Randall Flagg

The graininess of changes in Phil's status is not period-by-period as viewed by the fan-base - it's as coarse as several-month-chunks.

An example of why these sample sizes are bad - 4 teams so far, with 2 and 3 games played, are below 40% corsi (5 are below 40% of shots taken, including Dallas, who have been dominant in their two games). And 5 are above 60% corsi, including the Knights, who we outplayed handily until the third-with-the-lead, which score effects doesn't count (and if you already don't think we outplayed them today, read through the thread around the 2nd intermission here and especially on hfboards, which is far more negative towards the Sabres than this place is). The Knights are also that high because Phily was up on them 5-1 early in the first game and coasted for 2 periods. Nobody will finish near 60% or below 46% in either of these stats, most likely, and yet there are teams taking 30% of the shots through 3 games, that will finish in the top of the league when all is said and done. The Coyotes are over 60%, in 4th, and haven't scored a goal yet through two games. Do we wish we were them, playing "sustainable hockey?" Y'all need Jesus

Since I guess we're going all in on this.... Natural stat trick, which I don't believe does any sort of score-adjusting, has us at 48% Corsi through two games. Not sustainable. Corsica, however, I'm 99% sure does adjusting, and has us at 53% through our two games. Certainly a sustainable-for-winning number. Of course, 2,3, 10 games are garbage sample sizes still. Talk to me after 20+. @TrueBlueGED do you know if Corsica does score-adjusting automatically? Edit: that NST number is through 3 games, but Corsica doesn't have today yet.

Go billlllllllllllllz What is their best offense since ~2005? Was it one of Gailey's? Maybe 2011? Was the best offense since then better than league average that year? My memory of so many of those 2005-2013 teams is clouded by the fact that I was a middle/high-schooler watching them

Now, with the assumption that 53-10-21's chances start going in, having three lines going well can let us be patient with Mitts and Tage, which I think is what is necessary right now. They're not far off and would benefit most from consistent minutes and linemates. I wish we had one more decent LW right now to stick with them for that.

He'll forever be walking the tightrope, but he's played as well as we could have hoped through 3 games so far. I take Nelson out first if Bogosian ever comes back.

Just got done. 2-1-0 looks soooo good! So did the team, I thought. Not sure why Phil switched Beaulieu and Dahlin. Might have been rewarding Beaulieu for the good couple of games he's had. But hopefully he sticks with what has been working on Thursday. I'd also just not touch the lines. Skinner is the only thing keeping the 21+10 combo afloat at even strength, as their games have turned stationary. Other fast skaters probably could too, but the line is getting chances with Jeff there - leave it alone. Jeff is doing his thing and will score sooner or later. I love how he lingers near and behind the net. And his edgework is niiiiiiiiiice. I know Phil is probably tempted to switch him with Sheary, but as this board predicted, Sheary has fit Jack & Sam like a glove so far, and I think you have to keep riding that. Yes, shot attempts looked bad, again helped by a "let's get out of this game with a win" mentality as the third went on - but through two periods, zero people would say that Vegas controlled the game by any stretch. It was pretty even, Sabres with more zone time but fewer clean shots. Vegas, the best transition team in the league, got virtually all of their chances on the rush, and thus not too much sustained zone time, and I only saw 3-4 truly dangerous chances for them all game. I saw more for us. The Sabres are still stuck in the mire of figuring out how to open up the offensive zone, but they can at least keep the puck there longer than they've been able to in a long time. Their transition out of the d-zone is getting better and quicker every single game. It's slowly coming along. Please keep this going, Hutton, you're our glue right now. Risto-Scandella chemistry is showing. Erod and Jason are our best fourth line since we were last in the playoffs. Let's go Buffalo!

I saw him with a huge smile on his face congratulating his teammates.

I've been dating my girlfriend for five years. When this streak started, we had never spoken before.

Win this thing and let's grab our first above-.500 record since January 2013(second game of the lockout season). Dear god this franchise sucks. Please end that now Aaaaaaaaaand I have to peace out for now since I won't get to watch for a few hours. Go Sabres!!

He's had Tavares for a total of 3 games, and drew the Toews line last night anyway. And managed to have the 3rd highest goals-per-game in the league over the course of his teenage seasons without Johnny T. He's fortunate that he's an outstanding hockey player

Same. I'll probably be able to watch around 5pm central time

Does anyone know if they're planning on starting Derek Anderson? I can't imagine it, but these guys do weird things, like start Peterman.

At this point the best we can hope for is that AM/MM get their 12.5/10 mil contracts to mess with the leafs' cap long term, and have the team's defense keep them first round outs, eh? Since it appears that they're going to score enough for AM/MM to deserve those contracts

Also true. Anyway, that poster's point about people "liking" Allen after "hating" those particular two quarterbacks doesn't make any sense because for that reason you mention people DON'T like Allen as much as they liked those guys at this point in their Bills careers

Why? This board was insistent from the beginning, and did a good job of holding to, the idea that EJ would get at least 2 full seasons before final judgments were out, and that's what happened. Because of what we gave up for Allen, people have been harsher on him (coupled with those people not liking him pre-draft) than they were on EJ through this point. Same with Tyrod and his first 4 games with the team.

All I'm saying is that the teams were shooting the pucks evenly until the third was under way and we had the 2 goal lead, which is a common occurrence - the leading team going into a bit of a shell. So while it's not good to allow a lot of shots and to get outshot, we were not continuously out-shot and out-possessed, it all happened at the end. Since this is common, many people throw away game situations like the end of the 3rd period for us last night when looking at possession stats - that's "score-adjusting." To give an example of it happening elsewhere, I showed the results from the Bruins game - an even game shot-attempt-wise until the 3rd when they sat on their lead just like we sat on ours.

See everyone, Rangers games just be like that sometimes

Craaaazy So it's true that the last time they both won on the same day was that week?

It probably said "on the same day" then.

I don't expect us to be a good possession team yet either, for the record. But as we all predicted, keeping Skinner on his own line with guys who may not drive it themselves may mean good things in this regard going forward. He had so many more chances than in game 1, and had the puck on his stick a lot more

Just saw a tweet that pointed out that the last time the Bills and Browns won in the same week was 2015. The Bills beat the Titans that week, and the Browns beat the Ravens

I honestly like watching football games like that and wish there were more, while noting that we can't sustainably win like that in the NFL and so need Allen to become one of those arena league QBs like everyone else has. And I will never stop loving/appreciating McCoy's running abilities. He made some outstanding plays today.

How does it compare to his 56, or 65 yard games last year? In all seriousness, yeah, Josh was bad and still shouldn't be starting. Sigh.

Does he talk about "making them turn?" Because if so, you're remembering DB.