this Friday.

Not Amerk related, but just reading that in the same sentence really brought a point home. Helenius is 18, Benson is 19; these guys were in preschool or kindergarden the last time the Sabres made the playoffs. This ####ing streak has to end before they have guys on the roster that weren't even born the last time the Sabres were in the dance.

Vancouver ended the year on a crazy good run. They won their last 7 (including last night over the Kin-ig-hit Hawks). In those 7 games, they've only trailed for 3:38 seconds and THAT came in Banditland in a game the Warriors won by 1 (believe it was 14-13, maybe it was 13-12). The Bandits will need to bring their A-game to beat these guys. Was really hoping Ra-cha-cha would find a way to beat them but they got dominated early and Hartley was having serious problems as Vancouver kept getting very high danger chances. It was 9-3 at the 1/2 and the KH's could never get it back to closer than a 3 goal game though they did have a couple of glorious chances to get it back to only 2 but the post was not their friend last night. If the Bandits can get a couple goal (or ideally 3 or 4) lead, it could be that the Warriors would crack under the pressure of actually trailing; but if Vancouver gets a lead, the Bandits will have to really bear down to get back. Should be 2 good series.

Can't stand the Kin-ig-hit Hawks but hoping for them to win in Vancouver tonight. Was at the pasting the Bandits gave them last year in the 1st round. Would be fun to see the Bandits in the bad guys' barn again. (Went to both Bandit-Hawks games this year; fun times.)

Don't know for sure why that is. Would guess it's due in large part to lesser competition.

Have to believe he'd move to Buffalo if he were named the GM. If THAT were the reason they were to decide to give the job to Forton, there'd be no hope left.

They end up on the CW for about 10 or 15 home games per season. (Believe they've had one or 2 road games on, but could very well be misremembering. Have had the free Amerks subscription the past few years, so may be mistaken in believing something that was actually on AHL.tv had been shown over the air.) Guessing the AHL's new broadcast partner doesn't want any playoff games being shown via other outlets. Bummer.

Personally expect that making Forton the GM guts the front office as Karmanos and Ventura and anyone else any good says "screw this."

Speaking as one of the ones (lukewarmly) welcoming that twist in the plot, will say a big part of the reason to be in favor of it is nearly all of the better options don't seem to be realistic. Presonally believe Ruff is enough of a competitor that he truly does want this team to win and that he wouldn't be foolish enough to go along with a move of Adams to the PoHO with Forton becoming the GM. Though he isn't in the front office day to day, he has to be close enough to the front office to see things the way they are and should be. And at least from the true outside looking in certainly seems very apparent. (Realizing the view from outside is never the full picture. But will absolutely have a sinking feeling in the pit of the stomach should Forton get another bump in title &/or responsibilities.)

Agree with a lot of this. The primary disagreement is, personally believe that Adams thought a year ago's team WOULD start winning as it was (it wouldn't contend that year, but it would likely make the dance); his thought / expectation was severely off. And it was off even moreso this season. He made more changes this past season, but not adjusting the coaching staff beyond just the HC and an overreliance on 3 key young(ish) players (Luukkonnen, Cozens, and Samuelsson were all part of the leadership of this team and they all spit the bit through large parts of the year) doomed this effort as well. Hoping he's not the one trying to actually make this year's off-season moves because on a healthy squad we really shouldn't be seeing Benson and Kulich as Thompson's linemates. In an ideal world they're on a 3rd line feasting on other teams matching up with the top 2 lines.

Which is the nice part about having too many prospects to be able to bring all to the big squad. (Darn shame so few seem to be absolute home run can't miss guys; but still they have a bunch that could be 2nd liners or 2nd pairing with seasoning and maybe Östlund, or Helenius, or Poltopov should he ever come to NA, or Wahlberg, or one of the 2 really big Russian D-men or or will surprise.) A good enough prospect or 2 can help sell the slight downgrade in top end guy the other team is getting by going for quantity over quality. There's always somebody ready to take a small step back.

Thanks for the headsup. Was hoping the CW might carry one or 2 of the games this round, but doesn't look to be the case.

Makes sense thought that they'd dump the TV guy if only keeping 1. Radio broadcasters out of necessity do a better job of "painting the picture" of what's happening on the ice.

Is there nothing sacred the Pegula owned Sabres can't ruin?

Slightly off-topic, but if the Sabres hadn't drafted Savoie there's a really good chance they don't have either Benson nor McLeod on the roster who are two of their more useful players and both fill a niche the team hadn't had filled without them.

Well, Housley's available. And if the goal is McKenna ...

