Taro T

Wadr, not a chance. Even with baseball becoming a much bigger NCAA thing than it was 20-30 years ago, college ball isn't anywhere near replacing the minor leagues. Hockey's been on a similar model to how baseball is organized since forever. Can't see NCAA replacing minors either. Just don't see it happening.

Again, we're in Act 2 of a 3 act 1 GM play. 😉

Don't believe Lidstrom is a coach. He'd be a great mentor though should he be willing to do that. The guy that would be the ideal coach would be Mike Ramsey. But he's not leaving his beloved Minnesota. Wonder if they could convince him to be an advisor and just come to town for TC and conversations every so often via Zoom or the like.

Well, that's a big part of why IMHO Wilford needs to go. He needs a coach that will force him to start to do that. Could've sworn that Power has said that a big part of his lack of aggression comes from being much bigger than the other kids when he was in youth hockey and getting called for penalties any time he'd do anything more than just look ath them. He needs the coach that will force him to actually engage and also needs to hear about it everytime he holds the puck for 4 seconds just standing there when the right pass was available 2 seconds in. Pretty sure he's a bright guy, so he should be able to figure it out. But both of those he needs to be coached to trust himself to make that play and know that if he takes a penalty, it'll be forgiven (most of the time) and if he trusts himself to put the puck into a tighter area that will allow a teammate to really create chaos that an oops on that pass will get forgiven way more than going to a safe outlet 2 seconds later with that opportunity gone will.

Yes, and no. By bridging him and Reinhart (ostensibly because ownership was worried about cashflow in the heart of the pandemic) the Sabres created the situation where they both decided they needed a change of scenery (and Montour did and McCabe did and ...). BUT had those 2 been given real contracts at the time, really doubt that they and Eichel all want out that next year. Totally get WHY ownership would be hesitant to make the LT offer at that time. Their wealth was tied up in non-liquid assets. But had they done so, well rebuild #2 might've actually worked. Botterill's love of 3rd liners for 3rd rounders wouldn't really have done much, but a team built around Eichel, Reinhart, Dahlin, and Ullmark would have a great core to be building around.

Would agree with thtis IF he hadn't gotten injured right at the end of the season. Not sure that he'll have the full development this year that we are expecting/hoping. Hopefully that's just erring on the side of caution / not getting our hopes up; but expect we might not see the improvement from him from the get go like we would've had he been able to train properly the entire summer.

But, it worked for the Swamp Cats. Having Alex as the backup HAS to be a plan.

Yep. Billionaire owners and ran one of the lowest team salaries in the league every year but the 1st year Adams was the GM (and apparently this year too; but will wait until all the dust settles to say that for sure) and never ONCE took on a bad salary for a prospect or a pick nor acted as the intermediary in a 3 way trade to take on salary for a prospect or a pick. And every single time that cap space that they hoarded every year evaporated the day the regular season ended. Wouldn't it have been nice to have 2 more 2nd round picks, 1 more 3rd and another Savoie that could've been moved for players to help today? But courtesy of buying out Skinner in a season they didn't have to and in a season they didn't bother replacing his salary, they're running with $4MM less cap space than they could've and next year they run with $6MM less cap space. Soooooo frustrating. They may get lucky one of these years; maybe even this one. But planning on getting lucky when you aren't Leonardo DiCaprio probably isn't the best plan.

No, do not address goaltending in the abstract. Address goaltending in the NOW. And btw, by not addressing it once in 5 years, he STILL isn't addressing it NOW. The set of years that covers the last 5 also includes now. He has not done addressed goaltending in the now one single solitary time. Not with anything more than a HOPE that it MIGHT work. Well, he brought it Comrie - a career backup. Well, he brought in Anderson - a 40 year old. Well, he brought in Reimer - at this point, a career backup. Well, he brought in Lyon - a career backup who's high point is a platooned starter. Notice a trend here, perhaps? He literally brought the guy that played way above his typical level and kept the Sabres out of the playoffs in '23 to keep them out of the playoffs again in '26. He has set the Sabres to have a strong possibility of having good goaltending somewhere 3-5 years from now. IF he's really lucky, they'll have good goaltending next season. But if they miss the playoffs again this year and next waiting for that 3 year down the road goaltending savior to show up; guess what, they lose Dahlin and Tuch and Thompson. They'd be in a better spot than they were in '15 or in '18, or in '21 when they retooled as they've got a legit farm club this time and those players would likely bring something back in return; but you're looking at a playoffless drought at that time that ends up dwarfing the Bills playoffless drought. Would love to see Levi dominate this year. Having watched him some down the stretch, am not expecting that yet. So, realistically, we're looking at UPL and Lyon as the tandem. That looks like a top 24 pairing. Yes, they could catch lightning in a bottle and be a top 12 tandem; and then the Sabres have a shot at the playoffs. But for crying out loud, how about JUST ONE ####ING TIME in FIVE ####ing YEARS start the year with a tandem that is EXPECTED to be TOP 12. JUST ONE ####ING TIME. At some point, don't you get tired of them being below average for almost an entire decade and a half? Like Morissey asked:

3 years left. No remote salary cap issues this year or next. Likely none in year 3 either as the cap will be significantly higher by then. They can only retain a little over $2.5MM anyhow as the salary is just a smidge over $5MM. Where the Pens currently are, don't see why they wouldn't want an extra pick or prospect for the If the Sabres were to land him under that scenario, it would essentially cover the Skinner cap hit 3 years from now and a little over 1/2 of it this year and a little over 1/3 of it next year.

