Randall Flagg

An example going by this guideline: Re-sign one of Larry/Zemgus, ideally both Florida desides they want to break up the core, like Friedman alluded to. Their fans are piling on Dadonov, and I read on their forum that Q might not like him. Maybe it's Connolly instead. Move Asplund and a 2nd, or a different non-Cozens/Mitts prospect, for Dadonov or Connolly. Add if needed We can't find anyone else for a 2C, and send Risto and Mitts packing to Anaheim for Adam Henrique and Jakob Silfverberg. That's a large trade. Maybe we or they add small pieces. Sign Justin Braun on short deal in UFA. (I have no idea if he's any good anymore, it can be someone else) Give Khudobin money Skinner - Eichel - Connolly/Dadonov Olofsson - Henrique - Reinhart Johansson - Kahun - Silfverberg A type of GLO line Dahlin - Miller Braun - Jokiharju McCabe - Montour Pilut - Borgen Ullmark Khudobin I have no idea if this is cap compliant, but we supposedly have it set up to be able to lose all the contracts this summer so we can actually have a transformative offseason like this, so let's see it

I would maybe replace the defenseman acquisition (though would still welcome it) with finding a 3RW. I don't want Jason messing around with any more Veseys, Shearys, Simmondses, Froliks. Skinner - Jack - someone Olofsson - someone - Reinhart Johansson - Kahun - someone a line functionally equivalent to GLO, ideally GLO Lazar I would be happy if Cozens made it to one of those "someone"s. I would like him to attack the other two with no-BS, not-underqualified, definitively good players. Say Cozens makes the team and slots in nicely with Johansson and Kahun. The good thing about the Eichel line there is that we don't need a true 1RW in that spot, as we have a true franchise 1C and a guy who scored 40 next to him on the other side - find a stylistic match. If Florida wants to blow things up, send 'em something for Brett Connolly, so he can bang around and score some goals, win some board battles (playing the Tom Wilson role on the Kuzy-Ovechkin-Wilson line). Maybe we buy low on Josh Anderson and have it pay off instead. That takes care of that spot. Then, the big move can be a real 2C. I know it's hard. But we can't do a 3rd year in a row without one, and the circumstances leading up to our desparate need have forced Jason into this position, and I expect results. I want Henrique caliber talent at minimum but would like him to go above and beyond. I would put Mitts, a RHD, a first, another first, any other pick, any prospect on the table for this to work. Even a lottery win - that just makes the job easier. You really would tell me that in a cap crunch, Tampa wouldn't give up Cirelli for Mitts and the right to draft Byfield or Lafreniere? Feel free to add on Tampa's end if we end up with a lot of stuff to give up. Cirelli is a placeholder name though, and if we can find the next Cirelli, that'd be great too. Liger likes Morgan Frost. i've heard whispers of Gaudette being pretty good in Vancouver. I have no idea on either of those guys, all I know is that Jason needs to fix it for the 2020-2021 season. Skinner - Jack - Connolly-like addition, not 1RW talent, but not out of place in a well-defined role with these two Olofsson - real 2C - Reinhart - competent second line scoring, I think Olofsson has a lot more room to grow too. Like, 35 goals next year. Better and better at ES. Out of the Eichel spotlight, where he has been excellent in a small sample size. Johansson - Kahun - Cozens or a real middle six player coming from Tampa/whoever to balance the massive 2C deal. Genuine 3rd line, Kahun and Mojo already have chemistry. Will provide far more consistent depth scoring than the amalgations of Vesey, Sheary, Berglund/Vlad, Frolik, Lazar, Pouliot, Griffith etc. that we've seen the last few years, as our third lines have essentially been relegated to sheltered fourth lines GLO or its functional equivalent, doing what they've done for two years. This leaves us down a defenseman, probably a RHD, so I'd look for a smaller move to find a LHD, as I'm not comfortable praying that Pilut is a good second pairing guy and don't want McCabe there. Dahlin - Miller/Montour/Risto xxx - Joki McCabe/Pilut - Miller/Montour/Risto With one of Miller/Montour/Risto gone in the 2C deal. Jokiharju and Dahlin will be better versions of themselves, and Pilut could still develop enough to make this easy. But this is where you could look for one of those Miller-type deals for a defenseman of your stylistic preference, to fill things out and have depth like Borgen and Pilut ready to come up depending on what player gets hurt. Find a goalie better than Hutton to play with Ullmark. The team described requires one big move, on the level of the Trocheck trade that just happened, and that we were in on. It requires one smaller move, for a competent player that stylistically meshes with Eichel, without needing to be a first line talent. It requires one or two ancillary moves for the third line (which could come as salary balancing in the big 2C deal, or could come from Cozens) and then for the defense, each of which wouldn't be very noticable in terms of impact on our net pool of assets. It requires a stable goaltending acquisition for a guy that can play 30-40 games, in a deep year for goaltending free agents. It's busy, it's tough. But it's doable, and puts us in the race for the 2/3 divisional spots next season. Assuming Jason is staying, this is what I need from him.

