Randall Flagg

Dang.

There are pros and cons to coaching philosophies about line structures. Ralph tends to let things ride for loooooooooooooooong stretches of time without changing lines, because he believes in building chemistry. For a while it was annoying, because Jack's line was clearly losing matchups most nights. But they've turned it around,and I think the tough minutes are starting to show us another growth spurt in Olofsson's game, which would be huge. Most coaches would have split them up (and I would have agreed with them) weeks ago. But it looks like sticking with this top line for 25 games is paying off now.

I'd say Samson, I'd believe that Skinner is usually tied with him.

Can't watch for the first time this year I believe. Hopefully the last. Go Sabres!

Definitely hard to quantify. I might be biased overall by his 13 game goal less streak last year - I watched a lot of those games because when Leaves struggle it's enjoyable, and he was shockingly bad in most of them. I could see that clouding my view of the rest of his career because it's when I confirmed that I'd never prefer Auston to Jack straight up

Matthews has more defensive controller disconnected moments than Eichel both in general and in Sabres-Leafs games. he's really awful there.

https://hfboards.mandatory.com/forums/toronto-maple-leafs.17/

the only thing terrible about the officiating was that, once again, the Bills were on the wrong end of a brutally lopsided holding call disparity (i think it was 3 or 4 to zero holds called) despite the gameplay not actually shaking out that way (check out the Dallas OL on Oliver during his strip sack, compared to the one taht was called on us the very next play) The bills have to be at a net -40 on holding yards per game this season. I think they hold a bit more than their opponents, but not THAT much more.

Any time a game sends me to the opponent's message boards it was a good game.

Tie it up! watching these teams transition against each other is depressing

Frazier has been doing this a lot longer, and doing it with a defense he's had together for 3 years now. Not a very clean comparison. Maybe Daboll just had a coinciding come to Jesus moment, but the number of bad-to-horrifying tendencies and play calls, controlling for execution, has been about 1/50th what it was before the move

They'll need to return to the 12 point in 10 game 98 point pace that many cite, and then go on an additional run of something like 4-0-1 in a 5 game span. That'd get them to 98. Doable.

Some teams were happy to include guys whose peaks were in 2005 but who still technically played games in the 09-10 season. And like I mentioned, others only picked 5 skaters and 1 goalie. I really wish these writers would have coordinated a bit more with this

I must be dumb, because I'd put money on it being far easier to see the flow of the game and dissect potential areas of mismatch from up top, which is why he would decide to do it in the first place. It's no coincidence that, in addition to execution, the playcalling has been more sensible the last three weeks. And Daboll has said himself (according to Murphy) that he stayed on the sideline to have easier access to Josh and now can move up because of Josh's growth.

This is true but isn't the whole story - if this happened and Montreal got one point out of their 2 games in hand, we'd be out. Because right now we're 5 points behind the wild card spot already

That really does appear to be quite the move. And Josh developing to a point where he felt comfortable doing it.

Without those games they don't win this one. The plot and trajectory of this team was there to be seen by those who read Shaw66's weekly analyses on TBD

Neo has it - a lot of battered fan syndrome made it very hard to try and talk bills in this thread earlier this year. It was fun to watch them in the preseason and learning how to win early, but every time a few of us tried to talk about it most of the responses were "yeah but the bills" and "same old bills" and "they still suck" I wasn't the only one but it was lonely! True always enjoyed wins and believed in us beating the teams we were better than, and Swamp, Juju and a couple others had fun too. Then there were the guys who want to care so bad and still watch, but can't help the crushing feeling of impending doom, like inkman. Can't really blame them.

I was on an island by myself when I was enjoying evaluating this team and its players throughout training camp and then the early games. Nothing in response but Bills snark! Some of y'all have missed parts of the best journey buffalo sports has given us this decade. Edit: True gets props for knowing how to have fun with a sports team he's critical of

Oh

The duality of man

I've honestly already forgotten. Was Miller scratched again tonight?

