thewookie1

Load management should never be a thing; players make a lot of money and its their literal job to be out there, barring injury, for their many paying customers. The NBA is a literal joke with the fact they give their players games off for purely rest days; they should be required to then pay all those fans who bought tickets money back for their "load management" The MLB is a bit different, starters throw far harder than they used to and as such 100 or so pitches is about their limit. But that isn't a hard cap, some players are different than others and can throw on shorter rest or throw more pitches without issue. It all depends on pitching style and how they do in each individual game as well their personal attributes like age and experience. Probably depends on the player and their injuries. Suter and Doughty are both still playing and have been near the top of the league in TOI most of their respective careers. (Suter obviously took a step back in TOI upon his departure from MIN)

I don't think he played slow; I think he was out of juice and just didn't engage quick enough. Some of you guys just have this borderline obsession with finding scapegoats and chasing them out of town. Tuch has done very good in his time in Buffalo; just because he's not literally running through the boards 24/7 doesn't mean he's shot and needs to be dealt. Tonight was a better team with slightly more rest beating a lesser and less experienced one. Nothing absurd, nothing over the top.

Looked like a team that just simply ran out of fuel by the end of the 3rd. Their speed just slowly ebbed away and we even dominated the shift they scored their 3rd on.

When you play almost 60 min in two games it can catch up to you

Greenway needs to cold ***** Schiefle

Rough way to end the period but you can definitely see why the Jets are great while the Sabres are more or less ok.

Frankly I think Joki been better this year than Chychrun

Well he isn't wrong; the biggest reason is we still play Detroit 3 times in the final 21, Washington 2 times, Tampa once, Isles once, Devils once and even Toronto twice. You find a way to win those 10 games in regulation, and your odds of making it skyrocket.

I'd say its a bit of both. It's an accomplishment for Dahlin in regards to his skill and stamina But an indictment of depth; but more so after Power's return. Prior to that we were down our #3 & #4 or #2 & #4 depending on your rank of Power and most teams aren't equipped to simply replace those minutes with AHLers.

I think to start the year it also was a perfect storm of injuries, trying a more defensive system, and some goaltending variability. Usually teams have their core players go through downturns at different times but we effectively had everyone cold for the first two months and seemed unable to escape it. Goaltending was between a rock and a hard place; to get Levi to sign we had to promise him a chance to make the team and after his solid starts last season in clutch situations Adams really couldn't argue that he wasn't ready and jettison him to Rochester day 1. (This was mentioned by a few ESPN analysts when talking about Levi's agent being very much against Buffalo bringing in a vet goalie. UPL, thankfully still had supporters on the staff, and Comrie was sort of just a guy who they had expected at least some degree of competence out of. Granato needed to certainly do better at snapping them out of the funk they were in, how I have no idea but that's what the staff is paid for. Veteran leadership is a very amorphous measurement since it can only be judged based on the success you do or don't have. While Erik Johnson hasn't been Teppo Numminen by any means, he was the type of move I hoped for when Pesce denied us for a depth role. (7th/8th Dman) Clifton brought his experience from Boston as well so I can't say Adams didn't even try to bring in more experience. Where he stumbled was bringing back Jost and not bringing in a body to fill in for Quinn.

A combination of 3 things: 1. Thompson, Cozens & Tuch Issues early - Thompson's offseason was likely delayed by his end of season back injury; he is a proven slow starter as well but by the time he got going he ended up hurt 6wks + (Only since the All Star Break has he looked more akin to himself) Cozens went into the season feeling the weight of his new contract as well as Quinn's injury and overplayed everything to start the year, became agitated and got his face broken by a much bigger Flyer, couldn't see the puck with the full bubble and didn't seem to settle back in until Quinn returned and seemed to reset his brain. (He's weird sort of center who thrives on playing a more "winger-like" north-south style and does so when with Quinn and Peterka or when he plays wing/center with Mitts) Tuch's early season issues seemed to keep him slow and less explosive and I honestly don't think he really knew what to do without his above average speed to help in forechecking. (If you put cinderblocks on a guy who plays a very fast paced pressure style; it isn't going to look pretty) 2. Eric Comrie, and the unstable goaltending situation - Levi and UPL played very inconsistently with Levi actually having the Goalie lead for quite some time. Add that to Comrie's continuous issues both due to himself and the team's inability to give him goal support seemed to create a nigh-endless teeter-tauter. Additionally, due to Vasilevskiy's injury, Tampa was hunting the waiver wires for goalies (especially when they had to start random dudes) for any NHL goalie. 4 teams including the Sabres were literally trapped with 3 goalies to prevent Tampa from poaching them. And since Levi was in the Top 2 and they wanted to still give Comrie a shot, we ran with 3 goalies. I believe if Tampa had their goalie, Comrie is likely sent down mid-November and then brought up occasionally until Levi either seized the job or lost it. This uncertainty undoubtedly caused the players to feel less comfortable to take risks. 3. Overachievements in 22-23 didn't just level out, they went the opposite direction. People here have claimed all the career years were bound to regress to the mean; and there is merit to that in regards to players like Tuch and Skinner but for younger players, career years aren't finalities and can just as easily be breakout seasons to lead onto greater achievements. However, instead of basic regressions and experience gain we've had catastrophic underachievement in part due to injury as well as unusually bad luck. Teams rarely take a nose-dive in GpG between seasons like we have and the power play's inability to function seemed to sap the confidence out of the team. Injuries not only derailed players like Dahlin, Samuelsson and the three mentioned earlier but eliminated Quinn entirely while leaving lines in shambles adjusting the losses. Once you lose your confidence and start pressing, things are only going to spiral however this team seemed perpetually trapped in a wind tunnel never bottoming out but never getting anywhere either.

Yeah, honestly I want a Stolarz or Dostal type 1B style backup for next season and let Levi cook in Rochester the whole year.

The Montour one was hilarious as well, an ENG SHG and then he scores with less than a minute 5v5 with a goalie.

Bastards won

Frankly I disagree only because the players seemed very positive about Levi. If anything I’d say Comrie’s performance was more of the stab in back versus them going in disinterested.

When I was a child I was a huge Nascar fan; especially of my favorite driver, Dale Earnhardt. One of my favorite parts of Nascar wasn't truly the crashes but watching the pit crews and drivers try to get the car back out there again during a race. Something about seeing a car with its back spoiler and "trunk" being held on by tape to the back window. For what ever reason that was just so cool to me. However when Dale died I lost practically all interest in Nascar. In the end my favorite crashes were always the ones with no injuries but a cool damage that the crews need to try to fix to keep it going.

It was more the fact Benson was interfered with which cause him to trip the guy than the actual trip I believe. Montour gave him a full side hug which cause Benson to lose his balance and poke the skates out from under the other Panther.

Levi was promised an opportunity to prove his readiness UPL needed waivers to get to Rochester Comrie was the vet of the 3 When Vasy got hurt, 4 teams held onto 3 goalies due to Tampa lurking. The rest is agreeable

Well it was talked about for months so obviously he had an interest.

No, McDavid is a different story but Draisaitl is only under contract 1x8.5 and he's going to be asking for a metric ton

My guess is Edmonton offered the 1st, not us.

Sorta with both of you simultaneously; the Sabres have looked slower and somewhat stiff these last few games yet I also definitely see that unwillingness to give up persona they showed last year. A low energy variant of it at very least.

I frankly don't have an issue with the outcome. We had no need for Bush with the acquisition of Clifton + E. Johnson and got a 4th in 2025 To get a 3rd in 2025 the Ducks required deadline pricing, and 50% retention.

Leafs traded a 3rd and 6th to get an analytics nightmare but a good dude.