nfreeman

Thurman is my all-time favorite.

I am so sorry for your loss. God bless you and your family.

From the Athletic today: Girard just turned 25. He's 5'10, 170 lbs, LHD and has played over 21 min per game for Colorado for the last 4 years. He's under contract for 4 more seasons at $5MM per year.

Well, I don't think anyone would dispute that JA is more important than Diggs, but they aren't doing anything in the playoffs without Diggs.

Eichel was, by many accounts, an immature jerk when he was here, and validated that impression with his behavior at the first Vegas game in Buffalo, but IMHO he was also set up to fail here. The tank was a stupid, low-percentage strategy that produced the expected result, and it was compounded by a series of bad GM and coach hires. It wasn't realistic for a kid to muscle the franchise out of that quicksand. I don't blame Jack for not wanting to waste more of his prime years on another rebuild, or for not believing that KA was finally the right guy to build a good team around him -- especially when KA only got the job when JB got fired after refusing to gut the organization and implement an austerity budget in response to the pandemic. Certainly that was a crossroads at which he could've made himself an icon here if he'd chosen to stick it out and lead the resurrection, but his choice was reasonable. He landed in the perfect spot for him -- a successful, top-shelf organization with established veteran stars and leaders. He didn't need to be the focal point or the leader. He just needed to play hard and play the coach's system, and he did it extremely well. I don't see how anyone can think Vegas would've won the Cup without him.

I'm guessing that Diggs doesn't like Dorsey.

Diggs is maybe my favorite player on the team, but this is way out of line. WTF. They are trying to win a SB. Save the drama for your mama.

That stinks. It seems highly likely that at least 1 of the 3 Buffalo guys (Graham, Fairburn and Buscaglia), all of whom are very good IMHO, will get canned. I like their league-wide NBA and NHL coverage, but I probably won't renew if there is a significant reduction in Buffalo coverage. EDIT: so it looks like they are laying off less than 4% of their writers. Most of those laid off are named in this article, and none are Buffalo guys: https://nypost.com/2023/06/12/new-york-times-reorganizes-the-athletic-with-layoffs/

I've been a Mitts skeptic as long as the next guy, but I'm OK with a reasonably priced extension. The coaches and management extol his work ethic and his teammates love him. He gets a bit better every year. I don't expect him to be the 5th-best forward next year, as I think Quinn and perhaps JJP will surpass him, but if he's your 7th-best forward, you have a really GD good offense. And as others have said he fits pretty much anywhere in the top 9. I am totally fine with a 3rd line next year of Mitts-Krebs-Kulich. $5MM x 5 years is too rich for my blood for him. I'd be fine with $4.25MM x 4 years though. And they should only trade him if there is a really good player coming back.

I think a Korpie-type acquisition is the most likely outcome. I don't think KA will give up any of his prized assets for Helly or Hart (and I agree with that decision, FWIW), and I think the sellers will demand some of those assets in order to make a deal -- which means the price for them will be too high. There will be goalies a tier below Helly and Hart -- but still a tier or 2 above UPL and Comrie -- who will be more interested in a 2-year deal with Buffalo now than they were the last couple of summers. I think KA will procure one of them, try to trade UPL and try to get Comrie through waivers to Rochester.

Respectfully, there is zero possibility of this happening.

I'd sure like to see some evidence too, but 2 government officials stated publicly this week that the US government has these alien spaceships. This is after the government in 2021 released records of over 140 reports by US military aircraft of UFO sightings, only one of which was proven wrong, plus footage of something in the sky that no one could identify. I don't see how anyone can be sure of anything on this.

So if, like me, you've been interested in watching Yellowstone but didn't have the right streaming service, you might be interested in a promotion that Peacock is running: $20 for a full year of Peacock. It's the cheapo level, which means there are commercials during the shows and you can't download anything, but it's the full library, including a bunch of NBC shows and 4K movies (and I think there are no commercials during the movies other than about 3 minutes' worth before the movie starts) and it's only $20! You have to remember to cancel before it auto-renews in a year at $50. My wife and I watched the 1st episode of Yellowstone yesterday and I think it's going to be our summer binge show. This has been a Sabrespace public service announcement.

