MattPie

There are certainly social implications of living at your parents house after graduation. (just to be clear, I didn't, I moved to the Binghamton area after college in Buffalo). Second note: buying a house is not a particularly good financial decision, especially now that it looks like I'll be back to taking the standard deduction if the tax plan goes into effect how it looks now. Yes, you build equity. It's unlikely you're going to build equity faster than the 7%-ish return you'd get investing the money you save renting.

Here, try this on. Analytics are an effort to take raw stats and refine more meaningful data out of them. Here's an example, hits. Eye test says: man, that guy is great, he hits a lot. Analytics says when that guy is on the ice, his team takes 50% fewer shots per minute than the game average. Conclusion: that guy is probably a detriment as his team; you can't score if you don't shoot, and you can't shoot if you don't have the puck. If you're looking at two guys, this guy and that guy, both have the same number of hits, but this guy's team shoots average or more shots per minute while he's out there, you take this guy even if his traditional stats are identical (goals, points, hits, shots, etc.). Just keep layering factors on to try to compensate for other factors and that's what they're doing. We're in the birth of this for hockey, there are going to be wrong assumptions and bad data as things work out, but in the long run I'm betting on analytics. Even if there are players that look great and the analytics are terrible, it's entirely possible the analytics just haven't caught up to an edge case or the formulas need to be changed. It's directly akin to science; you observe, try to model and see if it works. If the model seems to work, go with it until some new observation blows it up and you start over with this new knowledge and build a better model.

Depends on how much he likes playing hockey, I guess. He's made at least $22M in the last four years, it's not like the other $3M is going to make or break him.

Yep, living at home. Unfortunately, it's the one I bought and have to take care of and not my parents. :)

Meh, that would require effort. :)

Part of the problem with football is the game just doesn't function (at least I can't imagine it) without the violence. Hockey is kinda in the same boat, although I have an easier time imagining an NHL without excessive hitting[0] than an NFL. [0] excessive hitting: essentially every hit Kaleta or Scott Stevens made after the puck was gone. Non-excessive: D pinning a guy against the boards on the rush, a forward bumping D off the puck, etc.

Those millennials should just go get a steady job and they'd be able to afford a house like I did. - Ray, 63, South Buffalo

Unless at least one of those 1sts is a top-5 and the rest top-10 I pass laughing the other GM off the phone. I'm not trading Eichel for a bunch of teen and twenty picks, where you're doing good if you get 2 bottom 9 forwards and really lucky if you get one top-3.

I should note that I'm not sure they'll improve under Housley, but the team as-is can play better. I'm not laying it at Housley's feet, but it may be a case where a coaching change would make a ton of difference by being a large shake-up in and out of the locker room.

They are all better than they've been playing, otherwise they wouldn't be in the NHL. I'm guessing it's a case of compounding frustration and lack of confidence.

Which is good. The numbers say the Sabres have to be the best team in the league for the rest of the season to even have a shot at the playoffs.

Did you see how miserable he looked at the Bills game! (No, you're right)

Definately seems like J-BOT is going to try to keep the Amerks together for the year and fill in the Sabres with pieces until their ready to make the jump.

Yep. The only thing I got out of it is D-Lo should be playing D.

True, I wasn't thinking about that. I was thinking more about the asset a GM would have to give up to get either (realistically, a non-1st round pick and/or mid-level prospect at best).

I think the Sabres don't have to pay Moulson if he retires or otherwise refuses to play wherever the Sabres send him. Retirement + KHL might be worth it. It looks like he gets paid $3M in actual dollars next year, so playing somewhere else might be worth it he really wants to play and/or the new team pays him that much.

I think that's right. The Sabres would hold his rights, I think, for 1.5 years if he tried to come back to the NHL.

Up thread I asked and it seems like at his age, it's no issue. That seems legit. The cap implications of early retirement were put in place mostly to stop teams from giving guys contracts well past 35 years old with the expectation that they'd retire before the end. That isn't the case here.

There are certainly GMs that believe some players can be reclaimed even if everyone else thinks they're not NHL players. There are also GMs that believe they know exactly who those players are. Finally, there are GMs that are completely wrong in those beliefs. :) It wouldn't surprise me in the least if there are GMs that think RL and CJ's troubles this year are on the team and not them. I don't know enough to say, but I could see Lehner going somewhere if the return is right. He hasn't impressed me, but I don't know how to factor out the D's play.

Sorry TSN, that report is pretty obvious. Of course the Sabres tried to trade him first! :)

That's actually pretty plausible given Matt and Jack's relationship.

It's be so terrible if the NHL took that "home" game away from the Sabres. Jack, I'm going to Boston in a few weeks. Got any recommendations on the best Chowda in the city? There's some cognitive bias going on here, that song is fine and all but does nothing for me. It's not even the best song named "I'm the Man". :) (NSFW, BTW)

Something like the first $800k-ish cap hit is removed, but the remainder of the cap hit remains with the Sabres (so $4.x Million). The new CBA did this to discourage teams from dumping guys in the AHL to get rid of their cap issue. Ott'wa did this to Redden just before the last lockout. Retirement: anyone know the cap implications if Moulson retires? I know age and contract structure all factor in there.

I really didn't expect this to happen. It doesn't make much difference in terms of cap or pay.

I'm not sure taking low quality shots all game it going to make the hockey more bearable, but anything is worth a shot. I also understand the logic wanting lots of hits, but you can't register a hit unless the other team has the puck. Not having the puck often leads to not scoring. So, I'd rather track something like, hits per minute of opposing possession. Probably drop out PK time, since you don't hit a lot when you're watching your GT get shelled. And double points for hits while on the PP. :) Good point. The question is whether the issue now is learning the system, critically low levels of individual confidence, or if the team has just plain given up. The latter two may be helped if loosey-goosey gets their groove on.