mjd1001

You can't just ignore the schedule either. They have played a pretty easy schedule so far. Take a look at the schedule they are going to be facing from the 2nd week of November through the next 30 days after that..... Wash, Edmonton, Toronto, Pitt, Calgary, Rangers, CBus, Boston, Montreal, Det, Seattle, Fla, and Carolina. 3 back to backs in there and at one point 5 games in 7 days. They have won the games that they had to play, so that is good, but it gets a lot harder between now and the beginning of December.

Many of us wont' be happy, but at this point I don't think there is anything the Sabres can do about it. The have shopped him around for months. At some point, you have to understand the 'item you are selling' is not worth what you THINK it should be worth, but it is worth what someone is willing to pay. The Sabres could have been holding out for a Zegras/Krebs type player, but if no one was giving you that for month and months and months, at some point you have to realize your asset (in its current condition) isn't worth what we all want it to be. If this deal with Vegas is getting ready to go down, Adams should be making one last call to the other teams he talked to and letting them know this is their last chance. Once you decide to deal him, you take the best 'last' offer that anyone makes.

I don't think it is a 'terrible' contract/deal, but I do question how it fits with the team: -$7.5 million isn't bad for a top pair D-man, but is he one? in 2018-2109 he had an incredible statistical season, every other year of his career hasn't come close to it. Do leafs fans and management view him as closer to that 2 peak season? or the rest of his career? Are they paying for a 20 goal player? or what he usually is (5-10 goal player)? -Even if he is worth it, they have very little flexibility in their roster now for the next few years. They are going to have $48 million dollars in cap space tied up in just their top 5 skaters...the same group that has been there and not gotten out of the first round. -D-men don't drop off as much as forward do when they hit age 28...but this contract is going to be giving the leafs a cap hit of $7.5 million on a guy when he is going to not only be in his mid 30's, but will have a LOT of miles on him (I think that will be his 17th full season in the league by the end of that deal). And with a full no-trade that begins right now. I think the dollar figure isn't terribly out of line, but I think that contract and player would fit better on a different team than on the Leafs.

I'm not sure how much ice time is a difference between them, or more of a reflection of the difference in the Roster this year. I like to look at ice time to see just what coaches really think of players..and a couple weeks into the season there are a couple things of note: Defense: -Dahlin lead D-men in Ice time by far, but he is not at Risto levels of ice time, or even close to the league leaders. In fact, the there isn't much of a difference between most D-men in ice time. Granato really does just roll them out there when it is their turn. -Dahlin gets most of the PP ice time, with Bryson and Miller getting a little, no one else really gets any. -Hagg and Pysyk get the most PK ice time, Miller and Bryson get a decent amount too. Only Dahlin and Butcher are not used on the PK much at all. In OT, it is Dahlin and Bryson, and that is really all. Forwards: -No forward has over 17:30 minutes of ice time per game played, so again, Granato so far isn't leaning on anyone heavily, he seems to roll out the lines when it is their turn. Olofsson and Tage lead, but not by that much over the rest. -When you look at PP time, Tage and Olofsson lead there, but there are 8 forwards who get close to even time overall on the PP. -SH? Eakin, Girgensons, Bjork, Okposo, and Caggulia...with a little less for Asplund and Ruotsalanian. No one else. But just like D-mean, overall everyone dressed gets a chance. If you are dressed for a game, no matter for what reason, you are going to get regular ice time. Forwards:

I agree. As of now I see this as an 80 point team, and that is with getting injured players back. Nothing I have seen so far makes me think any differently yet. Of course, 80 points to me is about 15 points better than I thought just a couple weeks ago.

On a somewhat related note, the fanbase might have to deal with this being a different type of team going forward than what we all though we were getting years ago. After Eichel is dealt, this may be a team with no superstar, no guy who will compete for MVP...no one in the top 10 in scoring. It looks like the prospect pool of forwards now may have some really good players in it, but a lot of them might be the hard working/two way guys with talent to put in 20-30 goals, not 40-50. And your 'elite' talent is on the Blue line (Dahlin, Power).

