...

Sir, please proceed with your argument.

I guess that's what you'd expect from a competent GM, something many around here do not credit Botterill for being. I'm glad it looks as through we're being aggressive.

A serious psychological condition is far more interesting than a running joke, though.

If they put him where he belongs, and, IMHO, that's on the first line with Jack and Jeff, I could see him easily breaking 40 points, probably getting 50 or more. I think most of that will come as assists. He's good on the walls and has the other two to finish. To me, the only real question is if Olofsson can hang on that line for the season.

No friggin' way. My call is 24-18-42.

The good Lord willing...

He gives up at the very end there and allows the enemy to take the shot.

I wouldn't mind this conceptually if there was some reason to believe the team's performance would be biased more toward the first half of last season than the second half. I mean, there was no reason for them to not be in the wildcard mix except for blowing all four tires plus the spare - unless it was coaching. While I'm interested in the boldness of the RK hire, I'm equally a-feared it will fail.

@Taro T, if you write something that you can't rewrite in a forum reply/post box, you should always, always, "select all" and "copy" before you submit the post. Although, I think you have an usually higher instance of disappearing posts, and so would recommend writing them in notepad or something like that first so your...ahem...computer gremlins don't waste your time.

Are we back to Cozen's having a questionable hockey IQ? I can't keep up.

I think it's time for "the analytics" to put up or shut up. If the numbers are good, why hesitate?

Sabrez 50: Burn It With Fire

It's a bunch of people who think they know better than everyone else. Who are desperate to come up with something that "beats" the retro designs, or even the goat-head. The egos are immense.

@Randall Flagg, that was an excellent summary of RAPM charts! I liken them as the modern player "baseball" card.

Certainly a relatively safe draft, with the exception of the Huglen pick, which I must admit is an intriguing gamble. My overall assessment is that it seems Botterill competently filled most holes in the farm system. I understand the Johnson pick, we do need some fresh D in the pipeline, but would have strongly preferred a more offensively aggressive maneuver. Our core D is young enough where we could have swung for more offense this draft year. I give it a B+.

Two pages and no dossier comment?

Because everyone laid into him for not liking the pick! After all that he invested into the draft! Of course he's going to be pissed that he's not given the same courtesy as those whose reactions are different.

No no. For all of the "I don't trust Botterill" and the like as recent as earlier today, are we expected to throw away that distrust as merely a conversation we had? Do we trust that they had a solid bearing on guys who were expected to go, say 12-25? Because if we distrust Botterill's abilities, then we can reasonably argue he had his team scout guys 25-35 thoroughly but not the 12-25 guys. They had players W,X, Y,Z penciled in, we didn't give the other guys as much thought because we didn't expect them to be there.

I'm happy to cut him some slack since draft night is a big deal to him. I don't know LGR from Adam, but I do know invests a lot of time in the draft. Of course he's going to get jumpy over the picks. I don't find calling it "lazy" obnoxious, especially when he did give his reasons for not liking the pick.

I don't see the issue with what he's been saying about it. I don't like the pick, either. We need to develop some people who can finish. If they had this guy penciled in as an option at 31, did they bother to consider the forwards on the board? You can argue they did...but do you really know?

I think you guys are being too harsh on LGR. His negative opinion of the pick is no less valid than anyone's positive opinion of the pick. Come on. You might value picking a D here, obviously the Sabres do, but not a one of you can say you always agree with every stinking move they make. I give you the ROR trade. When is the logic of "you don't know what was happening behind the scenes" applied to that around here? LGR is owed his opinion just like anyone else.

That's "meth", we're talking about "math".