Thorny

I’d love to make the playoffs. Just for shits and giggles

We have an incredible fanbase. 14 years no playoffs, a mid pack forward group by goal differential, currently sit in 26th, *11 points back* of the playoffs in Adams’ 5th year… …and upgrading the F group that accounts for 67% of the skater component of our roster would just be for “shits and giggles” Add a #4 dman and a backup goalie and plan for playoffs Superstars can’t elevate a team, but we are confident the output of a #4 dman elevates the team from bottom of league to the playoffs

Ultimately it’s easier to convince someone to trade for your mystery box than it is to open up all your mystery boxes and actually reach satisfaction at your haul

Love this so much because adams’ errors are strategic. The plan of building through youth, exclusively, ESPECIALLLY in Buffalo when the plan was enacted after 9 years of losing, was always a disaster waiting to happen it’s not surprising that Adams does better when moving out of his “comfort zone”, because his comfort zone definitively sucks. Like, this has been borne out - his initial strategy was rank. The further he moves away from it (FINALLY trading Savoie for McLeod) he does better. Because even if it’s not his comfort zone, it’s so demonstrably proven to be the better way to build that it can’t help but find more success It comes back to what I say all the time and, frankly, it’s quite satisfying to see it borne out so accurately - it’s not hard to win in the nhl. Base level competence. The Buffalo Sabres trying to be innovative and trying their own way to do things is a farce. Total farce. Take your medicine. Field a playoff team. Just stop with this nonsense. The league is literally designed to promote parity. If they stop thinking they are smarter than the league, the league itself will carry them to “success” (playoffs), just by its own inherent mechanisms. How many times have I said it? Base level competence. All they do is get in their own way.

I’ve said this for a long time but until proven otherwise… they won’t make the playoffs until they stop treating it as the natural side-affect of the process of building a cup team It’s never THE goal. They expect it to arrive as a symptom It’s hubris

The essence of “run back” need not be so literal. Most teams change at least like 6 guys every year just due to 4th liners and bottom pair players that almost always have high turnover rates. Backup goalie that was exactly the messaging they tried to sneak through last summer; and hindsight need not apply, called it out at the time: they indeed tried to sell a “revamped 4th line” as if it was an avenue to success. It’s not. if our top 9 is: Thompson, Tuch, Peterka, Norris, Benson, Zucker, McLeod, Kulich, Quinn: it’s a run back

Likely

My gosh. He had it down to needing to replace a LHD for 4.2 million. If that’s the obstacle to signing Marner, it’s not an obstacle at all We’ve lost the plot lol online GM simulator “It just can’t be done!” this team needs to win, desperately For the sake of the psyche

If the Sabres win out Adams will finish his 5 year average at 79 points per season

Always liked how Eichel distributed on the half wall

🧹🧹🧹🧹

People talk a lot about fixing the PP but the easiest fix could be an actual creative playmaker who will find Tage in all the right spots

Besides that, Marner is good defensively, we need way better D from our forwards, and he’s one of the best point producers in the league. I keep making this argument cause it’s true: we aren’t nearing a cap on goals scored lol. If we are losing 4-3, “damn, our D!” but we add Marner and win 5-4, we still win based the added value of his goals. Yes we can address D and should and Marner helps but a goal for is still worth the same We aren’t near a “goals for” cap. We have room for Mitch Marner lol This whole thing is literally “we have no room for Kovalchuck”. We are living the meme in real time. Ya, a team 11 points out of the playoffs wouldn’t benefit from adding one of the best players in the world. What are we doing? You add him and worry about if you can “realistically” fix the D later IF he can be had. Not saying he can. But re: Marner this is about principle

I’d kill to be wondering why we haven’t won a cup. I just want to make the playoffs I just want the regular season to actually matter again. We aren’t even a part of the league: I honestly don’t care about a cup we aren’t the leafs, we need to add everywhere right now, still. We are a team 11 points out of the playoffs and the cutoff line is abnormally low

He was, ya. Him and Botts both The issue is that Kevyn knew this and didn’t have a backup plan

This is sort of the point. There’s a chasm between “Marner won’t sign here” and “TINKER ONLY” with the forwards. i don’t think anyone questions your grasp of contract and cap specifics but there’s no logical argument to retreat from there to “don’t really do much of anything to the F unit, by choice.” which is what you originally said. At the end of the day, we know we shouldn’t be standing pat at F based on a macro look at the results beyond “they are top 10 in goals”, and especially not when there’s no reason to not go beyond “they’ll have a reasonable shot at it”, when playoffs are long past being the mandate On the other hand, it also can’t be framed as a choice beyond our control just because Marner may not sign here, not when every other team has figured out a way to configure their roster to the tune of achieving then required results in a far more timely manner than we have. You need not retreat to “realistically, what can be done?” We already know it can be it’s been proven a zillion times over. The moves Adams could make to improve or change the F group are literally uncountable there are so many variances of possibilities.

What’s the Sabres drought measured in square miles? Just like Idaho, most don’t know Ohio is a palindrome

Concept of Josh Norris’ existence

Took me a little while to hone in on how salient this particular point is

“What goalie is realistically signing here, though?” - GA/Adams We have to shape these rosters *keeping in mind* the wielder of the plan is incompetent Please keep that in mind re: the spirit of the thread the budgetary cap constraints prevent an immovable obstacle for only buffalo, regardless of seeing 31 other teams successfully navigating them what can Kevyn Adams do, really, when it comes down to it

There is no “the problem” that’s your major hang up. Your insistence on dialing down the issues to the smallest variables you can possibly get them is exactly the mindset that causes the team to miss the playoffs continually. Your ideas are strategically bankrupt a mid pack forward group (differential - way more important than goals for) being “not the problem”, to you, is the problem I’ve said this for 2 years, continually proven right, and it just doesn’t matter lol: hockey is a *fluid* game. Our offence is so good BECAUSE the D is bad. The forwards aren’t actually elite. If we had a better F unit that didn’t have to continually sell out systematically to maintain their scoring rates, we wouldn’t have such trouble

I don’t really have much interest in doing so: as mentioned, that’s your video game Adams doesn’t even put in the requisite effort and he’s paid millions Asking me to come up with a roster and being like “see! It’s impossible.” is an exceptionally weak argument, if it’s an argument at all. “Can YOU skate faster than Matt Ellis? No? Then withdraw your complaint.” lol Adams is a *professional*. Do I need to say it again? He’s a *pro-fess-ion-al*. He is supposed to be uniquely qualified to address the cap issues WHILE fielding a good team. That’s, LITERALLY, the job

It’s 78 if you prorate their record over the 56 for a full season that year if you don’t, and just divide total games over 5 years by points and covert to 82 game pace, it’s 79.something

If the Sabres win out, Adams can get his 5 year average up to 79 points per season