So my question is what happens to Quennville and Cheveldayoff?

No, he gets the surgery with the shorter recovery time, and ends up playing a few games late this season to show he is healthy.

I'm just thinking if the team that traded him less than a year later got a lot more than the Sabres did in return, a lot of the fanbase here would be very upset. It certainly would be a topic of discussion for a while.

Anyone ever consider this nightmare scenario? -Sabres Trade Eichel ( Calgary, Anaheim, where-ever) and get a bit less than they would normally because he is injured. -Eichel goes to that team, plays until the end of this season and plays very well. -That team, whoever they are, then turns around and flips a proven HEALTHY Eichel to the Vegas, the Rangers, or Boston, or someone else in the offseason when THOSE teams had both the chance to see him play and had a chance to clear some cap space. -The nightmare scenario for Sabres fans would be if something like that happened, the team that 'flips' Eichel ends up getting a lot more in return than what they gave up. I don't think it is likely, but I also don't want to 100% rule out a situation like that. I guess that is the one reason I am glad Adams is holding on for a big return and not just 'giving in' to what is currently out there.

Without getting too far into advanced stats (because I am not schooled in them all that well), look at some basic stats so far, supporting what a lot of posters have said: -Shooting percentage the Sabres are pretty much median/league average. With the 'talent' that this team has, one might think over the course of a whole season they would be below average, so some basic thinking says over the whole season the offense will be slightly less effective than it has been now. -Save percentage. Both goalies in limited starts are near the top of the league. If they revert to the middle of the league (or their career save percentage) the Sabres would have allowed about 6 more goals so far this season (1 per game). Averages make one think they will allow more goals going forward. Does that mean the team will fall back to being the worst in the league? No. Does it mean that some individual players can't play BETTER than they are now as the season goes on? No. What it does likely mean is that this team will not maintain the torrid pace they are on. At this moment I still think they are going to be about an 80 point team.

For me it's not a light switch whether they are good or not, how I think of them as a process. At the start of the season before the opener I thought they would be a 65 to 70 point team. Last week I had bumped that up to 75, now I'm thinking they have a chance at being an 80 point team. As the winter lose throughout the season, evaluations change, but right now I'm hoping for an 80 point team. Is that good? I don't know. If they go on this Western road trip and lose four in a row I'll be thinking they're back to a 70 point team. I don't think that'll happen though.

Don't take the opinion of a handful of posters and paint the broad brush about the entire board. And by the way, even if the entire board had that opinion, that's what this is for, a message board to talk about things. It gets tiresome when people start complaining about other people's opinions on a message board. That's what a message board is for, discussion right? Just because someone doesn't believe with you there's no need to get exasperated about other people's opinions. With that said, anytime there is a star player that leaves your team, most of us are going to want to see how well he does on the new team. For me it's going to be tough to make a judgment until we at least get to the 20 game mark. At that point I'll check and look in on Sam a little more because it's just too small the sample size now to have anything other than a wild opinion... At least for me personally.

I think the issue where he might be coming from... Not sure but my guess, is something that I also agree with. The Sabres have not said anything publicly since the first press conference that we spoke about. However, Eichel has had his agent or agents out there doing radio interviews, and openly talking to some of these so-called hockey insiders. If the Sabres are doing the same thing, they are being much more quiet about it. Eichel and his camp are being much more public about talking about the situation.

As of now, so far so good for being down 2 goals. They seem to be getting 'out-talented' but again not outworked.

They are looking like a 65-70 point team. The thing is they do have a lot of young guys who should be getting better as the season progresses, but on the other hand I don't think they have much in the AHL that will be on its way up soon that will turn things around quickly.

Maybe it is for the hockey games if there are a lot of viewers? Like I said, we pay more for a better connection, I have a brand new (less than one year old) router that cost over $200....and everything else we stream is solid. Just once the games start, it lags, and about every 5-10 minutes it totally locks up and I have to back out of the stream and go back into it to get it to restart. Even other ESPN plus programs are fine, just the live stream hockey games. I wish I knew why or how to fix it.

