Thorny

A marked improvement on the last 6 years of sabres hockey

No, if you can’t lose the 50 pounds you need to lose with one solid week of exercise and diet, with some small improvement first, you shouldn’t even bother. 50 pounds in one fell swoop or not at all. Terry pays for liposuction or we are stuck with eveything

So, A) let perfect be the enemy of good and don’t do anything, spitting in the face of accountability in the process b) extend Adams because: we’ve won 2 games after dropping the first 3, the owner literally isn’t going to change therefore we are powerless to make any other changes (as they’d be pointless), and we do literally need to have someone in the GM chair c) be sure to credit Terry for the Doan acquisition as I am told Terry has his fingers in every pie

Most aren’t. I’m not talking about discussing his strengths and weaknesses - that would obviously fit under discussing based on result. Context is always important here and you can look to the post I specifically quoted as someone who doesn’t leave room for that if the equation is simply “he wasn’t committed to getting better.” Any player “not committed to improving in any way” isn’t someone we would want which renders the discussion on result moot the post I quoted said “hard to say much different” with regard to my statement that it’s unfair to label JJ as a player with no interest in improving the inclination is often to “found money trade acquisition, dude we traded was a stalled-out lost cause anyways”. Defence mechanism. Labelling JJ as weak defensively is fair. Suggesting he had no desire to improve isn’t.

You’d think the fact we only ever trade guys who are fatally flawed and only bring in guys who “play the right way” would eventually result in a better team. Anecdotally, I always seem to hear, after the fact, that guys we trade away are folks we “didn’t want around anyways.” consensus in thread seems to be that Adams “wanted” to sign him but JJ wanted out. Are we thinking Adams felt JJ was reluctant to improvement if he was wanting to sign him? I’m trying to keep the argument straight, so forgive me. From reports we only dealt JJ because he had had enough - why wouldn’t Adams have been exploring a deal previous to that if JJ was someone selfishly only interested in himself and for some reason also not interested in improving himself? we can argue he’s bad for culture because he wanted out (if we ignore the why being of our own doing) but a young player struggling to round out their defensive game doesn’t torpedo their offensive worth and it certainly fits much more snuggly within the common development curve narrative that it does the idea he “wasn’t interested in being a better player” Maybe he’ll never have the aptitude and skill to completely round out him game? I could see that. But I’d deem the tarring and feathering of character we never miss the opportunity to engage in rather egregious.

Given the recent history of the franchise I struggle with the breakdown that only leaves room for beneficial outcomes If I had to guess it more so looks like a case where we will lose a player we want unless we make the playoffs

Goes both ways. The other side of this coin is the claim JJ had “no interest in improving” and that he was “anti-culture” and that’s why we dealt him. Don’t really see the need to call into question the mindset of a player retroactively but we’ve been here many times before so it’s hardly worth relitigating. As mentioned it’s a both sides dynamic. Probably best to simply judge based on the macro results.

This basically is the best words I can find for a terribly difficult to describe situation. I always do my utmost to be candid because I respect the fans but particularly those posting here, so much. Many of whom I consider friends. Online friends, whatever, what’s the difference in 2025. There’s no point in lying, or in lying to oneself, and being honest even now hopefully only has the added effect of supporting the fact my opinions in the past have always come from a place of honesty. Rooting against the sabres (in support of their long term success) in 2015 was a mistake, and it was poison - even if it was in the name of long term benefit, of wanting the best for the team. “Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.” - Sherlock Homes It would be a defeatist fools errand to root against the team again. When rooting for them is an impossibility under the current regime, it only leaves one option, no matter how improbably difficult: distance.

Water wet

Adams extension?

That it might not be better isn’t a salient argument for not canning Adams

I feel like you could open any draft thread at any page over the last 10 years and there will be at least one mention of an “Eklund”

Plowing straight into the tender, ya

Neither have you contributed a single goal, as evidenced by this video from 5 years ago, from shortly before Adams took over. thankfully @PASabreFanpicked up the slack. Can’t imagine the win total amassed in this clip alone is too far off the total garnered by the Adams regime since

Have mentioned that many times before - no one seems to want to claim the drought. This thinking was always fraught with peril early on, as no matter how much Adams and co wanted to pretend they could operate as if the 9 years of failure hadn’t happened, and institute their long build, the malaise of losing and low expectations and winning not being the focus had already infected the organization and fans. never mind the fact that Adams and co. now *are* the drought - Adams upon missing this year will have equaled the amount of misses by Botterill and Murray *combined*. the entire approach was always ridiculously hubristic

The sense that he could legitimately be fired after any one of these losses does make it quite tempting to root for that

But it’s a wholly necessary start

Well, Botterill had him as the guy on his list that Adams was keen on distancing himself from We can only assume Terry held Adams at gunpoint though and fed him that scouting report

I guess “I can’t see Adams being brought back” read to me as more of a prediction than an opinion of what you would do

I’m talking about making the playoffs. The goal needs to be playoffs year 1

Provided nothing but a “block” to the players from picks in rounds 3-7 making it to the show