mjd1001

At this point, if you can find anyone to take his full contract off your hands, I'd do it. 2round pick, 5th round pick, 'future considerations', whatever. Take the best offer. To me its important to just 'move on' and free up that money if its possible. If Lyon and Levi/Ellis aren't the answer, then you are in no worse situation on the ice than you are with UPL, but you have nearly $5m more in cap space. With Doan, and Kesserling, and Benson, and Tuch, and 3 bottom of the roster spots needing to be signed next year, AND currently only about $20m to spend on all of that, every dollar counts and you are wasting a lot of those dollars on UPL. If he can be moved, The return in assets doesn't matter. The return in cap space is more valuable than what he gives you as a player now.

No I wouldn't. I'd want changes from top to bottom. You never understood my point about Adams. I would not give him another chance under a new owner. My whole problem with the owner is, a new GM won't change much if the Owner sets the rules from above. Its not that Adams needs a new owner to suceed, its just that a new GM won't do much different under this owner. I have not recently fully supported Adams. If/when we get a new GM, is he going to be given full autonomy over decisions? Sure, he'll had to run him by Pegula, but it needs to be more of a "this is what I am doing and let me tell you why", rather than getting Pegula's input. I have been indifferent to the GM changing, because that change alone, with no other changes around it, won't do much unless the owner changes (or at least changes how he operates.)

Actually it's not short-term frustration. I am just about done with UPL. And the reason is... And I'm repeating myself from the game day threads... It's something that I started noticing this time early last year. There are way, way too many times where he's allowing goals where he's not screened... He is set... He is facing the shooter... And shooters are beating him cleanly from 15 to 20 ft out. And I'm not talking all the time with 100 mph blasts, but sometimes with fluttering shots, sometimes A shot that looks like they're trying to gently pick a corner against a high school Goalie. He didn't do that too much 2 years ago. Last year I started posting about it in October or November and some other posters said I was being hard on him. Well, it continued all last year and it's continuing this year. That's not a guy you can win with who was going to take you deep into the playoffs. If I know that... And I'm pretty sure I know that... It's just a waste of time keeping him here any longer.

The scoring drought is killing them now. At times last year and parts of this year it was the special teams. When it's neither of those, it's goaltending. When it's not goaltending, it's awful play of your defenseman. And if it's not that, it's injuries. A good sign of a bad team is when you poke one leak in the dam, another leak springs up someplace else. At some point, and I think most of us believe they are there, you need to build a brand new dam. And you need new engineers and workers to build it. I think most of us have a plan to make this team better. For me It starts with get rid of UPL, then bench or get rid of Quinn, And pray for no more injuries. You know what though? Maybe that allows them to be good enough to squeak into the playoffs. I see very little hope for this team sniffing a deep playoff run in the next... 3 to 5 years at least with the current roster and management? Unless they catch fire, and I mean immediately run off a 4 to 6-game winning streak, they have to start over. And starting over means really starting over. Brand new hockey people. Those hockey people are given power to make decisions. A coach that can hire his entire staff. Sure. Pegula is the owner so you run things by him, but he doesn't make decisions, he's informed of the reason why the hockey people are making the decisions they are. Really, what are most of us holding out hope for? That they can squeak into the playoffs? That they're the number eight seed with 95 points? That's the aspiration? That's not good enough, and they're not even close to doing that.

I don't think so but that's not the point... Don't take it to extremes. How many times in the past... Decade? When things have gone bad pegula is nowhere to be found in Adam's has to sit in front of the reporters and take the tough questions... While his answers hardly ever stray from something like... Terry is a great owner and the rest of us just have to do better... Or some version of that? I haven't noticed things like that happening.... certainly to the extent they happen here... Around the rest of the NHL.

If they come back from this road trip in last place in the conference, I'm ready to blow things up. Yeah it's early. Yeah they have injuries. Yeah they could still get back into it, but emotionally with regard to this team it's not fun anymore. And I'm the person that for the last few years... Once they have been out of things... Have said that I can enjoy the team on a night-to-night basis, just hoping to enjoy a single win. I think I've moved past that. There is all this fear about losing Dahlin, losing Tage, losing Tuch... Well guess what? Every other team in the NHL has made the playoffs since Buffalo has, and they've done it at some point without those guys. I'll give them this road trip. But if they don't do well on it... At least another tear down and rebuild, hopefully with different decision makers, can give us something to look forward to even if it's years away. With this team, that doesn't seem to be there. Hope. Right now.... Especially if this road trip doesn't go well... I'd feel like an idiot if I still hung on to some hope with this front office and this roster. Up until last night I nervously watched every home game hoping the arena would be filled... Hoping that the fan base is supporting this team. A switch went off last night where now I'm hoping for an empty arena to force some kind of major change. This road trip for me is not only the season... It is the short to medium term referendum on the entire franchise.

