Taro T

Your travel plans are keeping you from spending 10 minutes (tops) on line? Those must be some seriously elaborate plans. ;)

He does seem to be the Andrea Kramer of the hockey world.

Pretty sure the falloff in his play you observed was due to an elbow injury rather than pining for his true love during a game.

Not sure. Expect it comes from Krebs not being ready for the NHL last year though he was here more than just the 2 games the other guys got and also his being REALLY bad in his own end in October. Once people have an idea of what they believe a player to be, it is really hard for many to revise that idea until well past the point that it is obvious that the player has grown. (Or perhaps regressed. That unwillingness to change a view of a player is there for the guys coming back down from their peaks too.)

Agree. But playing devil's advocate, it's tough to read much into moves like that when the team is so close to the salary floor. While they were in Ra-cha-cha ~1/3 of their salary was still counting towards the Sabres cap payroll.

And that is different from the regular season how exactly? ;)

But you not caring doesn't really mean a whole lot. Adams caring would.

Hadn't realized it until just now, but not only did the Ducks take the 32nd spot in the NHL, but their farm club the San Diego Gulls finished in 32nd in the AHL by a full 20 points less than the 31st club had. Maybe Johnson wants to go there, not because of his dad but because he thinks he can be in their top 4 on day 1 and not have to worry about getting bumped for about 4 years. Didn't realize what a mess than or-gan-eye-zay-shun actually is. Wow. (And the Bruins farm club had the 3rd best record in the league and the best in the east. :censored: )

27 RWs to 25 RWs.

But no Marys. We don't need a Mary.

Is Luke, Luke, Tyce played like Duck, Duck, Goose but on skates? Sounds fun.

You won't be the only one.

Like the idea of Grzelcyk but doubt Adams would accept Riley as part of the deal. He seems to be pretty adamant about avoiding grabbing guys that don't want to be here. And, considering he cleared waivers this year, expect he'd start the year in Ra-cha-cha were he in the fold and can't see him happy about it.

Great question. Just don't know.

It will. And for the 1st time in what seems like forever, Canada Day might actually be fun once again as we get to open a new present or 2. (Not expecting any monster splashes, but any and all of a GT, a 4D, and maybe a power W could all show up that day. Maybe even a 4C that helps lock down the PK, too.) The draft could be interesting too, but not for the ususal "who are the Sabres getting with this year's top 10 pick" and "what disgruntled vet might go out for an extra 1st" reasons. It could be, what other team's disgruntled vet are the Sabres getting for their 1st, Olofsson, and some prospect that only about 3 people here will even remember is in the Sabres 50 bodies count.

Well, personally, am expecting the Thompson line to be back together next year and the Cozens line as well. But there are a lot of permutations that could work and we still haven't seen any of the off-season moves yet. If Granato has a hunch, will give him the benefit of the doubt as a couple of his moves (Thompson to C, Krebs to 4C) worked extremely well and were NOT intuitively obvious at the time the move was made.

Hoping they draft a D with that pick (well, actually, hoping they trade it and Olofsson for a D that is more on this team's current time line) but it doesn't sound like any D worth a 1st round pick will be available at that pick. Would rather see another F taken there, if that is in fact the case, than see them reach. Expect Adams will take the best available (again, provided he hasn't traded the pick).

What's interesting in this is they should be trying to maximize Thompson's production as he certainly appears to be their best offensive player. (THAT isn't that interesting.) But what if Cozens is the 2nd best offensive player next year? Does Granato move 1 of them to wing to put them on a line together or does he keep them both at C and give Tage the top wingers and Cozens the 2nd best wingers? Still say that how they decide to use Greenway (keeping him in a bottom 6 role or bouncing him higher to forecheck and also keep opponents from teeing off on his linemates; or might he get put onto the 2nd line with the intention of inflicting punishment on the OTHER team's top line?) will be the key decision for how the other lines get deployed. And, getting back to Krebs, expect him as either the 3C or 4C, but depending on what piece(s) get brought in at F, maybe HE slides to a wing? In that other thread, the thought of Tom Wilson as a Sabre is quite intriguing as they could have a beast forechecker on all of the top 3 lines and the 4th line could still have Girgensons who isn't a beast but is quite good in that role too.

That just blew up my bracket. ;)

He definitely had / has a knack for D-men. Would take him back in a heartbeat as an AGM tasked specifically to that 1 area. But he did not do a good job with choosing coaches (2 very big whiffs), goaltenders, filling out the F's, nor contracts. Keep him completely away from those and sure, as said above, would take him back to focus on the D if he were masochistic enough to want to come back in that limited role.

The bolded is interesting. At the B&G Insights last year, asked Adams if the FO was where he wanted it or if he still wanted to add people. He'd said at that time that the analytics was set and he'd like to have added 1 more scout and possibly 1 more development coach. Didn't have a chance to check if those positions were filled and also didn't have a chance to ask about what changes he wanted to make this year. (And unfortunately, nobody else asked either.)

Would be very unhappy to see him leave this soon after getting here. Let them hire Botterill and keep Ventura here 3-4 more years so his revamps to how things are done here are ingrained. He'll be a GM someday. Just don't make it happen NOW.

What is overall grade for the season? B. Considered a B+, but believe it fell just short of that. What grade would you give Adams and Granato (including his staff)? Adams B+; Granato B. The PP needed to not be so Jeckyl & Hyde and in-game decision making (particularly non-line matching at home) needed to be less head scratching to get Granato an A-. Goaltending kept Adams short of an A. What grade would you give the Forwards, the Defense and the Goaltenders? Forwards: A+ in the offensive end. C- in their own end. Defense: B in the offensive end. C- in their own end. Goalies: C-. They didn't get much support but also let in far too many soft goals / goals at bad times. Far too inconsistent to rate them higher a a group. What grade would you give the Power Play and the Penalty Kill? PP: C-. It was an A++ for ~6 weeks and a D- the rest of the season. PK: D-. Barely deserved a passing grade. It was awful nearly the entire season. Who is your MVP? Dahlin. Who is your ROY? Power. (Levi will still qualify next year, so didn't give it to him for this season.) Owen should get votes for the Calder. Who is your MIP (most improved player)? There are several to choose from but considering how the narrative on his play has changed will go w/ Mittelstadt. Who is your unsung hero? He might be too sung to qualify, but will go w/ Samuelsson. And some unasked categories: Who is the team's Heart & Soul? Tuch - hands down. He bleeds Sabres B&G and does all the little things right. IMHO he is this team's leader. Who will make the biggest jump by October? If he has faith in his shot by then, Power. If not, Quinn. Darkhorse: Krebs. Who was the biggest disappointment? Olofsson. With being healthy pretty much all year and getting 3rd line usage and constant PP usage thought he could've really brought more to the table than he did. He improved his game quite a bit last year while playing through the wrist/hand issue and thought he could continue to build on that this season. Of the players that got regular ice time, he's the one that stood out in that he didn't improve nearly as much from day 1 to day 186 as the rest of the skaters. Did the team exceed, fall short of, or meet your expectations? Met them overall. Though wouldn't have predicted a historically good road record nor a sub-0.500 home record, and there were several players that exceeded or fell short of expectations; overall they ended up right where they were expected to be.

What happened to Kulich? Didn't see him get injured. But we had to leave early as our table at Dinosaur was ready sooner than we expected.

Interesting list. Particularly how many of these guys that somebody interpreted as divers are guys that come off as being dirty players IMHO.