[Per Botterill: Sabres have relieved Phil Housley of his Coaching Duties]

2 minutes ago, North Buffalo said:

Just thinking about moving parts and who is drafted depending lottery spot, would want as much time pre-draft input with new coach. 

I don’t think a coach generally gets much input on such things, especially not a new one.  The GM is going to pick a player who fits his vision for the team he is building.  The GM is going to pick a coach who also fits his vision for the team he is building.

[Per Botterill: Sabres have relieved Phil Housley of his Coaching Duties]

I wasn’t sure this was going to happen, but I felt that it probably should.  

The speed with which it happened tells me that the decision was made a while ago.

[Per Botterill: Sabres have relieved Phil Housley of his Coaching Duties]

2 minutes ago, SDS said:

Phil could have had the rug pulled out from under him though.  He may have felt he had the greenlight to implement his system of the future and the team would be patient with him. 

It’s possible, but that’s the type of stuff that a coach and GM talk about.  I find it very unlikely that they were not on the same page in regard to what expectations were.

[Per Botterill: Sabres have relieved Phil Housley of his Coaching Duties]

3 minutes ago, WildCard said:

Same. Give me Keefe!

Has the game passed him by though? 

Two years ago they won 50 games and were among the best in the league.  I don’t think the league has really changed since then.

[Skinner Contract Watch]

7 minutes ago, nfreeman said:

Serious question:  does Skinner getting bounced from Jack's line for the last dozen or so games of the season affect his desire to return?

If it does, then that’s silly.  He was on a long goalless drought so changing it up couldn’t hurt.  If he wants to sign long term, it’s not super logical to think that he would play ever single game on Eichel’s wing for the next 6+ years.  

[GDT: Season Finale Sabres at Detroit April 6th, 2019 7PM MSG]

3 hours ago, Ho-Chi-Sock said:

A lot of mourning for Hughes. Sabres don't need another potential #1 center. They need middle-6 talent badly. Should be someone pretty easy to get in the low 10s.

We need to break this "No playoffs? Time to tank!" mentality if this team is to ever truly shake the losing culture. Go out with your heads held high. Enough of this race to get #1 every year.We got Dahlin, be happy.

Not at all advocating losing on purpose, and wasn’t hoping for a loss tonight, but don’t agree with the bolded.  Every team needs another #1 center or top line winger.  More talent is better than less.  I’m still going to be hoping for a lottery win.

[Casey Mittelstadt, deep breath, he's fine]

1 hour ago, dudacek said:

 

Yep, Housley really ***** things up by not playing Reinhart and Eichel the entire game and rotating Skinner, Mittelstadt, Dahlin, Pilut, McCabe, Rodrigues and Olofsson through the other three spots.

 

I think maybe the take away should be that Housley probably should have broken up 53-9-23 more often to facilitate some secondary scoring.

[O’Reilly for Montour]

7 minutes ago, dejeanerret said:

I think you have to see how Thompson pans out, and how the Sabres use that 2nd round pick

Bots has been drafting some good players in the first four rounds over the last few years.  They may be able to add to that stable.

I really like some of the skills Thompson carries and he is still very young.  If he can turn into a 20g scorer on a 2nd or 3rd line and Montour becomes one of our core Dmen then I think the Sabres got the better of this deal.

Right now, similar to that WGR call, it seems the Sabres have traded all of their good players away in hopes of rebuilding through the draft. Those players in my view were seen as anti-culture, yet they've gone on to other teams and have shined.   I saw the WAR stats that showed Kane & ROR on this team makes us a playoff team, and it fit under the cap.  That's tough to swallow for a fan base that hasn't seen a playoff game in close to a decade.  

If I could step back to July 1st I'd say I'd wish the Sabres kept ROR.  Granted, I was one of the fans who thought he had to go.  But after this season it seems he wasn't the problem.  I really believe the coaching style of PH and the culture he has created has adversely affected this team.  Had a different coach been in place, ROR wouldn't have been in that state of mind.  I don't think PH is demanding enough. Players simply don't listen to him.

I know this because ROR and Kane gets traded and they both are having career years with skilled players, similar to the players we now have on our team.

