In The Buff

Welcome back Tage

The thing about the Okposo injury is when u look at the replay, u dont see Kyle looking both ways b4 jumping on the ice. Thats 1 of the 1st things u learn & for some reason he just didn't do it. So yeah its unfortunate but was also avoidable if he just shows more awareness to whats going on around him. Why he didn't is anyones guess. Regardless i hope he's alright & i look forward to seeing what Tage can do. If Lazar, Asplund, Tage can have some success, it'll be a big boost to our team & we surely need it. Can't count on Jack to score 4 goals every night but if we could i'd take it ?

Sabres found the formula for winning again. Jack needs to score every goal! In-before Jack scores 100 this year ? Thank the Gods we won a game! Good job guys

The game was at 2pm because of that thing called a time difference. The game started at 10pm Sweden time. If the game were to start at say 6pm EST, it would've had to start at 2am in Sweden. As if that makes sense at all? Yeah that's smart. Theres no way around that with international games, whether its the NHL or the Olympics or whatever it may be. For your 2nd point, you & I are not on the team & don't have any way of knowing what they do together. But i can imagine it meant a lot to our Swedes to share their culture to the rest of our players. Instead of just talking about it, they were able to go there & experience it together. That probably meant a lot to the guys, both the Swedes & everyone else & no doubt brought them closer together. I would think that'd be pretty obvious. We lost the 2 games vs the 2018 Presidents Trophy winners & that sucks. Of course they'll be frustrated with losing. Losing will do that. We can only hope that it'll motivate them to play even just a little bit harder this next game out to make up for it.

Idk if it really matters if your star players are foreign born to qualify for a game like that. But case in point it made sense for us to play in this Sweden series because we have 6 players on our active roster taking part who worn born there, including Dahlin who is a star in his own right. Not an all-star per se but 1 of the bigger young stars, who is massively followed in the host country. The bigger question would've been why was Tampa Bay there when they had only 1 player from Sweden? And the answer is less about the nationality of their players than it was the league wanting to showcase 1 of their most talented teams in an international setting.

I voted yes because we should take pride in our team for being chosen to play in an event like this. Yes its a strain on our club with the logistics, but I'd rather the NHL pick our Sabres for events than ignore us all together. Then the narrative would be: "The Sabres get no respect, they're never invited to play in this or that. If Buffalo were a bigger city we'd get to play them etc" We all remember the Winter Classic & how proud & excited we were back then. Only reason i think some people here are down on it is the result of those games. If we won both games vs TB 6-0, I'm sure we'd be jumping at the chance to do that again. In the midst of a losing streak & losing vs 1 of the most talented teams in the league? Not so much. So yeah absolutely I'd like to see us play in any special series or games. For the pride of the blue & gold, to be relevant & play on a higher stage. For the players to have another experience, one that brings them closer together & one in which they can learn from. Just be prepared that we can lose because you know, that can happen!

kinda cool that RK put Mitts & Vesey out there to get their name announced on the ice for the pregame hooplah. Maybe that'll light a fire under them

If anyone needs any help with watching todays game, feel free to send me a pm GO SABRES!

I agree with everything you've said for the most part but just want to add that I'm sure Botts already knows whats needed to improve. Its been pretty obvious going back to last year & not much has changed to affect that need. He may have wanted to evaluate what defenseman to move out, but that was also due to necessity given the injuries to our back end. But I don't really see it as an evaluation thing. I mean for the most part our forwards are who we've come to expect. I see the no trade thing more along the lines that Botts has been waiting for our guys to get healed up & that he hasn't been willing to give up whatever assets it'd take to bring in another top 6/9 forward at this point. Seems every team is looking for help there & the asking price has to be high, because not many teams have a surplus of those players. So you either need to trade something of value or take in cap in return. And we really can't do that until next year when we have more cap space. I could see us doing what we did with Skinner though. Getting a player back who's in the final year of their contract. But I'm sure we'll see a trade at some point. I just don't want us to just make a trade for the sake of it, its gotta be for someone who can actually help us. Finding that right player on a team who wants what we can offer is the hard part.

I saw this article just now & thought I'd share it. Its a history of Swedish Sabres we've had over the years, with a pretty good write-up on everyone. On a side note, i didn't know we had a player named Linus Omark on our roster at one point. Not to be confused with current Sabre Linus Ullmark. Anyways here's the link for anyone interested: https://thehockeywriters.com/sabres-swedish-hockey-player-history/

Anaheim has been mentioned as a possible match all thru the offseason too. The question is who would the Ducks be willing to get rid of & who would we even want & do those 2 things match. Its been an issue of compensation imo. But at this point I think Risto has been an asset to our blue line & offers something nobody else does & i dont know if i'd want to get rid of him. I'm guessing if anyone is gonna go maybe it'll be Scandella, since i believe he's also a UFA next year. If we're not gonna re-sign him (and i would doubt that we would), makes sense to trade him before the deadline, sooner or later.