I’ve been quite resistant to wearing crocs my entire adult life, but I’ve been wearing them recently in the house and when walking the dog and my feet feel great.

Not sure, but one of you may be referring to average while the other is using median.

So who thinks the government really is in possession of a dozen alien spacecraft?

I think most here agree with this. The question really is what is the right price to pay.

Any state fairs or car shows or air shows in your neck of the woods? Or does either of you have a dog that you can take to the park?

It's a tough call. I would freaking love to add a no-BS top-shelf goalie to this team and see what would happen over the next 3-4 years, with TT, Tuch and Dahlin entering their primes and Skinner and Helly squarely in their primes, plus all the up-and-comers. Ultimately though I voted no. Like some others upthread, I think an extension with Helly will cost too much, which would result in the Sabres being unable to keep a couple of guys I don't want to part with -- and, more importantly, I think the spread between Helly and the goaltending that they should be able to find (although they haven't done so yet), either from Levi or elsewhere, isn't large enough to justify the high cost.

Add a poll inky!

The sky is an apocalyptic gray-orange in NYC today.

Leaving aside the self-assured snark, he was 15th by ONE advanced metric, right? Not all of them? Any others in addition to the one you posted? FWIW, he was 22nd in SV% last year. Do you think he'll return something equivalent to #13, Kulich, Östlund, Rosen, etc.? It's also worth noting that a key factor here is Hart's value to the Sabres -- not just his overall market value in the NHL. I don't think KA is looking for, or willing to pay market price for, a goalie for the next 5 years -- he wants someone to work with Levi for the next 1-2 years until Levi is ready to be the 55-60 game starter. Good point -- certainly my willingness to part with some of the assets I mentioned would increase if there were more coming back than just Hart.

And some people think Sabrespace is a mean, heartless place. There are a number of reasons Briere might trade Hart for a 2nd plus UPL/other non-premium prospect: - Hart has a $4MM cap hit - Hart will need a new contract next summer (which, btw, likely depresses his market value in trade) - Hart might not want to be the goalie for more years of rebuilding Flyers suckitude - Briere might not like Hart's game - Briere might want to tank (probably not as Briere seems like a smart guy) - No one is willing to give up a better package for Hart -- among other factors, he has a good amount of Flyers stink on him at this point As for an equivalent-value prospect that the Sabres could offer -- that's a tricky one. His numbers for the last 2 years on a crappy Flyers team are decent, but not great -- 2 years ago, 13-31, 3.16, .905; last year, 23-33, 2.94, .907. I think it's pretty reasonable to value all of JJP, Quinn, Krebs, #13, Kulich, Savoie, Östlund and Rosen above Hart (factoring in Hart's contract status, Flyers stink and the inherent volatility of the G position), and to value Rousek, Novikov, Komarov, etc. below Hart. Not sure there is a good equivalent. EDIT: actually, as suggested upthread, Ryan Johnson might be a good equivalent.

It just seems like there's more of a numbers game at DE now with Floyd, Von and Rousseau as the clear top 3. Keeping all of AJE, Boogie and Shaq would mean 6 DEs, which doesn't seem likely. I suppose they could try to address it by moving on from one of the DTs, but it seems more likely, and in keeping with BB's history, that they'll try to get a draft pick for one of the DEs. Totally agree on WR and OL. They are dying for another stud opposite Diggs, and I don't think Davis has the goods. The other guys seem like they could be decent #3 or #4 guys, but none of them seems like a worthy #2. They do have 2 good weapons at TE, so hopefully they can develop an offense that utilizes the TE more than they've done previously.

I'll predict $9.7MM x 8 years.