nfreeman

I liked Ennis and for a while thought he’d be a worthy rival to his contemporary Marchand, who is similarly sized and wears the same number. Alas, Ennis was laid low by injuries, including a severe concussion and major ankle injury and was never the same afterwards.

I wouldn't be surprised if the overruns did indeed to RR getting canned. 20% overruns, and the project has barely gotten started. Does anyone think this will ultimately come in at less than $2.5B? I'll also predict that the state or city ends up eating a good chunk of the overage, regardless of the current agreement on this. I'd call it a freaking joke if weren't so GD unfunny and so business-as-usual for big NYS projects. It'll never happen, but I would love TP to just cancel the whole thing, put up some more support columns in the Ralph and keep the team there.

The bolded is a great observation.

Dahlin is a very good skater IMHO but not a great one. Power could get to great. Excellent breakdown. My choice is Dahlin but you make a good case that Power has a chance to exceed a really high bar. I think Dahlin has more goal-scoring ability but Power might equal or surpass him in assists. And having a tandem like that would be awesome but Pronger & Nieds aren't good comps for our guys IMHO. I kinda like Dougie Hamilton as a comparable for Power, although I think Power can be better than Hamilton. Yes -- this is an important factor. I really want more hitting from Power so that by his 3rd year he's regularly a physical factor. I love the points about their hockey IQs and about Power manipulating the chessboard. I agree that Dahlin's game doesn't resemble Lidstrom's. At his best it's more like Orr's or Potvin's game IMHO. A few things can be true at once: - Dahlin can be at a level well above Sammy's. - Nevertheless, Sammy's game can complement Dahlin's game well -- and, yes, free Dahlin up to be more aggressive in pushing the offensive play -- and Sammy can be better suited to and more effective in this role than, say, 75% of NHL defensemen. - Any fancystat that calls itself essentially "good on offense" or "good on defense" is based on a bunch of different cascading assumptions and is inherently unstable and suspect. - Almost all d-men on a team as bad defensively as the Sabres were last year are going to have plenty of below-league-average defensive fancystats. - The correct spelling in this context is "complement," not "compliment." Yes indeed, and it's true for forward lines as well.

OK my friend. Let's not get too worked up about minor things. There are plenty of great things to be happy about, even when other people are breaking the rules.

I'm sure that's right. My point is simply that trading Helle for, say, the Penguins' 2nd-best young prospect would probably be better received in Winnipeg than trading Helle to the Sabres for Rosen -- even if Rosen is about as good as the Penguins' guy.

Yes -- it's not rational or in the teams' best interests, but IMHO more likely to happen in a market like Winnipeg where the pressure and media/fan scrutiny is very heavy. I love TT, and this is likely to prove out, but I don't this story is fully written yet. Kyrou and Thomas are both really good.

YMMV, of course, but I don't think Tatar or the other available forwards represent a highly likely, significant improvement over the in-house replacement candidates.

I wouldn't give up Rosen or Östlund for one year of Helle, and I don't think KA would either. I would probably give up next year's #1. More precisely, I think Winnipeg wouldn't trade with the Sabres unless they got one of Savoie, Kulich, Benson, JJP or Quinn. I don't think they can sell their constituents on getting no better than the Sabres 6th-best prospect for Helle. I would not be a-tall surprised though if they trade Helle to a different team, and the best piece coming back is no better than Östlund or Rosen.

Well, while I agree that the Jets would probably take that package for Helle, I think there is zero possibility of the Sabres -- or anyone else -- giving up 3 high-value assets for him. I also think there is zero possibility that the Sabres would give Helle a fat long-term contract. I think a more realistic scenario for any Helle trade is one premium asset plus a draft pick. In that situation, I don't think the Jets would accept Östlund, Rosen or the 2024 #1 as the premium asset.

