nfreeman

Franson isn't a good skater, and he's not a top-4 defenseman, but he'll do fine in limited and protected 3rd-pair minutes and on the #2 PP. Remember that he missed most of last season. Give him some time to get re-adjusted to NHL speed. More importantly, Franson's 10 min or so of even-strength ice time per game against the opponents' 3rd & 4th lines aren't going to be where the Sabres' season is made or broken. The top 2 pairings are much more important -- and the Sabres' top 4 guys all have significant question marks associated with them.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/nephew Boom!

Some people refer to that person as "my niece."

I am so sorry iTinSn. God bless you and your family.

Good post. Kulikov's role with Florida kinda evolved into a #2 at the end of last season, but it was mostly by default -- he certainly wasn't the Seabrook to Ekblad's Keith. He'll probably be the #2 here as well but it's above his natural station. I'm still kinda holding out hope for a trade for one of Anaheim's defensemen. If that doesn't materialize, we're left with the hope that McCabe takes major steps -- which isn't gonna happen this year. Risto is the most likely candidate to provide the Sabres with a #1. It's a lot to hope for, especially this early in his career. I can't really think of any true #1s who have changed teams recently -- other than Weber and PK, who were traded for each other. Before that -- maybe Suter going to Minny in FA?

Woo-hoo!

I think if Franson is heathy he will surprise a lot of people around here and have a pretty decent year.

The Cap Center was a terrible arena. And there was no upper bowl -- just one huge bowl that wen up forever -- which was a big part of the problem.

Flagg -- great chart. One question: is the quality of teammates metric limited to the player's team, or is it league-wide? I.e. does Risto's red color mean he's playing with the worst guys on the Sabres, or the worst guys in the NHL? It's also worth noting that the chart really indicates not how productive each defenseman is, but rather how heavy and difficult of a workload he's bearing. So Gorges' chart probably doesn't look that much different from Risto's -- but no one would argue that Gorges should get a $40MM contract (leaving his age out of it for this purpose).

While I don't always agree with pi, I think (i) his avatar is so eye-bleeding that it naturally makes others here hostile to his takes and (ii) more to the immediate point, there is a bit too much jumping the gun here on the "Risto is great" conclusion. There are at least 40 defensemen in the NHL who are better than Risto is right now. Will Risto get into the top 10 in the next few years? I sure hope so, and he's got the tools. But it's far from certain.

^^ My man.

I think there's a reasonable possibility that Zemgus beats out Larsson for #3 center at some point during this season.

I'm sorely tempted. But something's blocking me -- I'm all plugged up. You just made the death list buddy.

https://www.nhl.com/sabres/news/sabres-return-6-to-junior-clubs/c-282149498 Heh.

FWIW, Puck Daddy's Ryan Lambert (whom I'm not a fan of) has a piece up about Trouba and possible defenseman who could be traded for him, and his most logical trade is: http://sports.yahoo.com/news/puck-lists-who-could-the-winnipeg-jets-land-for-jacob-trouba-155943688.html

If Hillary were a Republican, she'd be Ted Cruz.

Awesome.

Serious question: for those propounding institutional racism -- what do you mean, exactly? That some police departments are effectively racist institutions because their SOP is to harass African-Americans and shoot them at the slightest provocation? That the whole concept of police is part of the way African Americans are oppressed? That the government is designed to favor whites over blacks? Other?

OK -- time to chill out a bit, please. The problem is that rioting isn't some harmless street march where a few windows get broken and police cars get bounced. Riots bring out criminals and thugs -- and criminal and thuggish behavior in people who don't normally act that way. People get killed -- this happened in Charlotte yesterday. Homes and businesses get destroyed. It's not the Boston tea party. It's opportunistic hooliganism. With Gennifer Flowers sitting next to him! Holy mackerel.

I want to see Kane on LW with Eichel and Reino -- both because he can skate and finish and to add an element of danger so the kids don't get messed with.

For the record, my point on Brandon was that he won't get another job as an NFL team president, not that he won't get another job in the NFL. He has done a creditable job of selling tickets, including suites and club seats in a difficult market for those products. (Of course, the Toronto series was an abomination, and he bears some if not most of the culpability for that.) Now, could my view of his job prospects change if Rex rights the ship and leads a miraculous charge to the playoffs? Yes indeedly. But if the Bills end up 6-10 and Whaley and Rex get canned? NFW. As for today's game: good for Rex and good for the Bills. Their offense looked a lot better to me in pretty much every phase, including coaching and execution -- especially given the imposters they trotted out at WR. And the D looked much improved as well. The Cardinals looked like the poorly-coached team, not the Bills. And Palmer looked terrible. I think Jerry Hughes might be team MVP so far this year. I want to believe they have a chance next week, but I keep thinking back to the hype leading up to last year's first Patriots game -- and then the Bills got completely manhandled and became unglued and committed like 20 penalties, most of which were of the deeply stupid variety. We'll see.

Now that sounds like a SabreSpace wager.

I generally agree, but I think there is zero possibility he retires with $10 million left on the table. Does anyone know the cap consequences if the Sabres buy him out after this season?

I think you and TW are probably right that Brandon is not likely to get canned -- but I completely disagree with that decision (if that is indeed where TP/KP end up). I also think there remains a real possibility that Brandon does get canned -- selling out a September game against a really good team is a much different kettle of fish than 30K empty seats for the December games, and tons of booing from the crowd that does show up, when the team is 4-10. I think that was after the 2014 season, not the 2015 season -- i.e. before the Rex Ryan train wreck.

No one is going to hire Whaley to be a GM again, and no one is going to hire Brandon at a position comparable to what he has now. Years of failure and ineptitude do not yield career advancements.