Randall Flagg

He simply was a bottom ~10 forward playing regular minutes in the entire NHL for his first 15 games. I'll put some tape together over Christmas break if you'd like me to and aren't convinced. Prospects develop, but most of the time, development does NOT entail being in the NHL while they are over their heads, which is why people wanted him down. It entails being in lower leagues until they can enter the league as not in-way-over-their-head. However, he was able to power through that it appears, and all power to him for that. It doesn't change what has already happened, but it turns the present situation into a much brighter one.

The new challenge for these guys is continuing to bring top-notch preparation and detail as wins pile up. It's a mental battle that most of these guys have never had experience with at this level.

Not being critical of Phil's decision, it was obviously a good one, but he made the exact same decision the very last shootout we were in, like a week ago, and it was the opposite of gold. Just because shootouts are a tossup even for the best of the shootout performers. Thompson is confident and has probably shown stuff in practice. I'm surprised we didn't see Risto or Dahlin. Did Dahlin try a shot in Winnipeg?

Nope, the obsessed player was a prospect that was ruining his chances at the NHL, not a player in the NHL. It was also a Canucks prospect. Speculation was Juolevi, not sure if anyone ever found out.

The Sabres are literally the best ice hockey team on the planet.

Then the original person who scored it is dumb. The tying goal was quite obviously from Jack/Bogo, and I'm not convinced at all that Jack deserves an assist on the OT goal. But I'll happily take both.

The coasting on the shootout goal was just insane. I've never seen anything quite like that. He coasted without moving a muscle, not even twitching, for like 25 feet. That was more "controller-unplugged" than the famous Ovie defense GIF, though in a much different way and with a much different result.

Jesus, Laine.

And it's not fair of me to ride Tage when he's bad and not point out when he's turned it around. It's both good for the team, good for Tage, and promising for the front office's long term future that this turnaround happened, and happened so quickly. A couple more games of this and I'm convinced he's a legit good depth piece, right this second. Not a prospect, bad-and-not-ready. Not going-to-be-good, not mediocre-but-on-a-hot-streak. Just more good depth for a team that hasn't had it for so long, with growth potential to be more than that. We needed to see prospect development for the first time under this organization. It was one of our most important offseason goals. Tage has developed under the front office. Alex Nylander has too. It appears that Olofsson has as well. Good vibes everywhere. And the team is winning a f*ck ton too, just for good measure. I have to fly back to OK tomorrow and then you guys are going to be stuck with me in the GDTs again. For tonight, of course, I watched yet another glorious win with the company of my girlfriend and my family. It hurts to leave just as much as that first time. Thanks to the Sabres for softening the blow and keeping me excited for the coming months. It's truly been amazing.

No analysis needed at this point. The simple fact is that these guys don't remember how to lose.

...They gave Eich an assist on the OT goal?

Elie is bad

I think one of the biggest leaps this team can make is finding someone that fits Sam like Jeff has Jack, so they can bring each other up, rather than using Sam to salvage otherwise-unplayable players, which he still can do. That's not getting the most out of Sam though.

Find someone who looks at you the same way dudacek looks at Sam. In all seriousness, I agree. Sam is so nifty and useful.

I think at this point, exhaustion is the thing that would be their downfall, not ability.

I hate that we play the Leafs the night after we play Nashville, while the Leafs get 2 days off before.

Just keep banking points. Gritty effort from the boys.

That's boring. We want a trade!

According to hfboards, teams are averaging 3.08 goals per game this season, the highest total since 2005-06 which finished at the same number. Of course, lots of games left to change that. However, teams are averaging more than 2 fewer PPs per game than in that season.

Montreal is scary. Idk if Byron/Armia are back, but even without them every line flies. We have won two very close games against them. Hope we can get the third. Need to clean up the slot in front of Carter and start feeding the slot in the offensive zone. We are doing that less during the streak than we were before it. Picture that. Our hockey has been and can be even better, and yet we've won 7 in a row. Let's go boys!

Welp, never going to mention Aaron Maybin with a snarky tone again. Awesome.

