Taro T

He said he was shooting at HSBC & over torqued a rib and the tip snapped. Very fluky injury, but those fluke injuries do on occasion happen. He also said the groin injury that was bothering him at the end of the previous year still isn't right. And then listed the other items that happened in season. (Ankle & herniated disk.)

Pretty sure that right now, they just about NEED Rutherford to arrive. Because if he doesn't, Adams needs to be the best at finding under the radar talent (at all levels) & don't know that he can be. Because the above the radar talent will choose the surer things to come to when they have an option.

Probably because it is. (And in fairness, expected that post script to be a part of the prior post; not a stand alone.)

In light of today's conversations, can the Mittelstadt line be a #1 line? 😞

On the plus side, the Skinner & Okposo contracts no longer seem limiting. Okposo will be gone before they're close to the cap again & Skinner will only have 3 years at most left.

But, the teams aren't competing with the Sabres to land Eichel, Reinhart, & Ristolainen. They're competing against 30 other teams. The sell-off will bring legit assets. The problem is, those assets in all likelihood won't help in '21-'22. It's the true hockey trades that have a greater likelihood of blowing up. The Sabres are poised to be the youngest team in the league next year. Hoping Adams has more Sakic in him than Stellick. The emotion of the day makes it hard to believe it's the former & not the latter.

Well stated, gents.

On the surface, it doesn't. But what team has the best odds of winning the lottery? 3D evil chess, my friend. 😉

GA keeps calling Krueger Rasputin. Can't help but feel he was off by 1 office on that description. Adams gutted the front office on his 1st day. Canned Ralph right before the Sabres were scheduled to play 2 games vs the B's while still having his goaltending corps adequate for an AHL squad, basically guaranteeing the interim coach wouldn't bring an immediate return. And then was at minimum the face of the decision to keep the franchise center from getting surgery. All the moves seem to be designed to give himself an extended window to get things turned around. So, what 13 seasons without playoffs? Summed up the day perfectly. Sadly.

Just watched Jack's presser. Don't know if the decision to not want Eichel to have the surgery was made by Adams or ownership (obviously after consulting w/ their own medical experts) but can't see Eichel ever trusting the individual(s) that are resisting him going that route moving forward. There's a LOT of repair work that would be necessary to fix that relationship. Doubt any of them have the ability to do it. This emotion is inline with that felt on 7/1/7, the day Dom was dealt, & the day O'Reilly was dealt.

Don't see why any of the players would commit today to being all in on this team. There's no coach & no legit NHL netminders signed. They've just tied a league wide record for longest playoff drought & head into the lottery with the best odds of winning it for the 4th time out of 10. Since Ruff left, this team has never even reached an NHL 0.500. BUT, get the coach right, get Ullmark back & a goalie as good as him, and maybe there's some desire to be a part of the crew that finally rights this ship.

Well, once the coach & GM are on the same page, the players brought in will fit the vision. Right now, the only real consistency amongst the players on the roster are they have speed & are a bit clueless in their own end. That kind of leads one to believe the coach needs to have a relentless forecheck & play a puck possession game. If the goaltending gets fixed, running Ruff's post-lockout 1-3-1 neutral zone system would likely work & theoretically the kids would get better at it as the season went on like happened when the system was 1st introduced in Buffal9.

The whole ####### idea should be a non-starter. But if they come knocking on the door asking for the Sabres best player, they should be expected to offer the same. If they won't do that, then they should be politely told to go #### themselves.

If the Rags really want Eichel, the discussions START at Fox & Kakko/LaFreniere. If Fox is a no go, then walk.

IMHO, it wasn't so much Murray overpaying for assets that set the Sabres back, it was the combination of his overpaying and then Botterill letting those assets walk for nothing (Lehner, Bogosian) or pennies on the $ (O'Reilly, Kane). Swapping from building a heavy team (Murray) to a fast team (Botterill) also hurt. Neither being particularly adept at hiring coaches either also set the team back. Bylsma didn't fail because he coached a boring style. Bylsma failed because he had the players THINKING rather than PLAYING. For crying out loud, he had a team with a ton of young guys (Eichel, Reinhart, Girgensons, Fasching, Bailey, Baptiste, Carrier, Ristolainen, McCabe just for starters) learning how to play in the NHL trying to figure out which of the 8 whiteboards worth of info they needed to be doing at any given time.

