Curt

The bolded statement is not actually true. He played in a top 6 role with Carolina. He got the ice time of a top 6 forward. I also find it hard to fathom how he will get 17 mins per game if he isn’t in the top 6 of this team.

No. It looks like only 4 of them are.

I’m not sure he is going to play any games. They put their largest contracts on the active roster so that their cap hit was as high as possible on opening day, for cap/LTIR reasons. Quinn had a higher cap hit that some of the other taxi guys. That’s all.

If a team steamrolls Buffalo, it won’t be because they punched them in the mouth. It will be because they are better at hockey. Also, Sabres are a pretty big team. What do you even mean by “tough guy”?

Oh, well if we are looking for players to get 20 points in 56 games, then yeah, none of them are doing that except Eakin maybe.

Do you think he is viewed as less of a leader in the room due to his salary? PS, he has been wearing a letter for a couple years now.

With all that stuff you just mentioned, it’s not going to be normal. It’s going to go from a competitive 2nd division league, to more of just a place to keep guys playing.

Riley Sheahan shovels a relatively harmless shot towards goal. It glances off a defenders leg, changing direction slightly, and the surprised goalie gives up an awkward rebound. Skinner flys in from the left face off circle and buries the rebound! He skates back to the Sabres bench and yells F U Ralph, I’ll do it myself! Krueger leans over to Steve Smith and whispers, “I love it when a plan comes together.”

Cool. Not surprising to me. Hall and Staal may both be here for only one season, so they don’t take letters from guys who already have them. Teams need more than 3 leaders anyway.

I disagree. I believe that culture is definitely a thing. Having an environment where everyone feels that their contributions are valued and everyone is working hard, with team goals in mind. It raises the ceiling of what a group can achieve together. Of course I won’t be so foolish as to suggest that a good culture can magically turn a group of scrubs into a championship team. Culture is not magic dust that you sprinkle in the locker room. It’s generally instilled by team members who have a gift for, or have learned how to inspire a positive, team focused attitude in those around them. If those players are stripped away, the culture can disappear with them. What happened to the Oilers after they traded Wayne Gretzky? They won another Stanley Cup. What did the Bulls do the season that Jordan was playing baseball? They still won 55 games.

This is bizarre. They can’t and won’t? Some of those guys absolutely can and have produced at a rate of over 20 points per season. Here are their 82 game scoring rates over the past two seasons. Eakin- 25, 43 Sheahan- 19, 19 Okposo- 30, 30 Lazar- 22, 15 Reider- 15, 13 So, Okposo and Eakin consistently produce over that rate. Sheahan is right there, just below. Lazar, maybe/maybe not, personally I think he has a little upside (just a little) but that’s just me. Reider has simply not produced offense the past coupe seasons. Also, I personally don’t think all 5 of those guys will be in the lineup very often. However, I think a big part of our disagreement on this is based in our degrees of certainty about what the lineup will be. You seem to be assuming that Skinner will be stuck with Sheahan and Lazar the majority of the time and that all 5 of those guys will be in the lineup most of the time. I think Cozens is going to play. I’ll also be upset if Skinner-Sheahan-Lazar is a thing that happens more than a few games.

Coaches watch them day in day out. I guess they thought he didn’t look ready enough. I’m sure coaches have certain things they look for to determine this. I have seen no definitive evidence that Krueger wont put Cozens, for example, on a line with Skinner. I’m good with a rugged vet in the other spot. In fact I think it may be necessary. I would be terrified to ice a Skinner-Mitts-Cozens line. Im not so down on the marginal vets as you. If they can play decent defense and put up 20+ points, that’s ok for the bottom couple guys in the lineup.

I think the ideal for me is somewhere in between. Skinner-Sheahan-Cozens maybe? It’s nice that people said nice things about Mitt’s half season in the A, but I will not trust him to be the defensive conscience of a line until I see it in the NHL for an extended period. Lots of players are good in the AHL then come up and suck. Dumpster fire is what? A medium amount of negativity? Lol

I don’t care about the Bills at all. This means nothing to me. Yeah, sure, it depends on the contract for Hall. It always does. I just don’t understand the massive amount of negativity regarding this season which hasn’t even started.

Then what? Hall resigns. Cozens works out. Staal is old and is gone. Kevy hasn’t shown that he CAN’T draft and he hasn’t shown the ability to get FAs except signing the best FA available. I don’t know that everything is going to work out great, but it’s not all doom and gloom.

I don’t think so. He was pretty good in NCAA. Some NHL team was likely to sign him. He is probably just an AHL guy though. This is what I mean. Did you think they would go from missing playoffs to cup winner in one offseason? This is a possible playoff team.

A lot of negativity in here for a team that looks to be better than any team of the past decade-ish.

Yes for me. He has done things for his own personal benefit that are against the interests of the country. Is there a word for someone who does that?

I mean, I’ll wait for games before getting pissed about the lines. Asplund is definitely just a place holder there. I don’t have a problem with Skinner outside the top 6, but they have to find some way to make it work.

Yeah, makes sense. It’s honestly likely correct. It’s not really bad news for Buffalo though. He didn’t come here to run the PP and be the #1 offensive C.

How many games?

How do you know for sure?

I actually edited that a couple mins after I wrote it because I wasn’t fully happy with what I said and wanted to be more specific. It just got quoted before I got the edit in, lol.

Yeah, sure. Was just discussing ES offense. No desire to defend Risto’s defensive play.

Ok. You asked me to find you a returning player whose offensive production went up. I found several. You said that your research showed offensive reduction across the board. To me it looks like about half and half, in other words normal. You say Krueger was bad for the offense, but the team scored more goals per game. The numbers you presented were wrong. Your assertions were wrong. What do you want me to do?