nfreeman

Nice win for the Sabres. Florida didn't play with much urgency, but the Sabres did and they earned it. Very good game from Nilsson. Presumably he gets the start tomorrow too -- and perhaps spurs some more focused play from Lehner. I completely agree with the comments upthread about Kulikov. He looks really good and is a significant upgrade over Pysyk. He had the 2nd-most ice time today among the D. I saw some encouraging signs from the Zemgus-Ennis-Reino line today. Having closed out that win, if the Sabres can travel to Winnipeg, play another early game and grind out another W, I can see myself becoming optimistic again . Go Sabres.

Serious question: they are 1-5 and getting blown out at home. At what point does GMTM really think about canning DDB? 2-10? 3-15?

So does anyone have any info on what happened, including with the alleged video? My guess is he got into an argument that turned into a scuffle with a bunch of late-night semi-wasted dirtbags who thought they might be able to gouge some cash out of the situation. Good thing they smeared him as someone who assaults women and made him do the perp walk though, right?

Habs won again tonight (beating Tampa) and are 7-0-1. Weber led all skaters in ice time with over 25 min.

They really will eat the most disgusting things, innit?

You must be overlooking Matt "Ovechkin" Moulson!

Well, after 6-7 games, Nashville is 2-4 and the Habs are 6-0-1. Coincidence?

Beat me to it. My dog is 100% housetrained and never has an accident -- except when he eats the wrong thing and vomits. In those situations -- one of which occurred on Sunday when I was trying to watch the Bills game -- he has a strong preference for the carpet. (OTOH, cleaning up his vomit was better than watching the 2nd half of that game, so there we are.)

I am interested to see how they react to the Philly stomach punch. Hopefully they will exhibit more mental toughness than they did after the Eichel injury. We know how the Roy/Vanek/Pommer teams would have reacted. Let's see how the ROR/Reino/Risto team does. I am cautiously optimistic that they will come out like they did in the 1st 2 periods vs Philly -- and this time they will close out the W, which will give them some confidence and help right the ship.

Serious question: how many goals would Moulson have to score in order for us to to live with, say, 6 triumphant posts from pi per day? I think I'm in at 28 goals.

I'll say it again: you reap what you sow. These are the fruits of the tank -- losing games in the way that only a "loser team" loses games. The team was supposed to lose, lost a million games and in so doing became a bunch of losers who do not know how to win and, even worse, expect to lose. There's going to be a lot more of this crapola until it gets better.

I was thinking the same thing myself -- and Zemgus looked pretty good IMHO against Vancouver. Ennis, although improving, is still a ways away from being the consistent threat he used to be. Still, it's a line with intriguing possibilities.

This is somewhat counter-intuitive but definitely an interesting point. It would be freaking huge if Moulson could contribute some regular scoring.

Amen brother!

I hope so. That was a really dirty and dangerous hit. If that isn't a suspendable hit, I don't know what is. Well, presumably, if this were to become a negotiated CBA point, the cap accounting would be part of that negotiation and the NFL would come up with an accounting treatment that they liked.

If you grab the butt of a woman, for the first time, and it turns out she's there with a tough dude, is he entitled to beat you to a bloody pulp? If yes, why should you get away with it in one instance but not the other? If not, then how can there be a rule against butt grabbing if there is no consequence for breaking it?

You have got to be kidding me.

But most people (including me and many others here who have criticized Dareus) don't think the act of smoking dope is immoral -- our issue is with the fact that he knew he'd be hurting his team if he smoked dope and did it anyway. That's why Dareus wasn't innocent. If the suspension risk is gone, the problem is gone. That's why I was questioning (perhaps inarticulately) qwk's post.

But if there's no punishment, does it matter whether or not he's innocent?

You don't need to sign a legal form, but you do need to keep your hands to yourself unless and until it becomes clear that you have been invited to do otherwise.

Well, I agree that it's unrealistic, but not that it's unfair. As it currently stands, the Bills are completely hosed regarding that $32MM -- and it will be even worse the next time Dareus gets caught (I think the next drug suspension is a full season). How is that fair? As for forfeiting part of future salary/bonus -- that would work economically but I think in practice it would result in the player in question having a pretty poor attitude at work, which the teams would like to avoid. I wouldn't be surprised if pot suspensions and bonus givebacks were both part of the next CBA negotiation.

BTW: If I'm reading this: http://www.spotrac.com/nfl/buffalo-bills/marcell-dareus-7718/correctly, the Bills have paid Dareus a cool $32MM in bonuses -- and I don't think he lost a dime of that for his suspension. It probably won't happen, but I'd like to see the next CBA provide for all bonuses to be escrowed and paid at the end of a contract (or when a team cuts or trades a player), with proportional reductions, plus penalties, for suspensions, showing up out of shape, etc.

You're really going to keep going with this, aren't you? At first I thought you were joking.

This is getting a bit overwrought, IMHO. DDB is an experienced and accomplished coach. Reino is a very young player with a ton of potential, but he's far from an established star. He's also not a particularly good skater. And, he's a guy who the team is relying on to produce offense -- but the team has scored 4 goals in their 3 losses. I don't think DDB wanting Reino to move his feet and play faster is a-tall a crazy thing for DDB to say.

Well, how about this, then: Miami is 3-4, the Bills are 4-3, Miami has a better win (Pittsburgh) than the Bills do and Miami beat the Bills convincingly. With that factual background, I don't see how you can say the the Bills should've beaten Miami.