Still believe that after goaltending & getting the right coach, the thing this team needs most is the 2C. Yes, there are 3 potentially viable candidates in house & there is a very real possibility that 1-3 of those internal candidates might be ready for it in the fall of '22; but 2 likely aren't there yet & the 3rd that might be really works well with the franchise C. As they really only NEED the 2C to be GOOD at that role for 1 season, wondering if Olofsson & either Ristolainen or a 2nd could get that guy. Lines end up: Skinner - Eichel - Reinhart Ruotsalainen/Bjork - Vet 2C - Cozens/Ruotsalainen Asplund - Mittelstadt - Thompson Girgensons - New 4C/ Cozens - Okposo Spare: Eakin / Bjork Wouldn't mind re-signing Sheahan to be the spare to send Eakin to Ra-cha-cha. They'd need to sign a vet D to partner with (hopefully) McCabe. McCabe - New guy Dahlin - Borgen Samuelson - Jokiharju Spares Bryson & 2nd new guy. Top 2 pairings basically interchangeable. You want to say Dahlin's pair is 1st, cool. Would still be nervous if too many injuries happen as really not sure the guys pencilled innforvRa-cha-cha can step up as about 7 of those guys from this year stepped up leaving fewer guys to be down there on the verge of being ready for their shot. And if Reinhart is the 2C this year, want to see Cozens on Eichel's wing.

With the exception of Brawndo, will stick with people I didn't notice get mentioned / only noticed they were mentioned once: Randall Flagg Raki Chz Marvin D4rk LTS SwampD NS Inky Tom Webster Weave 11 Charlie Hoss Thorny MODO nFreeman JohnC Radar & Brawndo. Didn't include people like Woody & Carp who are very valuable posters but still seem to be on self selected hiatus.

It's a fairly oversimplified position, but they need a coach that can understand his players' strengths & will build a system around what they can do rather than forcing a square peg (or several) into a round hole. It's what Ruff did for close to 20 years. My expectation is that Gallant can do this. Can Granato do it? Maybe. If after a full search the powers that be decide Granato is the right guy, so be it. But under no circumstances should they just hand the reins to him.

The Bruins game that was delayed, they offered tickets for sale in a ham handed way and had under 400 (out of over 1,900 available) sold. The rest of the FOUR games they offered for sale still only sold a couple hundred more than that. And a lot of the Pens & B's game sales were to non-Sabres fans. They saw that they couldn't even sell 1,000 seats on a weekend day against opponents that historically have had good demand for the tix. When there hadn't been ANY tix sold for a full year, no less. The virus & hoops to jump through accounted for a fair portion of that, but not all of it. A lack of interest brought on by another failing year following the previous 9 was a bigger factor IMHO. Stinking again for an 11th consecutive season could finally be that proverbial stick that will break the fans interest's back. And once that's broken, it's going to take a heck of a lot more to get it back. Not saying Granato won't be the right coach, but the odds are long against it. And we were one Tokarski family emergency away from ending the year on a 1-10 or 2-9 run because the Houser magical 7+ periods of hockey never happen. (And again, hoping all is well with his family. Not making light of their travails.) Nearly this entire board was off the Granato bandwagon.

Against the Bruins? There is NFW Skinner should ever see the ice vs the Bergeron line.

Would have a reasonable amount of trust putting GEO out against the Bergeron line. Wouldn't trust any other permutation of F's they could deploy against that line until we actually see them have success against it. IF?

IF the Sabres F up the next coaching choice, it'll be a lot more costly to the Pegulas than what Krueger will cost them out of pocket moving forward. They have to get this right. And cash flow shouldn't be an issue this season. Not w/ the new TV deals for both their major teams leagues & fuel prices rebounding.

And they got crushed by them. The LOG line was the only 1 that didn't.

The B's will be salivating at the possibility of getting Skinner on the ice against the Bergeron line regardless of who that other winger is.

With the lockdowns the way they are, has ANY player really had an opportunity to excel in that area this current season? Don't know the answer, but if they have they've been quiet about it (which truly is appreciated). Since we have little to no data on that aspect, based on the other 3 criteria, he's a no brainer. Know Okposo has been pretty big on community in the past.