I have been having a hard time with it watching NHL games. The quality is awful. And I don't mean just resolution, I mean the feed freezing, and stuttering. It seems to only happen during games too. If I watch an 'old' game it is fine. If I watch one of the other programs on it it is fine. And we have a very good connection with our TV and good internet service (all other streaming services are crystal clear in 4k when available.) For some reason when I try to watch a game on ESPN plus, the quality just goes way down.

As with most things, it depends on what you define "good" as. Playoffs? I'd need to see them in a playoff position/contention well into the second half of the season. An 90 point team that misses the playoffs? Lets see them keep up a good pace for 20-25 games to get me there. A 75-80 point team (basically a team that finishes better than the expectations of the pundits and most fans before the season started)...well get 3 points in the next 3 games and I'm just about there at that point.

He's on a much better winning team. As others have said two games is much too short of a time to make a judgment. If we get to the 40 game mark of the season and he is on the third line with only about 20-25 points on the season, then we can start to have a legitimate conversation about how good he is again in a different environment. But at this point of the season the conversation can be had but there's not much to support it. But it's way too early for that and not enough time for him to accumulate some points.

You must have a problem either reading or comprehending, I guess I can't do anything about that. READ my post and THINK, use a little CONTEXT if you are able to. Be evolving his game, I am talking about not only how he plays but how he approaches the game. "his game" doesn't mean just what he does on the ice, but rather everything he does related to it. And secondly, how is it a fact that he evolved his game? that is an opinion. Just as you say what I say is an opinion, there is no fact, no data set, nothing that can be proved by anyone, especially you, that shows his game has evolved. Has he gotten BETTER? Maybe, that doing the same thing and getting better is just getting better, that is not evolving. If you are so incapable of understanding this is a message board where we can state our opinions and draw from them and insist instead that it should be operated like a court-of-law where you determine what is fact or not...well then you just don't add much to this community, and certainly don't make it a fun and inviting place for others to post their opinions while you are waiting in the weeds to shoot them down. Live in your little world where you think you are being cute and 'educating all of us' on what you consider facts though, must be a nice place. lol And the bottom line why I am even bothering to reply to you? because you said "some of this stuff is unbelievable' I'm not going to not reply to someone who takes a shot at someone else's 'opinion' and then ends their next post with "if you got an issue with that, hell that's just my opinion" talk about needing to take a look in the mirror..geez.

Of course it is what you call 'supposition'. lol. This is a message board, we discuss ideas, opinions here. If we just want facts we would go to an analytical website. And my 'opinion' is one that others agree with, and it is based on actual observations. No "Data" is required for me to have an opinion and post it here. Oh, and other people who have opinions different than you, or want to have an independent thought that doesn't agree with your point of view is "unbelievable". What a small world you must live in. When you feel the need to post "Some of this stuff is getting unbelievable, I’m sorry " to someone elses opinion you are one step away from becoming the 'get off my lawn guy' Lighten up when it comes to others opinions, let others post ideas that are different than yours.

Today or tomorrow would be a great day for the fans if Eichel was traded. Interest in the team is rising a bit, and the die-hards seem really happy with the direction of things after 3 games (even if most realize this team will be good to even get 70-75 points this year, and losing streaks may be coming). With that said, a few days off between games would be a great time to fill that void with some news of a return for him. I can only hope and wish...

I think your comment with Jack is spot-on. I don't intend this to be a criticism of him but it will probably come out that way..... When some players are 'stars' growing up, they are always driven to learn more and to take things to the next level. It seems with Eichel, he feels/felt he was already at that next level and could just 'keep on doing' what he was doing. I'm not saying he was lazy and not willing to work, what I am saying is he is the type of player that would NOT look to 'evolve' is game or his attitude. He would just keep playing the game he always played and have the same attitude toward his workouts, his teammates, and coaches as he always had because it always worked for him.

I'm not going to be surprised if this team goes on a 3 game losing streak, I'm not 100% convinced they are even better than last year...but I'm still holding out hopes for that 80-81 point season. I want to cautiously say it is a pretty good possibility at this point.