SabresBaltimore

1. Sabres win and point totals 43-31-9 - 95 points 2. Do the Sabres make the playoffs and if so how far do they go? Yes, but out in the first round 3. Team MVP: Dahlin 4. Team ROY Levi 5. Most Improved player Peterka 6. Team leader in goals, assists and points: Goals: TNT, Assists: Dahlin, Points: TNT 7. NHL Award candidates (Norris, Vezina, Selke, Calder, Richard, MVP etc)? Any winners? Dahlin for the Norris, Levi for Calder but neither winning 8. How many players score 10 or more goals? Who? 9: TNT, Skinner, Tuch, Dahlin, Cozens, Mitts, Olofsson, Peterka, Krebs 9. How many players score 20 or more goals? Who? 4-5: TNT, Skinner, Tuch, Cozens then one of Peterka (most likely), Dahlin or Mitts 10. Does anyone from Rochester get callup and stay with the Sabres (such as Pominville back in the day)? Not unless we have a long term defensive injury. Then Ryan Johnson maybe 11. Which Eastern playoffs team (s) miss the playoffs and who replaces them? No clue really. Bolts and Rangers out. Sabres and Detroit in 12. Stanley Cup champions 2023-24? No clue really. I don't really follow the league that closely beyond the Sabres, so I'll just guess based on who was good last year and say the Devils make the jump this year. Maybe that's wishful thinking because I like Lindy Ruff 13. Other predictions you'd like to share? Nope

Per: https://www.nhl.com/sabres/news/how-to-watch-buffalo-sabres-preseason-games-2023 Friday, Oct. 6 vs. Pittsburgh – 7 p.m. Watch: MSG (Dan Dunleavy and Rob Ray; pregame starting at 6:30 p.m.) Listen: WGR 550 (Radio Simulcast) I figured I wouldn't get to watch this one, but like the last MSG game, it looks like it will also be on NHL Network for anyone who has that/is out of market. It was announced yesterday that Levi is starting (which I find a bit of a surprise after how bad UPL played, I thought it would be Comrie). Both Cozens and Eric Johnson were out practicing with the team too. So far I haven't any other roster announcements. I'm hoping they put out most of their starters.

I don't think Rousek has to pass through waivers yet. Also, if we do waive UPL, I think they're more likely to risk Biro to waivers than Clague, but I could be wrong.

I think it's the latter, but I worry the team is expecting the former. I would have loved for UPL to come out like the good version we saw on those 12 occasions and make himself our backup. Age/contract wise he is the better fit. But he didn't do anything to instill confidence for me.

I hope you're right. I think they will keep 3, but I don't want them to. Ideally we can get UPL back to Rochester. But if we lose him to another team, I still think it's better than keeping 3 goalies. I'm hoping all the public facing talk about all 3 is just to try to help KA trade Comrie or UPL if they feel like UPL can't get through waivers. Either way our current goalie pipeline is a mess.

I would agree if they somehow don't end up keeping 3 goalies. If not, though they only have room to keep 7 on my list.

I posted this in another thread but it looks like I agree with Fairburn I guess. So I won't repost my list. I don't want to keep 3 goalies, but I'm kind of leaning towards that's what will end up happening. I think Biro has looked good and there is a slight chance someone might claim him if we waive him, but Benson has made it impossible to fit him into the roster spots right now. Maybe they call him up later. If by chance we do waive or trade a goalie, then I'd have Clague as an 8th defensemen. Possibly Byron, but I hope not. Sabres seem to like him far more than I do. I'm also not sure what we do when his 9 games are up and we send Benson down. Probably bring up Clague or Byrson to be our 8th defenseman. But I'll worry about that later since this is just opening night projections though.

I think UPL showed last season he could win them games when they played bad. To me the issue is consistency. After a great stretch of games last season, he slumped and then never recovered. With Levi the clear #1 on the team, you just need someone who can go in and win you a game every now and again to give him a break. The breaks may be even more important this year too since Levi's a rookie who hasn't played even played a longer AHL season, let alone something like the grind of an 82 game NHL season. Comrie was a decent backup before we signed him. We thought maybe he could be a stop gap starter, but that hasn't shown to be the case. However when healthy he's looked like a manageable backup. Sure we'd all love to have a veteran starter who could transition to backup as Levi get acclimated, but that's not happening. At best we'll get other AHL starters or unproven backups. UPL started out terrible last night through 1 and a bit periods, but then seemed to settle in for most of the 2nd and 3rd. The team played terrible in front of him. They always seems to play terrible in front of him. That's my biggest concern. We saw late last year this team play much better defensively. Part of that is likely the pressure of a playoff push, but I think a large factor is Levi. Comrie put up a better showing with mostly AHL defenders against a fairly close to regular season Pens team. But the team hasn't shown to play that much better in front of him compared to Levi either. Personally I think we should keep Comrie and trade/waive UPL, but I think the team is still hoping to get a more consistent version of UPL that looks like what we saw when he had that good stretch last season. It's kind of why I think they are going to go with 3 goalie, maybe at least until Quinn is back or they finally rip the band aid off and pick 1 back-up