Boston: We drew the backup, but they played on the road against the cup champs the night before, there starter giving up like 6 goals. In general, Halak has "become" their starter for now: He has 3 more starts than Rask and a .935 save percentage versus Tuukka's .909. It's "drawing the backup" but both the situation at the time and later on indicate it's not any sort of "disrespect" NYR: We drew Lundqvist. No-doubt-about-it starter/best goalie on team. Vegas: We drew Fleury. Obvious starter, not great this year but far more games played than an even worse backup. Colorado: Varlamov, their starter and top performer in net. Arizona: Raanta, their starter, only reason he's not leading them in starts is injury. Vegas: Fleury, again their starter San Jose: Martin Jones, the starter. He is worse than Aaron Dell this year, but still has the bulk of their games. If a changing of the guard happens (Sharks fans want Dell playing a lot more) it didn't happen when this game was going on. LAK: Jonathan Quick. Their starter, but he's only played a few games because of surgery on meniscus. Anaheim: Ryan Miller, drew the backup. They played at Vegas the night before, using Gibson there. At the time, Vegas was a cup-finalist, not seen as a bad team. Makes some sense. Not an obvious "disrespect moment" just yet. Montreal: Niemi. They had not played the night before, did not play the night after. IMO, the first unusual drawing of a backup. That game was sandwiched by victories with fine goaltending, so it was a bit odd to not see Price. Through ten games we saw 7 starters and 3 backups. One backup situation was odd. This corresponds to facing starters 57 games, which IMO looks like an average amount for any given starter, and given the relative lack of "dominant starter, obvious backup" situations that like every team had a decade ago in today's NHL, with plenty of "established starters" falling off the map unexpectedly, I think this is normal so far. But I think things are going to get a little more skewed in the next set. Columbus: Korpisalo. A backup, but a backup getting his 2nd of 3 starts in a row. Not a "decision to play the backup instead of the starter because Buffalo" - Bob was really struggling at the time. Badly. He's righted the ship since then. So, tally for backups, but not the same way the Price situation looked. Calgary: Rittich. They used Smith in Toronto the night before, so a fairly easy back-to-back decision. At the time. Now, however, Rittich is the starter. He's won 8 of 9 starts, has a bunch in a row. So we drew the backup at the time, but played the better goalie, and it was a regular back-to-back situation where the better team (at the time) got the better goalie. Ottawa: Anderson, their starter. Ottawa: Anderson, their starter. NYR: Lundqvist, their starter. Montreal: Price, their starter. Six goals baby. Vancouver: Markstrom, their starter performing much worse than the backup. Tampa: Domingue. Vasi's injury occurred the next day, and so we drew the backup. Nothing special, other than Vasi having started a few in a row. No back-to-backs. Winnipeg: Brossoit. The backup. Great season, and spelling Helle after 6 straight. No back-to-backs. Minnesota: Dubnyk, their starter. Pittsburgh: DeSmith, their "backup" but really their starter for now as Murray recovers from being @$$. Buffalo was not his first start in this string of games, nor his last, and so I don't count this as being disrespected by drawing the backup. Philadelphia: Lyon. Another technical "backup" situation...however, they have a bunch of goalies hurt, and the other guy that was the other option gave up six goals the game before, so that was hardly a "this is only Buffalo" situation. It was a "please god let us find a goalie that can play" situation. Montreal: Niemi. Back-to-back, Price gets the Bs at home. Reasonable. Price sux Through 23 games, the Sabres have faced 14 no-BS starting goalies given the context of the time. This corresponds to 50 times over the course of an 82 game season. Last season the top 31 goaltenders averaged 53.5 starts. This season the average top 31 goalie has 13 starts, in 21 games, which paces for 50 games on average for the starting goalie. So, based on how often teams are playing the "dominant" goalie, the Sabres are actually bang on in terms of how many times they should have seen a starter versus a backup. Considering that there were only three situations where we caught a backup not on a back to back with a better/home game waiting the next/previous day, and in each of those cases the starter had gotten an extended stretch, well, 3 "disrespects" in 22 games can't be unusual for any team. In conclusion: The Sabres aren't drawing more backup goalies than average, and the skew towards this very busy stretch (for all teams) seeing more than we have been just makes it look like teams don't take us seriously, but I think by now most teams are aware that we aren't yesterday's Sabres. Teams are, on average, going to start their starter 50 times this season at this pace, and the Sabres are on pace to see 50 starters. Nice. I'm not at work which is why I was able to post a bit more lol! And we came to the same conclusion except I counted Korpisalo against CBJ as not really a backup because he got several games in a row due to bob being bad, and we were in the middle of that. But he certainly is a backup.

Montreal has a home game at night against the Bruins tomorrow. Assuming Price is good (he's not) I'd very easily start him in that game over the game the day before on the road, no matter who it was against. More detailed look incoming.

Does anyone have a count on how many backups we've faced? I'd be interested in looking at schedules and seeing if and when teams have back-to-backs. We got Dubnyk instead of Minny's backup, why did they choose that route while other teams didn't? I mean I know the Sabres have been bad but it can't be too much work for coaches to notice the season we're having, eh? So I wonder how skewed the backup-starter ratio is.

Unless it's Pittsburgh playing the hot hand and keeping Murray on the bench for several consecutive games because he's been freaking dreadful.