Well, I asked about Rosen and Östlund because I don't think that price would've gotten it done, and I'm curious as to whether you do. I agree that it depends largely on the other team. I think that Nashville doesn't need to trade Saros, that they rightly see him as a franchise goalie, and that they would have zero interest in trading him to the Sabres without getting at least one of those top 5 (Quinn, JJP, Savoie, Kulich and Benson). I think Philly feels pretty much the same way about Hart. I think that the Canadian teams are under a ton of pressure at all times and that each GM would feel like he could not present a deal to his owners/fans/media in which he parts with his franchise goalie and wasn't able to get more from the Sabres than the Sabres' #6 or #7 prospect. (Although I think it's fairly likely that you're right about Winnipeg ultimately not getting more than an Östlund/Rosen level prospect for Helle.) I will add that none of this IMHO excuses KA from not upgrading the goaltending this summer (or last summer or the previous summer). It's a problem and he's accountable for not fixing it. My point is simply that I think the price for the big-name goalies is too high, and I'm fine with KA not paying it.

Yes. Fans love splashy moves, and they hate losing. Does that mean we are dumb, or weak-minded, or morally compromised? Or just that GMTM was accountable to us and to his boss for the performance of the team, which stunk?

I think that none of Helle, Saros or Hart (and probably not Demko or Markstrom) was coming here without one of those 5 coming back (including this year's #1 as a proxy for Benson in any potential pre-draft trade). Does either of you think the Sabres could've gotten/could get at present one of those goalies for Rosen or Östlund or a 2024 #1?

IMHO it comes down to which top prospect for which goalie. Are you giving up 2 of Savoie, Benson, Kulich, JJP or Quinn for Hart, Markstrom, Demko, Saros, 1 year of Helle or any of the other goalies that were allegedly available? I am not, and I think frankly only Saros gets me to part with even 1 of them.

Both of you make interesting points here, but still: if KA doesn't bring in a goalie before camp, do you think they are going to waive UPL and keep Comrie? That seems very unlikely IMHO.

Ooooooooooooohhh. THAT just happened.

Or Moose Jaw?

Awesome.

I like the 2nd one but not the first. It would make power plays even more important than they currently are, which IMHO would not be good for the game. The offside nuance I'd like to fix is this: when entering the O-zone, I think the puck currently needs to be all the way into the zone -- i.e. it cannot be on the blue line -- before the skater enters the zone, or else it's offside. I think if the puck is on the line, it should not be offside. Separately, other changes I'd like to see are: 1. OT in the playoffs goes to 4-on-4 after the 1st OT. 2. Significant reduction in the size of goalie equipment. 3. Match penalty and suspension for head shots during post-whistle scrums like the one Dahlin got concussed on last year. 4. Helmets off in the shootout.

What a lovely piece of friendly hockey talk this is. Maybe get some exercise.

Well, I agree that KA -- like all GMs, I would think -- has valuations in mind both for his players and for outside players, and doesn't want to make a deal that departs too far from those valuations. I also agree that he wants the team to develop primarily via homegrown talent. But he still brought in 2 defensemen from outside this summer presumably to be lineup regulars (I think he expects E. Johnson to be in the lineup), and it's pretty well confirmed that he's attempted to bring in goalies a couple of times as well. What he hasn't done is been willing to part with, say, JJP and a #1 for Hellebucyk or a similar rich price for Hart. I agree with those decisions, but I still think that if goaltending is a problem again this year, he's accountable for not finding a solution.

The talk about Comrie and UPL begs the question: what happens if, as seems reasonably plausible, UPL looks pretty meh in the preseason? Would they still waive Comrie in that situation and gamble that no one claims him? And Comrie were to be claimed -- are they just going to start the season with Levi and an uninspiring UPL? I think Levi is going to be good, but still.

Great thread. I met Danny Gare at an autograph session in one of the local malls when I was a kid. He was really nice. Then, in the late 1990s, I went to my first Sabres game in Buffalo in forever. We went to a bar downtown after the game, and there was Gare, pretty sauced, big grin on his face and having a great time with anyone who wanted to chat with him. A few years later, I was on vacation in Florida during the week of the NHL all-star game, which the Panthers were hosting, and I ran into Miro Satan at a hotel. I almost bumped into him, looked up, recognized him and reflexively said "Miro!" He looked up, I said I was a Sabres fan and wished him luck. He was pretty nice too. Never got to meet Rico, who was my favorite player as a kid. I did see Perreault once in the late 1970s picking up takeout food from a restaurant on Maple Road as I was entering with my family. We didn't talk but he obviously knew he'd been recognized and smiled.