There's merit, but ONLY if you've already developed a place where the guys you'll really want to keep at the end of their "option" window will want to stay. IF there's not a chance in heck that they'll stay given their druthers, you CAN'T spend the entirely of that window making up your mind. You HAVE to "exercise the option" and sign that guy a year, or realistically 2 years, before they reach the point the decision on where to stay is theirs. Botterill never twigged to that reality. Perhaps it was because he was always close to the cap overpaying 3rd liners; perhaps he did understand it, but the timing of when Covid hit kept him from acting on that reality; perhaps the Pegulas simply wouldn't let him go that route having been burned on the Leino and Ehrhoff deals (the latter of which only burned them because the rules changed with the CBA changes); or maybe it was for some other reason or a combination of reasons. But the end result was a LOT of very good & good hockey players walked out the door for nothing or for futures after they'd spent their formative years developing into good players in Buffalo. And the other downside of ALWAYS waiting untii the option is ready to expire is you NEVER get a bargain contract unless the player truly loves being where he's at and gives a hometown discount.

They haven't ALL been turned into sports complexes. In Ra-cha-cha they get turned into concert venues and restaurants. 😉

He brought in Johnson the Elder only and not much else because he and Granato were both convinced the team was pretty much a lock to make the playoffs if they simply kept working hard. Not only did they pretty much run the band back with almost no changes to personnel, they spent the preseason doing stuff like seeing if come March should they need to have someone step up from Ra-cha-cha would it be Kulich or Rosen that was the right fit on Thompson's line and so on and so forth. They forgot that the reason they'd been having great starts usually was them gearing up to hit the opening of the RS like it was the start of the playoffs and few of their opponents were taking it that seriously and those opponents definitely weren't taking the Sabres seriously. When they treated October just like everybody else treats it, October ended up looking a lot more like the rest of the calendar. My 2 cents. YMMV.

If ALL of the current coaches are still here, even with improvements to the roster, no, hope doesn't appreciably rise. On a macro level, there were 3 things that doomed this season: too much youth, too poor of a coaching job at the X's and O's (poor defensive structure; ridiculously bad PP design; etc.), and too inconsistent of goaltending. The moves you suggest, (at a minimum for arguments sake will say they) in large part allievate the 1st issue (as does the simple passage of time in large degree; 3 regulars that are vets in/just past their primes, an experienced goalie in his prime, and father time making everyone still here a year older); and on paper it also allieviates the 3rd issue. But the 2nd issue remains and that 2nd issue remaining could go a long way towards scuttling the perceived improvement of the 3rd issue. Remember how awful Miller was in St. Louis even though he was still a very good goalie? In large part that was because the system they used expected the players to take away as many shots as possible leaving the goalie with pretty much an equal chance of facing a shot from the current puck carrier or someone he'd passed to whereas he was used to Buffalo's system at the time which left the puck carrier the goalie's responsibility and taking away the passing lanes was the defender's responsibility. Having the team do the same dumb things they currently do doesn't inspire confidence that the next "good" goalie actually will be any better than what they currently have. Personally, expect that by the time the puck drops for real in October, will have hope they've finally gotten to a point they can do it (at least to a level that gets them in the dance), but if nothing has changed in the coaching staff then realize it'll almost certainly have been a hope derived from searching for things to be hopeful about rather than one derived from what has actually transpired.

At SOME point, even if Adams is the GM, this team will make the playoffs. Heck, he came within a kneed in puck of it happening 2 years ago. BUT after 5 years and overall 14, at some point they just have to cut bait. MAYBE this'll be the year it all comes together. MAYBE the revamped core will finally be old enough, experienced enough, and close enough to their primes to have a 100 point season. Firing or redeploying into an different role Adams doesn't guarantee that they do make the dance. The players seem to believe in themselves and 2 vets that had other options open to them decided to stick around. So, the players seem to have hope or belief or whatever else one wants to call it. (Though it very well may be they believe in themselves and not management. Or maybe they do believe in management too. Don't know, haven't spoken directly to any of them. 😉 ) But, right now, the fans need hope. And keeping things status quo doesn't provide that.

It's the wrong time to make a significant roster altering move, but bringing up an Amerk or making a change trading for a bottom sixer (or considering they were desperately missing their best player who isn't a F) or a 3rd pairing guy that brings that "new team bounce" and looks like worldbeater for a week before becoming what he really is could actually get them a couple of W's during that streak. That would at minimum get them 2 more points, likely 4 more, and doesn't end up deflating them and possibly doesn't ruin the entire season. It ISN'T a shortcut to "what could he have even done." He could've done SOMETHING.

At the B&GI, Ruff addressed your Q to a degree. Because they had essentially an abbreviated TC and ran with the lines that seemed to make sense from last year while playing a full NHL team against 1/2 NHL squads it caused at least 2 issues. 1. The lines weren't optimized (my wording, not Ruff's) prior to facing an actual NHL caliber opponent. And 2. they thought they were better than they were because of the way the preseason played out (pretty much Ruff's words). Which resulted in them not being ready for the 2 games vs the Devils. They didn't get the structures in place that Ruff wanted installed before the bullets started flying. They played a little better when they got back to this side of the pond and might've had a better start with some puck luck (they definitely could've won the LA game at a minimum) but they didn't really even get to their more typical early season solid play for a couple more weeks. That had them chasing points early.