mjd1001

Me too. It's not like they can't call him back up in a day or two or a week or two depending on the amount of game time he gets down there.

Move makes sense. You're keeping both of your potential backups with some in-game work. I posted here because I refuse to post about UPL in a thread where the title has "6k" in it. The only thing worse than that nickname is having a member of this forum be the one who's pushing for it because he came up with it himself.

I think some of us are arguing this topic by did the trade acheive the intended result? Some are arguing was it good at the moment? and some by was it good in the long term. My point of saying the ROR trade wasn't bad at all is because i judge a trade over the long term, and in my mind, this team was not winning anything improtant with him here (they proved they could be really really bad with him on the roster) and now the team is better for having Tage on it than not. If you want to say the trade was bad at the time because you gave up the best player at the time....or that it didn't do what you intended it to do...fine. There is an argument for that. But when I came to read this topic, I look at it from where we are now. Again, if the trade wasn't made you would not likely have won much anyway (my opinion based on a few years of results with him here), and by now Tage is certainly the better player at the moment.

Up here in northern Niagara county (Lewiston/Youngstown area) the roads were dry for the most part and you could see the grass. Last night and this morning, we are getting our first measurable snowfall of the year, probably have 3-4 total inches on the picnic table still out in the backyard. I think if the Stadium would have been build in Niagara County, these issues wouldn't be here. Not that I want the Stadium near where i live...logistically I prefer it is miles and miles away (I don't go to many/any games anymore), but there is a lot of open, cheap land right off the highway Between Grand Island and the Canadian border. But, its going to be in Orchard Park...it is what it is.

Zach Hyman. -31 year old. Former 5th round draft pick. Didn't even break into the NHL until 4-5 years after being drafted. (4 years in college and 1 year in the minors...even in college 3 of his 4 years he was single digits in goals) -Averaged 14 goals per year with Toronto his first 6 years before being traded to Edmonton. -Signed a long term, $5.5m per year deal that Toronto thought was too high to match This year: -27 goals through just 40 games. -on pace for a 55 goal, 90 point season Having 2 former 1st overall picks as linemates sure does help!

Can't argue with that. Next 4 games, if they can get 6 of the next 8 points....You will have my interest back at the all star break.

Dahlin is going to have close to 25 minutes of ice time. No way you should be playing him that much with a 3-0 lead.

Toronto might be in trouble. They are currently in a playoff spot. However, they have gotten 59.5% of available points while playing the 2nd easiest schedule in the league. Also, with no injuries at all to their top 5 'core' players. To miss the playoffs the danger point total is 95 for the season. If they get 56.5% or less of the available points (not much worse than they have been) they are in trouble. Oh, and for the rest of the season, they have the HARDEST schedule in the league. They are good enough to be comfortable in the playoffs by years end.....HOWEVER.....Buffalo's top 4 scoring forwards (Thompson, Tuch, Skinner, and Cozens) have all missed games (25 and still on the rise), Torontos big 4 (Matthews, Marner, Tavares, and Nylander) have missed a total of ONE game between them. If/when injury luck turns on them, its going to be an issue.

I like to run the numbers like this every week or so, but it takes me a while, thanks for doing the updated work. In simple terms, they need to play like a top 3-5 team in the NHL from now until the season ends to have a good shot at the wild card.

Tomlin is, I think, 37-30 without Big Ben at QB, just over 4 full seasons of games, and either with him, or without him, he still has never had a losing record. Its not as many games as BB, but when you are talking 4 full seasons of games, AND the last season or 2 of Big Ben he was a shadow of himself, worn down and beat up, that says something to me positive about him I can't see at all in BB.

Is that post from a reliable source? Maybe it is, don't know who it is though... But, can't really blame him if its true. -4th worst team in the league. 11 (ELEVEN!) points behind the Sabres with the same number of games played. -Stutzle, their 'superstar in waiting' is pulling a Cozens, going from 40 goals last year at age 21, to barely being on pace for 15 this year. -Tkachuk is playing well, but his production is down from last year when may were hoping for it to go up a bit. -Managment changes all over. Front office and coaching is a mess -No matter who they put in net, they don't look good As hopeless as we think the Sabres are, Ottawa is that even more. If he wants out, I can't blame him too much.

