nfreeman

Why? Because you think Montour is a lock to be a good top-3 NHL defenseman? Because you think Kane will not re-sign here and Montour is the best the Sabres could get for him? Other?

Marty doesn't strike me as the type of guy who'd fabricate something like that. I'd be interested to hear exactly what he said -- i.e. whether it was information from his sources, or whether he said he's heard rumors, or other. But if he said essentially that his team sources have told him that Kaner is going to be traded -- to me that is a solid piece of evidence to support a prediction that he won't be signing an extension with the Sabres and is thus likely to be traded either at the deadline or over the summer.

^^ Tough standards from Senor Doohickie!

This will be an interesting beta-test of whether the Sabres should've made this move.

I too was pleasantly surprised by Rodrigues -- he showed more speed and puck skill than I expected.

Pretty sure there was, in the last couple of years, a mini-epidemic of fed-up fans in Edmonton and Toronto (at least) throwing their jerseys on the ice in disgust with their teams, which occasioned much anguish.

There is zero possibility that Eichel will be traded.

It does seem like Lehner was referring to Eichel, innit? Not sure how I feel about this. While the best player on the team needs to buy into the system in order for the system to work, he also needs some freedom to be creative. OTOH, if his teammates are PO'd, it's probably because this is a consistent issue.

This doesn't seem likely to end well.

Did you see it happen? If you saw it, and if you don't think your son did anything out of the ordinary (or if you didn't see it but you trust him that he didn't do anything wrong), then I wouldn't make him pay for it. The stick isn't supposed to break under those conditions, and the store knows that potential customers are going to handle the sticks a bit before buying them. OTOH, If he was goofing around with it, being careless, pretending to pole vault with it, etc. -- then I would make him pay for it.

I too found that remark by DDB interesting. I suppose one reason we haven't seen much of it is that Kaner's centers have usually been Larsson and Zemgus -- who aren't the playmakers that Eichel and Reino are. I watched it and I agree -- he is definitely cutting Hammy off in a way that he didn't do to the other guy. Interesting.

Respectfully: NFW. It is crazy, IMHO, to commit to any goalie for longer than 3 years, especially well before his contract status requires you to do so.

I think this has been settled -- the Sabres can only call him up from juniors due to an emergency rash of injuries.

I noticed that too. The HNIC production is consistently excellent.

Yes indeedly!

Here's something else on Lehner: it's fair, IMHO, to attribute some of the Sabres' PK deficiencies to him -- I think there's more than a little truth to the axiom that your best penalty-killer has to be your goalie. Lehner ranks 21st in PK SV% and has surrendered the 6th-most PPGs. However, it's fair to note that Carey Price's PK #s are worse than Lehner's -- Price has surrendered the most PPGs in the NHL and is 25th in PK SV%. Price is 9th in overall SV%; Lehner is now 4th.

One Kane item from that interview with GMTM that I thought was interesting was GMTM's statement to the effect that they are continuing to work with Kaner regarding off-ice behavior. We'll probably never find out, but I'd love to know what he meant by that.

Good stuff here, matter, but it's time to set up an avatar.

Speaking of Ennis -- since Zemgus is still out, why not try him at center between Gio and Foligno?

If Franson is out for 2-3 weeks as has been reported -- no one is going to give up a #2 for him.

This is some high-quality hockey talk here boys.

If another team had McCabe, would you trade Kane for McCabe? (The correct answer is "hell no").

I thought Evander evinced the most happiness tonight I've seen all season. I really hope they sign him to an extension early this summer. Kadri is kind of a poor man's Marchand. Very hate-able. (Although to be fair I thought his hit on Gio was clean -- but not his crash into Lehner). Lehner was terrific. Pretty sound game by the D as a group. Now they need to keep it going tomorrow night vs Miller.

Good man. Don Edwards was one of my favorite players as a kid. Me too.

Hang in there friend.