Pegs keeps him not because of his performance, but because he is obedient, he takes the arrows for the owner, he will never cast any blame on the owner. Pegs doesn't want a GM, he wants a PR person to protect him And make him feel listen to and important.

At the time that I wrote that post, they were not dead last and we're just outside.

Positionally they did.... Sabres outshot the Blues. Sabres had 18 scoring chances to 7 for St. Louis. Sabres had 8 high danger chances to only 4 for the Blues. Sabres almost tripled St. Louis expected goals. Positionally the Sabres played better. They just couldn't score, had a terrible turnover by Quinn, and bad goaltending.

Ok, the easiest/quickest way to "fix" this team: Owen Power: Play him with Kesserling, no one else. It seemed like the plan, and in the few minutes they have played together they have been good. Do not experiement with him with anyone else. He's not playing well with anyone else but looks comfortable with Kesserling. Tage: Please, PLEASE stop experimenting with him on crazy lines. Play him with either Tuch or Benson at all times. Quinn: Press Box. He hurts the team too much. UPL: Done with him. Don't even count his play and goals allowed, at this point I don't the the rest of the team trusts him and likes playing in front of him. Doan: Hes on the PP, He just stands in front of the net. All the time. Of course a LOT of others stuff can be done. But to me those moves alone get the team back on track.

So.... Might be shuthout by the worst defensive team in the NHL. By their backup goalie. On a night where you are at home. You are playing with rest. And the team shutting you out played last night and had to travel to your rink. There were worse overall moments in the plast year (the losing streak last year) but has there been a single more disappointing game than what this one looks like?

I kinda thought it was Quinn who skated into Thompson. Quinn was moving, Thompson was not. Thompson was already near the boards and he can't accelerate from 0 to full speed in 0.5 seconds to get out of the way. I'd have to see the replay again, but it looked like Thompson had no-where to go so he just stayed on the boards and Quinn went into him. Maybe the bigger question is, why are both wingers on the same side of the ice when in possession of the puck?

Krebs has now replaces Östlund at center on Tage's line?

And if those shots were a few inches closer, they could very well be saves, meaning the Sabres would have 0 goals on almost 30 shots tonight.

He has been on of the players who have not lived up to their play from last year. Especially defensively, lots of mistakes he didn't make last year he is this year.

I always default to the position that if its close on the replay, let the call on the ice stand. I think in all sports, if you can't make a firm decision after watching the replay for 30 seconds, or if there is any doubt at all, the on the ice/on the field call stands.

Dahlin hasn't been himself the entire year. Thompson is burried with 2 guys he never played with. Tuch comes and goes. Zucker injured. Put Thompson and Tuch back together. It may not be what you need long term but its better than where they are now. After the way UPL played last year, and how he is playing tonight, it has to be frustrating/futile playing in front of him.

He looks slow, his pads are slow to get to the corner. And worse, the trait he picked up last year is still there, he gets beat cleanly by shots. Yeah, the shooters are NHL shooters, but when a guy is 15+ feet out, UPL is in position, he isn't screened, he should be stopping most of those. 2 years ago it wasn't an issue, but something happened, he is getting beat cleanly by shots he is ready for way too much.

I guess that was the correct call on the no-goal, but if I was St. Louis, I'd be a bit upset about it. I think it could have gone either way.

I'm not sure if its coaching/system, or just will by the players...but it seems that when the PP had success, it was doan (or someone else) who just planted themself in front of the net. Didn't 'rotate' through, didn't skate through the crease..but they planted themself there the whole time. On the PP, that seems to have gone away..and so have the goals.

Except I'm pretty sure that isn't tage on the faceoff circle, didn't someone else take that bad one-timer? I think Tage has been on the point this PP.

Tage on the point? Not sure I like that. Yeah, he has a good shot, but he also has pretty good hands in traffic. I get trying something different, but that isn't it.

Sabres were close to dominating the first period. 2nd period was closer, probably a slight overall edge to the Blues. Not a good sign when they played last night and the Sabres were home resting.

Remember a couple years ago, the team scored 5 or more goals in 25 games. Almost 1 in 3 games they scored 5 or more. More than once per week on average. This year, they've done it 2 times, in what is likely to be 14 games. About once ever 2 weeks.

Zucker has some big goals, but I have thought his play without the puck and the number of turnovers, is a step back from his game last year. Yet, you are still correct, they miss him. I don't have confidence in Ruff and/or Adams to bench Quinn. But if you were fully healthy, MAYBE he would be getting less minutes and doing less harm than he is now.