Woah momma

So these are all the teams that made full lineups for this activity on The Athletic. The rest of them either didn't do it yet or only gave a starting 5 plus a goalie, which is lame as hell. Honestly the Sabres don't look so bad now. I think the key difference is that for most of these teams, most of these players had their best seasons overlap for quite a few of the seasons, whereas in our lineup there's a chasm in the middle of two decent eras.... And it's funny how 25% of the Wild's forwards are our guys Ottawa Hoffman - Spezza - Stone Tkachuk - Duchene - Alfredsson MacArthur - Turris - Ryan Michalek - Pageau - Neil Methot - Karlsson Phillips - Ceci Chabot - Gonchar Anderson Toronto JVR – Matthews – Kessel MacArthur – Tavares – Marner Lupul – Kadri – Nylander Hyman – Bozak – Kulemin Gardiner – Rielly Muzzin – Phaneuf Kaberle – Hainsey Andersen Philadelphia Hartnell - Giroux - Jagr Schenn - Couturier - Voracek Briere - Carter - Simmonds JVR - Richards - Konecny Timmonen - Pronger Provorov - Gostisbehere Coburn - Streit Mason New Jersey Devils Hall - Elias - Kovalchuk Parise - Zajac - Palmieri Cammalleri - Henrique - Jagr Zubrus - Hischier - Clarkson Greene - Severson Fayne - Larsson Salvador - Zidlicky Brodeur Pittsburgh Penguins Guentzel - Crosby - Hornqvist Kunitz- Malkin - Neal Hagelin - Bonino - Kessel Dupuis - Staal - Rust Dumoulin - Letang Martin - Schultz Orpik - Cole Murray New York Islanders Lee - Tavares - Okposo Nelson - Barzal - Eberle Bailey - Nielsen - Grabner Martin - Cizikas - Clutterbuck Leddy - Boychuk de Haan - Hamonic Hickey - Pulock Greiss Carolina Hurricanes Skinner - E. Staal - Williams Svechnikov - J. Staal - Cole Ruutu - Aho - Whitney Teravainen - Lindholm - Brindamour (they put him under centers cuz he barely tipped the decade) Slavin - Hamilton Faulk - Pesce Hanifin - Commodore (another guy who barely touched the decade, Ward/Gleason if not) Ward Chicago Blackhawks Sharp - Toews - Hossa Panarin - Richards - Kane Saad - Shaw - Debrincat Bickell - Bolland - Versteeg Keith - Seabrook Oduya - Hjalmarsson Leddy - Byfuglien Crawford St. Louis Blues Steen - ROR - Tarasenko Schwartz - Backes - Perron Berglund - Schenn - Oshie McDonald - Stastny - Reaves Bouwmeester - Pietrangelo Parayko - Shattenkirk Jackman - Polak Binnington/Elliott Dallas Stars Benn - Seguin - Radulov Eriksson - Spezza - Richards Morrow - Ribeiro - Sharp Roussel - Eakin - Ott Goligoski - Klingberg Heiskanen - Daley Lindell - Benn Bishop Minnesota Wild Parise - Koivu - Granlund Zucker - E. Staal - Pominville Nino - Coyle - Vanek Foligno - Brodziak - Clutterbuck Suter - Spurgeon Brodin - Dumba Scandella - Prosser Dubnyk Vancouver Canucks Sedin - Sedin - Burrows Pettersson - Kesler - Boeser Miller - Horvat - Samuelsson Torres - Malhotra - Hansen Edler - Ehrhoff Hamhuis - Tanev Hughes - Bieksa Luongo Anaheim Ducks Rakell - Getzlaf - Perry Cogliano - Kesler - Silfverberg Selanne - Koivu - Ryan beleskey - Thompson - Palmieri Fowler - Lindholm Beauchemin - Vatanen Visnovsky - Manson Gibson Calgary Flames Gaudreau - Monahan - Iginla Tkachuk - Backlund - Frolik Hudler - Bennett - Lindholm Glencross - Stajan - Ferland Giordano - Brodie Russell - Hamonic Bouwmeester - Hamilton Kiprusoff

I listened to it. it's scary that that dude is running our team.