Here's my tentative 23 man roster pending something changing with tomorrow night's game. The lists aren't exactly ordered except the ones I'm less confident/are on the bubble are listed at the end of their respective position groups 13 Forwards Thompson Skinner Tuch Cozens Mittelstadt Peterka Greenway Girgensons Krebs Okposo Jost Olofsson Benson (9 game trial) 7 Defenseman Dahlin Power Clifton Samuelsson EJohnson Jokiharju Stillman 3 Goalies Levi Comrie UPL I don't want to keep 3 goalies, but I'm kind of leaning towards that's what will end up happening. I think Biro has looked good and there is a slight chance someone might claim him if we waive him, but Benson has made it impossible to fit him into the roster spots right now. Maybe they call him up later. If by chance we do waive or trade a goalie, then I'd have Clague as an 8th defensemen. Possibly Byron, but I hope not. Sabres seem to like him far more than I do.

I have Johnson as the #7 on our depth chart right now. I'd probably put Stillman 8, Clague 9 and Byrson 10. But I agree with others that Johnson gets sent down to get more playtime. I think they'll keep Stillman as the defacto 7th instead and waive Clague and Byrson.

Feed is live: https://www.nhl.com/sabres/video/buffalo-sabres-live-stream-6336966456112

I've seen this come up a few times, but there are issues with twitter embeds now because both the app and the web version give you an x.com address instead of twitter.com address. Apparently this was fixed in version 4.7.3 according to this thread: https://invisioncommunity.com/forums/topic/475548-twitterx-rolls-eyes-embedding-issues/#comment-2954398 It looks like this site is running 4.5.4. I'm not sure how easy to upgrade, but I figured I'd pass that along just in case

and of course editing this crap on your phone is way harder to do than on a computer.

The issue may be that when you do that you're only changing the display text and not the embedded url. Typically when you copy/paste a url it uses the url as both. Like this: <a href="https://x.com/LLysowski/status/1709661985481044161">https://x.com/LLysowski/status/1709661985481044161</a> So you could end up editing to: <a href="https://x.com/LLysowski/status/1709661985481044161">https://twitter.com/LLysowski/status/1709661985481044161</a> Such that the display name looks right but the link is still going to x.com The other thing I've noticed is the forum code seems to detect a twitter address and converts it when you paste it. So if it's not the first thing, it may be you need to change the URL and THEN paste it into a forum post. Not paste it and change it. Ideally the forum code would just get updated to work with both, but that's easier said than done because they'll have to do a deployment.

That is correct

If it doesn't, at least we only signed him to a 1 year deal and our defensive depth looks a bit better than I thought coming into the season.

Oops. I missed the date I guess. I thought it said it was opening night.

Yeah. Exactly. In hockey the best you get is "lower" or "upper" body injury.

Girgenson is 29. He's 2 years younger than Skinner. And 6 years younger than Okposo. Calling him a slightly younger old man is kind of a reach. He's certainly not a young player anymore, but he's still probably got several more years in the league left in him as a role player. This reminds me of when reporters asked him if he'd contemplate retiring if he didn't return to the Sabres, and he was like "I'm only 29". I think he seems older just because he's been around for 11 seasons.

I love how detailed they get with hockey injuries..

I didn't have Benson playing with Krebs/Rousek on my guess, but at least he will with Mitts and Tuch on the PP it looks like

Oof. I figured he'd play at least the final 2 presason games.

Yeah. That could be too, but then who centers that line? Plus, I feel like Benson has locked in his 9 game try out and those 3 are still trying to fight for a chance to be on the initial 23 man roster.

Talking to a buddy of mine about this, I think this is probably a one-off or special occasion thing. Even with Football expanding to 4 and sometimes 5 days/week, the vast majority of games are Sundays from 1-7pm, so Redzone works really well. Apart from this opening night where all 32 teams are playing, is there a day of the week where the bulk of the league is playing? Saturday nights maybe? Canada does (or did, I haven't watched Canadian coverage in a few years) their Hockey Night in Canada double headers on Saturday nights. So maybe that would make the most sense if ESPN would want to make this a recurring thing. I'd probably swap to it during intermissions if I'm watching the game live. But 99% of the time, I start an hour late so I can skip intermissions and commercials. That's a lot of time saved over an 82 game season.