Wouldn't be surprised. Would expect the Pens would have to retain salary, and they probably would want to as they've got a full 23 man roster signed with over $15MM in cap space left.

Now, now, be fair to Mr. Adams, whatever could he POSSIBLY have done differently? We KNOW there were no other options available because he didn't do anything differently. We, and he, are left with raising our arms and shouting at the sky because there were LITERALLY no other options available to him.

He's had 5 YEARS to address the need. What is the excuse the OTHER 4 years? Yes, it is easy to come up with hypotheticals. It's even easier to just shrug and say "well, there's absolutely nothing he could have done."

Hated, and still hate to this day, losing Ullmark.

So, YOU'RE the one that made Zucker take that penalty that blew everything up at the end? Sheesh, like the soup Nazi says: No Sabres for YOU!!!! 😉

Really? A guy pencilled in to be the backup as he's been a career backup pretty much every year in the league except 1 where he was the definition of a platoon starter is your example of Adams "addressing goaltending." This team sets itself up annually to in a best case, if everything goes right to have a 100 point season. And EVERYTHING never goes right, ever. Realize it was a tough ask this year to put a goaltending tandem on the ice that would be clearly better than last season's tandem as the few goalies that moved aren't worldbeaters. But Vancouver, at a minimum, is in a place that they've essentially got 3 GOOD goalies and are on the verge (1 year away) of only have 2 spots available for them all. Why not make an offer that they can't turn down, ideally to land Demko. But if not, to land the backup that they locked up LT. Get yourself a little breathing room to not need every single thing go right. Why not make an offer on somebody else (other than Gibson; he won't come to Buffalo and he fades badly down the stretch)? If the Swamp Cats needed a goalie, you know darn well that Zito would've found a way to get one. Vegas would too.

We're all hoping for that. Hope ain't a plan.

You ever see how good he is on this tire fire? Imagine what he could do with teammates that can play this sport.

See, that's the thing, IF Byram is traded (and persoanally expect that to be less likely by the day, but it is still realistically possible) really expect him to be traded for a package that returns about $6MM worth of salary. Except for McLeod, they don't make trades where they get the best player. (Want to say there was one other small one that the Sabres got the best player, but darned if it's coming to mind right now.) So, $6MM, $1.5-2MM, & $1.5-2MM of which only $0.5-1MM counts against the cap initially though as injuries hit, they'll burn that back. So, somewhere a bit above $3.5MM in space. If Byram gets an $8MM award and they keep him, they're looking at ~$2MM in cap. So, the pointless buying out of Skinner last year lets them appear to be spending to the cap on players this year. (Technically they will be close, but they'd be well over $6MM below the cap without that hit.)

The top 4 are good to excellent D-men (or would be if given a legit system to play in now that they are all at least close to their prime if not actually in it). The 5 and 6 should be able to be good in a good system but both have been hit or miss in the past. Would be happy with this D if somebody other than Wilford was directing them. On paper it is better than they've had since Montour was a Sabre. And it COULD be significantly better than that. Expecting coaching will hold them back. Wanted improved coaching, D, F's, and GTing. Provided Byram isn't traded, this is the one unit that did actually substantially improve on paper.

The Sabres have one - Dahlin.

In fairness, you don't often hear Adams described that way. (Usually) context helps tremendously. In this instance, not so much.

Not entirely true. Yes, even if they are perennial champions, they aren't going to be worth more than the Broadway Blue Shirts. But their value would go up significantly if they were successful on the ice. They'd have perennial sellouts and the broadcast rights would go up in value as more people in the area would be watching on TV so the ad rates would rise. Throw in merchandise sales and the like, and winning would likely increase the team's value quite a bit. Especially if Pegula or the guy he hired to run his teams could figure out how to get Sabres games broadcast on the NP, the value of the team could go up a lot by putting a winning roster on the ice.

The bolded is accurate. IMHO. And if the Sabres had an actual NHL caliber coach running the D door, expect that he'd be able to answer that because that guy would know what he is working with every day and would let the HC and the GM know his thoughts about it. As for would there have been a caveat or conditions in Adams statement that they planned to match any offer? We'll never know. He didn't make the statement in the way Quinn did nearly 20 years ago which Lowe felt he could put in a crazy offer (at the time, nowadays it'd almost be pedestrian) that politician Larry let himself get backed into matching. Expect (hope?) that Adams claim that he'd match any offer included either the adjective reasonable or realistic in that statement. And if he did or didn't, again, we won't know because Byram didn't sign an offer sheet. But, do expect that had Byram gotten an offer sheet it would've been for less than $9MM and Adams would've matched the offer. But that is as much speculation as you or others believing otherwise.

Well, yes. And that's why if Quinn is on either PP unit, he is on the one w/ 2 D rather than the one with only 1. 😉