Many of us who don't think he's all that great do not 'begrudge' him for having Brady. Its what he has done without Brady that is telling. If you have a sample size of what he does with a HOF QB and a large Sample Size without a HOF QB, then you have something to go on to compare. Just because others may think any coach with a HOF QB is a 'great coach', I don't, thats the lazy argument. Show me what you do without a great QB...and I'll show you/tell you if you are a good/great coach or not. Tomlin has faults, but he has gotten a variety of teams to the playoffs without great QB play. BB? Not as much...

Which is why I think he's not a good coach, let alone the best every. Sure he has been 'gm' also, but even if were just a 'coach', that 'coach' has a large part in decisions about players, and he has tried many, many times and had many opportunities to pick and develop another QB, most (all?) have failed. And as others have said, sure Tampa had a good roster, but Brady is 1 for 2 in Superbowls with another team with another coach...add to that a look at Peyton Manning...several coaches that were fired or middling without him that had an unreal record with him. And Finally, Tomlin. There is a guy who has had more than 1 or 2 seasons with bad QB's and has had winning records. Take the HOF QB away from BB, and he's just...bad. As a head coach he can still design a good defense, so maybe that makes him 'less than bad' but in my mind he's certainly not good. I look at it 2 ways...If they edited the comments out, then Political correctness is continuing to accelerate at an alarming rate. But the other side is....the 'other side' of that argument has no problem pointing it out and making a point of it either. I am starting to find the people in these 'culture wars' who make a big deal about something to be even more tiresome than the thing they are making a big deal out of, on both sides of it. There seems to be a need to always make a huge deal out of 'Look at that! Look at what THEY did!" Great, someone did something and now you are so offended you have to let everyone know about it. Wonderful. Just please keep moving along and don't let me know until someone is showing up at my front door looking to commit a crime...and don't tell me that It's coming...don't try to scare me into thinking it will happen. Let me know when it does, until then, take your thin skin someplace else.

That sounds good and I agree with it...and despite losing interest in watching them this year....when your entire first line misses major games AND your 3rd/4th best player (Cozens) does his best Ville Leino impression on the ice...well, you at least have SOME reason why they can/will do better. The ONLY thing that holds me back from buying into it is, Adams has said, and Granato has said MULTIPLE TIMES that development time is basically done, that this year is about winning. I'm patient, I like MOST of the guys on this team. I enjoy the journey (the team building phase) almost as much as I do the immediate wins. So I'm not in a rush to make wholesale changes and I like seeing the improvement in the roster, even if there are ups and downs. But again, the organization had key members come out and say that year was about winning...so....??

The Sabres did not improve their team at the time of the trade, but what Tage has turned into has improved the team. And what St. Louis does with what they get...has zero impact on whether it was a bad trade for the Sabres. St. Louis winning the cup did NOT cause the Sabres not to win it. Buffalo now is likely better for the trade. ROR did not make this a good team when he was here...and the couple years after he was here they were not going to be a contender if he was still here by his addition alone. However the team IS better for for what Tage has turned into comared to what ROR would give to this team. If anything I can not only say it wasn't a bad trade for the Sabres, it probably actually was a pretty good one. Why? If that trade could be 'un done', the Sabres wouldn't be much better (again, you had ROR for years and you didn't have a good team), but you would also lose Tage and i for SURE would not want to do that. If I'm pretty sure that un-doing a trade would not have turned this into a winning team in the past, but undoing it would take away that is likely your 2nd best player (and a top 20 goal scorer in the league), then I'm not un-doing it and its a positive trade.

Maybe there is a hybrid solution to what everyone is discussing here. You keep Levi with the big club, he practices with the team, he gets a spot start every now and then. IF UPL goes on a run where he plays three, four, or five games in a row and Levi doesn't get a chance to play, then you send him down to Rochester with orders to give him two games on a weekend.

I would love that, but I'm afraid it's going to be a higher amount than that. Especially with it looking like the cap is going to go up a decent amount the next couple of years.

