Drunkard

Welcome aboard. I've been here since the trade of he who will not be named. Better secure a lazyboy in a prime spot near the beer fridge. I have a feeling it's going to get crowded in here really soon.

Skinner should definitely be playing with Eichel. Since we're going to be paying him top dollar for close to another decade he should at least be playing with our best center in order to get as much production out of him as possible. Reinhart may not get $9 million but it's not out of the question given his age and production. He's on pace to score 70 points this season playing with Eichel. Botterill decided to bridge him and Reinhart should benefit from that fact greatly. Another blunder from the so called cap expert.

So we should be content with him sitting on his hands until the trade deadline? At that point the Sabres will be well out of the playoff race and he'll likely just be selling off Scandella and Bogosian for late picks from teams looking for playoff depth. Yeah, there may not be any deals going on now, but it was obvious last season that the forwards needed help and his big moves up front were re-signing Skinner, letting Pominville go, bringing in Vesey who has done nothing and bringing in Johansson who has actually been better than expected. Any way you slice it though, it wasn't enough based on how that last 5 months of the season went and that was obvious to almost everyone on this board outside of the handful of people who were either taking the wait and see approach or people who defend Botterill pretty much no matter what. Sure it's tough to point to this exact moment in time to force a deal but the reason the natives are getting restless/impatient is because there were other opportunities (last years trade deadline, the entire offseason, free agency, the draft) that he could have made a move to improve the forward talent and he mostly maintained the status quo other than bringing in one new solid contributor in Johansson.

60 points on the second line is great, but not if he's earning $9 million or something along those lines. Skinner was a bargain last year with 40 goals for a cap hit of $5.75 million. It won't look nearly as good when they pay him $9 million for 30 goals this year.

We should definitely keep Reinhart unless some team offered us a center of similar age and talent and I don't see that happening. For being a so called "cap expert" though, you'd think Botterill would influence the coaches when setting up lines to not make his job negotiating contracts more difficult. Last year he let Housley keep Skinner with Eichel for most of the season in a contract year and the result was having to overpay for Skinner in money, term, and a full NMC. Now they aren't playing together and we're paying Skinner as a 40 goal scorer and he probably won't be since he isn't with Eichel. This year Reinhart is up for contract and he's letting Kreuger play him with Eichel so he's on pace for 70 points. This will lead Reinhart to getting a big deal being paid as a 70+ point player but with Buffalo's luck they'll probably move him down to line 2 next season and he'll pace for 60 points while getting paid for 70.

I thought about paying the money for NHL.tv when they started off so well in October again, but I'm glad I held off. I don't think they'll nosedive as badly as they did after the winning streak last season, but at least if they do I won't have to pay to see it. If they somehow manage to turn things around I can always subscribe for the back half of the season and the playoff race but at least point I'm pretty sure I won't have to spend the money.

Skinner can't be traded because Botterill not only overpaid him on money and term, but he gave him a full NMC. He's not going anywhere unless Toronto wants him and I doubt they want to pay him what we're paying him. I agree that he should go back to the top line though. With Johansson out, we're basically a one line team anyway, so we might as well stock that top line with our 3 best forwards (Skinner, Eichel, and Reinhart).

Show some leg and start hitchhiking, man.

That definitely makes a lot more sense.

Because Thurman Thomas went to college there back in the 80's. Other than that, I got nothing. If they really do prioritize the Bills in Oklahoma like that though, you should be able to watch them on the local CBS station instead of shelling out dough for Sunday Ticket.

I still haven't paid for NHL.tv yet after I wasted my money last year but when I do have access to see all the games, I definitely wait 30-45 minutes so I can fast forward through pregame, anthems, commercials, and intermissions. I usually catch up to live somewhere towards the end of the 3rd period and I much prefer that to sitting through all the non game parts of the program. I just disable all notifications from the NHL app before the game starts and then watch something else saved on the DVR until enough time has passed.

He also doesn't manage volcanoes, mudslides, earthquakes, child soldiers, hurricanes, wildfires, floods, war, disease, famine, drought, or holy men who diddle little kids with the protection of a multi-billion dollar crime syndicate helping them get away with it for centuries. I guess he's too busy doing the other important stuff, like making sure the right people win Oscars, Emmys, and Grammies.

Probably because Dahlin and Jokiharju are both getting getting sheltered relative to the rest of the defense and since they are on different pairings that only leaves the McCabe Ristolainen paring to carry the water.

Tom Brady can tell the flavor of a popsicle just by sitting on it. Tedy Bruschi taught him.

Ristolainen definitely seems to be holding his down despite once again being treated like a plow horse by his 4th or 5th coach in a row. The good news is despite getting his power play time cut and whatever time he is getting there being spent on the second unit, he's still holding at his regular 40 point pace so far. Good for him.

To hell with that. Trump may be a horrible President but at least the only way he panders to the religious right is with his judicial appointments and making up fake nonsense like the war on Christmas. With Pence, things would definitely run smoother without all the media circus, but we'd still get the same type of judicial appointments and he'd probably try to get conversion therapy camps public funding. I'd rather have 5 more years of Trump than 1 day of Pence.

That's hilarious! I guess I should have googled it, first. Man, this guy has so many conflicts of interest it's probably impossible to determine if he ever makes a decision based on the facts or the interests of the U.S.

Remember his draft announcements? The book would be more like a newspaper article. I made some good choices (Reinhart, Eichel, O'Reilly, Kane, Olofsson) and some bad ones (Moulson, Okposo, Blysma, etc.) Admittedly, I didn't spend much time or effort on the personal side of the game. I called the owner's wife a ***** and they fired me.

Or they will be breaking ground on a new Trump hotel and golf course in Turkey sometime after the 2020 election. Probably not, but would it really surprise anyone at this point?

Well, that definitely makes me feel better about it. Coming out the gate strong with a 2-0 start certainly helps as well. Hopefully they can keep it up.

Definitely. I think that's 100% why he released that list of judges drawn up by the Heritage Foundation and he promised he would only selected Justices from that list. It definitely worked, although I'm sure they were more than a few Ministers and other holy men who helped to get their congregations on board with him from the pulpit on Sundays.

Yep. I don't buy that he actually believes in all the planks in his platform but in the end it doesn't matter because he knows where his bread is buttered and his platform checks enough boxes to placate the evangelicals, gun advocates, pro military, and people who value tax cuts over everything else. Politicians used to deny or dance around things like litmus tests when choosing judges and Trump is the first guy I can think of who openly said that not only would he have a litmus test, but he let special interests groups draft a list that he promised to choose from.

This sounds an awful lot like the "clean slate" and "we won't watch film from previous seasons" that Housley said when he got here. If they aren't going to take past performance into account this may turn into another one of those evaluation years fans have got to be tired of paying good money to see.

You can get a VPN for relatively cheap that can make your network appear to be out of market and avoid blackouts on NHL.tv. I'm pretty sure @darksabre has mentioned doing this so I'd either shoot him a PM or see if he responds and he can fill you in on how that works.

No need to be a dick about it. Just because his bargain bin shopping for defenseman gets you all hot and bothered doesn't mean having Johansson and Sobotka in the top 6 isn't going to sink the ship. We'll see.