Right from the beginning faceoff the Rangers came out with energy & intensity. We just havent matched that imo. That NYR pressure could be why we've seen so many turnnovers Who knows.

man the Sabres are having a rough time getting past the blue line tonight

The decision may very well be not to play Bogo at all. But when he's healthy, at least that option exists in case he's needed. Thats the point i suppose. Depth is a good thing

Bogo isn't healthy today & won't be for quite some time. But when he is the health status of those players could be different at that time, so that would be a decision to be made then of course. But hypothetically if he were healthy right now (even though Montour in your question isn't ready to play right now either) I'd imagine RK would make an assessment based on how Bogo looks in practice to see if he'd be an upgrade over anyone. I would also expect a conditioning assignment in Roch prior to him being in the lineup, if theres time left in the season for that. Its hard to hypothesize these things because we just don't know what Bogo's time frame is. I can't really just pick a player willy nilly because thats just not how any coach would/should do things imo.

Yep if this season goes as we all want it to, come time for that final playoff push a healthy & fresh legged Bogo could be just what we need at that crucial point in the season. Especially since injuries are gonna happen at some point (even though they won't since i don't want to jinx anything). But having more healthy players at your teams disposal is never a bad thing imo. And for those Bogo naysayers, everyone's been down on Okposo prior to this season, including myself. And he's played well with RK's new system. Who's to say Bogo won't do better in RK's system as well? Depth is a very good thing to have!

I don't think many are in the "all is well' camp with Risto. There's definitely areas of his game that could stand to be improved upon. But he offers something that nobody else provides on our back end. That strong physical presence that dishes out the physicality & doesn't just take it all game long. I think a D core needs a mix of physical players & offensive players. If Risto is taken out of the equation, our d core looks a lot more wimpy. Just my opinion of course ?

Yes thats what i think happens too. For Bogo as well whenever he's ready. Only makes sense that you'd want to get these guys coming off injuries time to get up to game speed. Barring other unforeseen injuries of course

Erod's a good depth player, can play all thruout the lineup, but he's not as good a goal scorer as Sheary is & I do think that line has better balance with him on Casey's wing. But its nice to see Casey was able to capitalize on a couple opportunities tonight. Kids been working hard & putting in the effort & getting some chances. Its great to see him be rewarded for it. And i'm sure it'll relieve some of the pressure he's put on himself & from some fans as well. It'd be awesome if he got a hat trick tonight!

I wonder if the Ducks have Miller start tonight to face off versus his old team. And thanks to Pi2000 for another GDT thread. I really love the old videos you add to them. Brings back lots of great memories! Thanks!

As fans we're tempted to do a lot of things with this roster. But big picture we're 5-0-1. I dont think you take a chance at screwing up his head or confidence by sending him down unless he does something detrimental to the team. Like costly giveaways or seriously stinking up the ice. You continue to stay the course, coaching him up, instilling confidence into him & hope those chances he's been getting start going in. If we start a 5 game losing streak & that line is still under performing or more specifically him then yeah, perhaps sending him down would be good. But not at this time when we're 5-0-1 imo.

Yeah 1 or 2 year deals only. I don't think its smart to commit multiple years to bottom 6 players hitting 30. Also there's other players in the pipeline that could very well be pushing for ice time. Players that would be cheaper & younger & perhaps offer more upside. And that Larsson line is playing well now. To a surprise to almost everyone.... 6 games into the season. Perhaps they're overachieving & can't keep it going, who knows? Lets wait to see how that line looks in January or February before we start talking about multiple year contract extensions. I mean just a few months ago when they were given 1 year deals, lots of fans were upset that they would be playing here again this year. Now 6 games into the season after some success we're talking multi year deals. Such is the rollercoaster of being a sports fan i guess. But a wise GM i would think takes a patient & cautious approach before throwing the money around.

On a side note, once Montour, Bogo & Pilut all return from injury, JBots is gonna have to make a move. So perhaps if this line is still not where we want them to be, a trade can be made to bring someone in that will effect the composition of that line.

For as much as we wish Casey was further along in his development, i do think we need to remember he's only 20 years old & is gonna need time to fully mature. We're talking multiple seasons both physically & on the ice. If he wasn't getting chances i'd be more worried. But he's been getting opportunities to score & just hasn't finished. In time those chances will go in. So i'm not overly worried about that line. Not enough to bench anyone anytime soon. Plus in Casey's case, he's cash money in shootouts & contributing there. But if that line was a liability defensively that'd be another story as well, but theyre not to this point. So i say just keep coaching them up & give them some time to get it together. In the meantime we can all talk about it in these threads that come out a few times a week lol

i do think in time that line will be better. You have Mitts who is still finding his own game & learning how to use his high skilled talent & apply it to his play. You have Vesey who has only been in the league a few years too, playing on a new team which along with him is learning a new system as well. You basically have 2/3's of that line not knowing 100% what theyre doing yet. So I'm not really surprised that line isn't our best. I think if we had a more seasoned pro to go along with those 2 guys, it'd help them out a lot. But again i don't want it to sound like i'm too harsh on them.