I think there can be a middle ground, but it all depends on the cost. Samuelsson is slgned long term, so does that make him part of 'the core'? Maybe, but he certainly isn't as good as/as valuable as Dahlin or Power's potential. So, can you sign Mitts to a long term deal but have him be the 4th-7th best forward on this team? He still would be part of the core, correct? As far as how good he is...he is not al all star caliber player, but he is valuable. He seem to be a 20 goal, 50 assist guy. More importantly, it appears he would be a good 2nd line guy, but if you need to bump him up to the first line, he can adjust and help linemates without brining them down. He can and maybe SHOULD be a 'core' guy, but I think he can be that without being a 'star'.

They were a bad team with him here, they were a bad team after he was traded. I didn't see them getting better with him on the roster. End the story all I need. Just as much as my argument is incomprehensible to you, Yours is to me. I didn't see them turning the corner and turning into a playoff or cup contender with him here. So how could trading him away... Were you got arguably a top 10-20 scorer in the league in return.... Be awful? I don't get it.

I don't see the ROR trade as being one of the worst ever. Not even close. Same thing with Eichel. A trade being bad for the sabers has nothing to do with what they went on to do with another team.... It has to do with what they did for your team versus what you got in return is doing. When ROR and Jack we're here, the team was bad most of the time, never made the playoffs. When they traded them, same thing. You can make an argument that things you got back for each of them might be worth it in the future or are worth it already. For me to qualify as a bad trade... It has to be one that you look at in the future and say... Oops, that one really really hurt us. I don't think if either of them were still here, especially under current conditions, that this franchise would be turned around in any major way.

Enough with the 6k stuff, its not sticking.

I'm going to go back to what I said earlier... What is the reason anybody wants to watch a game and whether like that? You have Josh Allen, you have James Cook, you have Stefan diggs... You want to see them hindered? You want to see Allen not be able to throw the ball on target?... You don't want to see downfield plays... Cook make cuts and accelerate at full speed through the hole? I don't get it. The game against the colts a few years ago was fun to look at for a couple of minutes, but it wasn't good football.

Its a middle ground. You don't want an owner watch a junior game and fall in love with a guy and tell the GM to draft him...or have him watch one series and see a middling guy play great and demand he get signed (Leino). On the other hand you don't want him/her to be totally absent. I'd think as an owner, I'd want every single major decision to be run by me...I'd want to sit in on the pre-draft meetings. But at the end of the day, my management is telling me what they are doing and WHY they are doing it before they do it....but the owner has to know that those guys know SO much more about hockey than he does....so its more being 'informed' of decisions and having them all explained to him instead of him over-riding them. Maybe the owner can be involved, or even make a decision as to when to 'rebuild' vs 'reload' for an aging team, but other than that, not so much direct involvement.

Nothing is really jumping out as me as anyone I likely see gone. Really nothing. Maybe, MAYBE someone like EJ tells Adams he'd be open to be traded to a contender (as he doesn't really have ties to Buffalo/Sabres) so you flip him for a 3rd or 4th...but I can't see much else when I look at this roster and how the management handles it.

I don't get the enjoyment part either why people want that. It looks fun to watch for about 5 minutes but then.... Seeing a QB like Josh Allen over and underthrow WR's due to the wind...seeing WR's not able to make cuts. OL and DL basically stand there in a stalemate at times becuase they have no footing. When I want to watch FOOTBALL, I want to see the best athletes do things to the limit of their abilities. I want great cutbacks. Pinpoint throws 20+ yards downfield. I want to see a sack because the best DE made a great move and shot around the other teams best OL who didn't have the speed to cut him off. Jumping one handed catches. THAT is THE sport. I sometimes find it funny when people say that 'real football' is played in bad weather. Really? Watching guys slogging around 1/2 speed in mud or snow... watching passes go through guys hands because of the weather. FG's that are barely a matter of skill but turn into a guessing game for the kicker to if/where the wind gust is coming from after his foot hits the ball? How is that more enjoyable to watch and how is that 'real football' more than watching the best athletes be able to perform in the best conditions where everyone can show of their skill to the max? I don't know, I guess when I say I like football, I like the running, the catching, the Athletes at their best allowing them to do those things at their very best. Not an added random layer added on top of it that takes away from the pureness of what the sport is. Whenever this comes up and I post something like this...I rarely get a well thought out response...I get some 'eyeroll' or 'disagree' emoji's at the bottom of my post but no one usually stands up with a well thought out response.