This is a tough, but doable, set of moves. It should be Jason's baseline requirement if he is held on, given what he's done for the C and G positions in his 3 years here.

But the asset management laid out in order by dudacek is all connected, and paints a scary picture. Other moves are irrelevant to the worries that series of moves inspires. I love plenty of Jason's moves, including the Eichel contract, Skinner trade, Kahun trade, Joki trade, and Miller trade (and the move that brought Scandella here). Still, the series of moves pertaining to cap space and asset management laid out by dudacek is unforgivable.

An additional solid move on top of a mountain of incompetence does not lessen the worry that the mountain of incompetence provides.

The cool thing about the Eichel goal was that my sister and I said "yes" and began a high five, before the pass even got to his stick. You just knew that he wouldn't miss.

They do a part in the beginning of each issue where they ask a question and publish their favorite twitter responses to it after a writer makes their case. The question this issue was who deserves the Hart, and a twitter user named pastajoe argued for Eichel.

The thing is that Hutton also played well for a decent chunk of the stretch Ullmark was out. Ullmark isn't so good that you can write in more than 1-3 points in that stretch. People are overestimating the impact one NHL goalie can have over another in just a handful of games, because while Hutton is bad, he wasn't all bad during that stretch, and Ullmark isn't great. I'd argue that Hutton had 9 or 10 games where you can't guarantee Ullmark would be any better, and Johansson had a good one in there as well. Adding a bunch of wins is just silly and our team is still flawed enough that that switch wouldn't have made much of a difference

But a slightly longer stretch gives him 6-11. Being arbitrary because you want to give the Sabres as many wins as possible is not a compelling argument in support of this team They would be in a very similar spot had Ullmark not been hurt, if I'm seeing correctly they were 1 game above .500 before, and are 1 game below it now

Ullmark won 6 of his 15 starts before tonight, going back to our swoon in December. Why would he have gone something like 10-3-1 in those 14 games?

If a shootout shot, or this game, or even a month's worth of games, are what Terry bases these decisions on, we are screwed either way hehe

That is only for offside challenges

What benefit do we get for not challenging that?

I'd ask Ralph for a timeout but

Poor Risto.

LOG have been doing that to Ovechkin and Kuznetsov all night long, they have been excellent

Pretty fun period, except for when the stinkbug decided to crawl up my calf.

Is it me or does Olofsson look way better without the checking assignment line one draws? ;)

Samson's flow

NHL.com has our PP at 12th-worst.

I'd add quite a bit. Ekblad has taken a monster step forward in the last year and a half or more

A team I haven't really thought about in this light. Something to watch for maybe

Last time Washington visited Buffalo as the season circled the drain, we had a surprisingly fun afternoon.

I think we could get Henrique for less, and I would shoot for better, and come back to trying to get him if that didn't work. I'd also move a RHD to try and upgrade your 3RW and make it a strength of the line.

If I'm not mistaken, our very own @pastajoe made it into the most recent edition of The Hockey News!