dudacek

Some poetry in those numbers about this team, isn’t there?

I’m obviously interested but I don’t feel particularly invested in who they keep or who they fire. I like the people well enough and I think the assets are here to make the kind of step the Canucks took this year and the Devils took last year. (If people don’t remember Vancouver had 83 points last year and the bubble was their only playoff appearance over the previous 8 seasons; the Devils had 63 points and had missed 4 straight and 9 out of 10.) Just make it happen. I don’t care how. I’ll judge you on the results.

I do put some stock in them, not so much as gospel in and of themselves, but as an indicator of what message they want out there, and I also like to read into how they react to the tone and the questions that are posed. What isn’t said is often the most interesting stuff. Taken within the exact context you describe, you can find a few nuggets. I would never expect Adams to give me the truthful answers to the questions I posed: those are more my way of telling you fine people what I think his priorities should be and what I care about when it comes to fixing the team. I’ll get my answers by what he does this summer.

This isn’t really about prospects anyway, it’s about wanting more shift disturbers on the actual team. The number of Tom Wilsons worthy of top 10 picks in the NHL draft are few and far between, year after year. If you’re taking the best one available ahead of a Zach Benson, or an Owen Power, you’re probably not getting the best player. It’s not that aren’t interested in the type. The Sabres picked Wahlberg and Strbak in the 2nd round last year, they’ve got guys like Miedema, Novikov, Poltapov and Nadeau in the system. It’s whether or not guys like that work out.

Always appreciate when the numbers support the eye test. It felt like the Sabres improved in their own zone this year; if I could say it in one sentence, it would be “instead of giving guys a clear lane and a full second to shoot like last year, they were giving him partially obstructed lanes and a half-second.” Also interested in the offensive data stating they did not create nearly as much off the rush this year. Am I correct in reading that as they were sending one guy to blow the zone instead of 2? Certainly that would affect the numbers of Tuch and Cozens, who I’ve always found to be extremely dangerous off the rush. This also feeds into the acquisition of Byram, and type of defencemen they gravitate to: one way to compensate for fewer breakout targets is to employ accurate breakout passers. Another thing I’m curious about is how the numbers at both ends of the ice compared from the first half to the second. I felt by eye test there were noticeable improvements as the season progressed defensively. I did not necessarily feel the same way offensively. One would expect a break-in period at both ends of the ice, if we were dealing with a new system.

I don't need Kevin to make me feel better with rhetoric or sacrificial lambs. I have three questions I want answered: 1) One of the league's best offence's disappeared this season, apparently for 3 reasons: the power play was awful, the team could never get bodies and pucks to the net to score any greasy goals, and the team's 5 best goal scorers all regressed significantly. Why did this happen and how are you going to fix it? 2) This team was absolutely terrible in the first period. Why did this happen and how are you going to fix it? 3) Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen was among the league's best goalies since Jan. 1. Beyond that, the team and its individual players did not post particularly good numbers in any particular part of the game. What are you going to do to make sure the Sabres won't be so reliant on one man to be the difference between winning and losing? Good managers diagnose the root cause of problems and they make corrections. I want to see a plan for addressing these issues and I will hold him responsible for its execution.

They won’t make it until Friday if they are getting fired. I will be shocked if Adams is fired. I don’t expect Granato to be, but I won’t be surprised if he is. I think public relations demands some form of sacrificial lamb, but I doubt he has it in him. Im not sure if he can do any better than “we’re committed to our plan and we will be working hard to get better”. Which ain’t gonna cut it with this group.

This season played out very much like 2016/17. A 78-point season of regression after a season of hope that the rebuild was coming to a close. It resulted in Bylsma and Murray getting shown the door. I see 2 differences: the internal organization was far more fractured then, the fan base is far more impatient now.

Officially, the 2nd most successful Buffalo Sabres season in the past 12 years? 🎉

Pretty sure it’s the fanbase. From what I hear half of them are really mean and boo the players and stuff. And the other half has their heads buried in the sand and refuses to make the team accountable for being so goddam terrible for so goddam long. 😘

I clearly see the argument. I can also see how that argument falls flat if your three “skill” defencemen can also play good defence. Nobody said the Robinson/Lapointe/Savard Canadiens had too many of the same type of defenceman. Or, if you want more recent, less once-in-a-lifetime examples, the Josi/Ellis/Subban Predators, or the Hedman/Shattenkirk/Sergachev Lightning, or the Theodore/Pietrangelo/Hanifin Knights. There’s no doubt Power and Byram have to get a lot better in their own zone. Considering they’ve played 162 and 163 games respectively, I expect they will. How much better they get will ultimately decide if the trade made sense or not.

I'd tend to hope that guy should have a longer resume than Eric Comrie's one 19-game season as an NHL backup. A Casey DeSmith/Jake Allen/Kevin Lankinen level guy maybe? But I actually think a guy like the Comrie of 2 years ago is the type of signing we're going to end up with: Adin Hill, Laurent Broissoit, Alex Lyon, Charlie Lindgren... Not necessarily those guys right now, but a guy in a similar situation to where they were a few years ago: 25-30, tasted the NHL, never quite cracked it.

Like I said, you don't really like the plan and you really don't like the execution 😁. My only point is that the hand hasn't fully played out yet. As to the bold, I think we all wanted Adams to use his depth in young, talented forwards to acquire a top 4 defenceman That's exactly what he did. You might say (many did) "not that young, talented forward for that top 4 defenceman". We shall see.

There are plenty. Chicago, Colorado and Tampa cup winners seemed too obvious and too successful. But they fit. This year's Vancouver team fits. New Jersey. The current Winnipeg Jets are product of this method. Ottawa is trying and thus far failing. Montreal has just started. The Florida Panthers tried and failed in the years around when Pegula bought the Sabres (22 years without a playoff series win, 19 of those without the playoffs at all) and finally got good when they tried a different path Sometimes it's just the darkness before dawn. Sometimes the sun doesn't rise at all.

I know you and Adams don't like the same players and that makes it really difficult for you to endorse his plan. But he's hardly building his roster solely through the draft. In the past 2 1/2 season he has acquired Tuch, Krebs, Lyubuskin, Comrie, Greenway, Clifton, Johnson and Byrum to augment his NHL roster and he'll almost certainly add a few more more over the next 2 or 3 months. They've been a pretty mixed bag and you can rightfully criticize his choices. But it's wrong to imply he's not interested in adding from outside the organization, and Tuch and Byrum say it's wrong to say he's not willing to make bigger moves. I don't think it's any secret what you don't like is that he has chosen to ice rookies like Benson and Quinn and Power instead of players who are better than those guys right now. But that wasn't the plan. And the plan isn't to keep adding more and more rookies. The plan was to accelerate the development of Tage, Dahlin, Mittelstadt, Cozens, Quinn, Peterka, Krebs, Samuelsson and Power by letting them learn in the NHL and fill in the gaps in that core as needed. Other than the 1st 3 players, the development part hasn't fully played out yet. Whether you like it or not, Mitts for Byrum was the first significant move to fill the gaps. It's the plan itself you don't like and that can absolutely be supported by the facts. But he hasn't finished what he started.