thewookie1

After Carolina is eliminated I’d imagine Buffalo could request permission to speak with Rod. Until he signs his extension with Carolina there is always a slim chance. Not to mention Rod would be stupid not to wait until after Buffalo can talk to him since he can ask for more money.

Your disdain for Dahlin is akin to PAs against Pegula. He’s a gifted player and gifted players do make mistakes of arrogance due to their confidence in their play. Every player worth anything will do that every so often because the opposite is far worse. (Essentially Dahlin under Krueger where he’s playing on broken glass terrified to make any mistake.)

Well how exactly is he supposed to find out who’d be ready for the NHL without them playing NHL games. Levi was promised games, UPL wasn’t waivable and Comrie was already under contract and the vet in the group. A. Do what he did B. Waive Comrie hoping that Tampa doesn’t poach him and run with two unproven young goalies C. Go back on your promise and send Levi to Rochester this angering the player and the agent D. Waive UPL and pray he doesn’t get scooped up leaving you with about 40 NHL starts between your goalies. E. Sign another vet goalie, as well a combo of B and C. Wilford is a an Assistant Coach but his fate will be up to the new coach, Ellis could be retained by the new coach but has already been slated for another job. As everyone has said, he needs to walk the walk now but I’d rather think positively than just wallow in misery.

He had a great interview about the whole incident with Strickland; was interesting

1. Anderson actually did rather well, Subban was great in Rochester, Dell was awful, Comrie was a great guy but also a mediocre at best goalie. He attempted to get other goalies but failed to. In the end though he ended up right about UPL and Levi has shown signs of future greatness; he doesn't get kudos for it but your need to harp on this point everytime and it ended up looking ok by year's ended. 2. Well he did make attempts but when your shopping in the bargain bin or getting rejected by better players there isn't much there to work with. Clifton did look better as the year went on too. 3. He brought back Jost once, Okposo(the Captain) once and Girgensons(a solid defensive forward) twice. Haven't we learned that cycling an entire bottom 6 every year doesn't exactly work all that well? 4. Mitts was going to want 8x7mil which would of put us in cap hell in trying to adjust the roster, Byram was likely the best asset available that could potentially help both now and later. Unlike fans, GMs can't just do kneejerk reactions and expect to accomplish anything. As they say, hindsight is 20-20 and we have the same benefit of that as he does. Perhaps like many of us, Adams hoped things would work out even if the voice in his head got louder about issues he saw creeping up. He can make suggestions and shop around for potential fixes for the issues but that doesn't necessarily mean they are widely available to grab. He chose to see if the players could work it out themselves with their coach; all of which he liked. And when they didn't find the correct answers he decided to be more direct. For us its been 13 years but for the players it most certainly hasn't; you can't crucify a player for something he wasn't even a part of to begin with based on a whim. Even if he saw the issues in January or February; he very likely didn't want to fire Granato and that while a mistake was not something done out of malice or a lack of a pulse. He likely just really wanted this group specifically to succeed and turn things around.

Reading between the lines: After last season he believed the roster would take the steps forward needed to go from 9th to Playoffs. UFAs to replace Quinn temporarily were far too expensive to acquire but he does feel some regret there. He felt that with Erik Johnson and Clifton's experience coupled with our other vets that the players would correctly grow. However while the team did seem to like Johnson and still do like Clifton neither could quite break the over abundance of arrogance. They were kids who acted like kids who thought what they did last year would just instantly comeback this year. Adams hoped that Granato and the vets could reign in the issues and salvage the year. The players loved Granato, as did Adams, but when that still didn't fix the issues the kids were then punished. Feels like Adams akin to Krueger proving himself inept wanted to prove to the players that they were wrong to believe they were owed a playoff spot or that playing wouldn't require a great effort. Some of them probably believed Adams wouldn't fire Granato like we did and he called their bluff. Now we wait to see what else happens.

Very true, he'll have to put his money where his mouth is but at very least he's finally saying what we want to hear.

Arguably I'd say the opposite; I think he effectively said he wouldn't hire him as HC due to his lack of NHL experience but would be happy to let him be an assistant

Arguably the best conference he's had

Adams seems pissed that his team didn't make it this year. Remember how we kept UPL up last year because Okposo vouched for it. I think he truly was counting on the the coaching staff and players to bring it together. They failed this year; but I don't think he has any more patience for it.

They do say that the first step to fixing something is knowing your own issues.

Briere's situation was also prior to Kim's medical incident

It would we better than Julien or Appert for sure

I wouldn't hate it

Don't disagree with you

My guess is Ellis is being transferred elsewhere and Wilford is at the whim of the new Head Coach

Perhaps Pegula finally decided to put a fire on Adams' ass to do something or resign

I personally feel bad for Granato because he seems like a great guy but from a team standpoint that was very much needed to push beyond development central.

It would be nice if you wouldn't blatantly ignore Dahlin and Muel in having some jam to their games. Yes, in general our defense is on the soft side but just ignoring Dahlin, who literally was within a handful of hits of Clifton all year, is outright biased.

My guess based on the press conference times will be that the majority of assistants are fired and a vet coach is hired to be an assistant along with other new people.

Cozens has had issues this year but he’s also had god awful puck luck, complete reverse of last season, so getting a couple goals today makes me happy.

Benson on a great ply by everyone on that line

The season was well summed up in this game to be honest. Back and Forth with the other team looking dominate at times but the Sabres did counter-punch effectively. Killed off a questionable 5min PK Score 1 PP goal Gave up a SHG Power made a clutch save twice behind UPL We had a puck 2/3rds over the line only for a Panther to use his hands to pull it out last second Kill off another PK Have a failed PP attempt Screwy OT Florida scores due to their best center stripping our 2C and passing it to our former player who's fresher than everyone else who easily skates through the Sabres and scores.

Now that we know you had a brain fart, I can’t help but imagine this

Murray will always be known as an overspender, regardless of the facts due to his tendency to throw assets at particular players he wanted to get. For instance, trading 2 2nds for Fasching and Deslauries was very unlikely to pan out. 1 very raw player and a guy switching from D to F. There was potential there but we already had and continued to bring back Bailey and Baptiste which created a logjam in Rochester which was in dire need of a center. The other major example was the Evander Kane and Bogosian deal seeing as he traded two NHLers, a 1st and then some for an injured head case who was literally being shopped around and a disappointing injury riddled defenseman + a throwaway goalie. Effectively it felt like they should of been able to get Bogosian for Myers straight up and that they traded a King’s ransom for a guy WPG wanted to be rid of.