To this poll's point, it's a wait and see.  Honestly, we have no choice.

Kane is not really having a career year, he is just about exactly where he was his other 3-4 best seasons.  O’Reilly is having a career year but is playing with a lot better players than he ever did in Buffalo.

[The Will Borgen Thread, Now with Video]

16 minutes ago, inkman said:

This team desperately needs a player like him in their lineup.  Kids got moxie.  Give me a half dozen of those. 

Yeah, I’m not much for fighting or a lot of the rough stuff in general, but this team does need a little more heart. ❤️

[The Will Borgen Thread, Now with Video]

14 minutes ago, inkman said:

Let's check on Will (he's number 3)

 

That is beautiful.

[Ivan's Draft Dream 2019]

If I was Buffalo, I think I would do it, assuming Vancouver is in the top 10.

Horvat is an excellent player and exactly what Buffalo needs.  Hughes could be a star equal to Eichel, but is not a sure thing.  This draft has depth in the lottery.

I don’t think Vancouver would do it unless they are completely out of their minds’ for Hughes.

[Reinhart, The Force Awakens]

4 hours ago, nfreeman said:

I looked at his game log — out of the 10 goals in Jan and Feb, 1 came in the first game of the year, which is fine but was probably before the bottom really started to fall out, and I think 4 came at the end of Feb when it was too late.  

 There was a stretch from early Jan to late Feb of about 19 games during which they went 6-13 and fell from about 3-4 games over DeLuca .500 to about 3-4 games under.  That was when the season was lost, and it was during that stretch he was meh (before, as previously noted, closing up shop for the season in March).

He had 5 goals and 12 points in those 19 games.  The game before those 19, he had 2 points, the game after, a hat trick.  That section of the season really doesn’t look like much of a slump for him, from a purely statistical standpoint.

[Reinhart, The Force Awakens]

3 minutes ago, ... said:

I have to tell you, that it wasn't until I saw that Sam could not only get violent, but has a legitimate "Beast Mode" in the offensive zone that I thought we'd be better off trading him.  With those characteristics now showing in his game, which I think started showing in February or so, I think he is an ideal second line winger for the Sabres.  He just needs a better center.

I think he has really shown improvement in a lot of areas this season.  Skating, shooting, physical play.

I think the new physicality you are seeing could have a lot to do with improved skating.  When players are stronger and more balanced on their skates, it’s a lot easier to deliver checks and push guys around a bit.  Better skaters always just look stronger out there.

[Victor Olofsson - Time for his own Sabres thread]

With his awesome shot and what appears to be a decent level of well rounded game, I can’t see how Olofsson doesn’t have a floor of “offensive-minded middle-6 winger who scores 15+ per season”.  I feel very confident that Buffalo has a long term part of their top-9 in Olofsson, and that is a very good thing.  Three cheers for GOAlofsson.

[Reinhart, The Force Awakens]

15 minutes ago, Doohickie said:

I dare say we still haven't seen his ceiling.  And he has a quiet groundedness about him that tempers other mercurial players like Jack and Skinner.

I hope we haven’t.  He is such a smart player that I think he can keep finding ways to get better.

Yeah, he seems like a pretty calm guy.  Doesn’t get too high or too low.  Dahlin seems to be like this also.  You might be right about it being a good balance to Jack.

[Reinhart, The Force Awakens]

3 hours ago, dudacek said:

Looking at our PP stats, where I stumbled up this:

Sam Reinhart is only 6 points behind Jack in even-strength scoring this year - 55 to 49. Sam is tied with Kuznetsov and Backstrom for 45th in even-strength scoring in the entire league this year.

Wasnt he getting flack for being a  2nd-line PP specialist earlier this year?

I would say that Reinhart is Buffalo’s most improved player this season.

[McDavid not happy with Edmonton...]

6 hours ago, kas23 said:

EDM is not just a “losing team”. That team is downright cursed and it’s not because they don’t have the talent. They certainly do. Draisaitl would probably do very well on a winning team, surrounded by people interested in winning, which would eventually rub off on him. This does not describe the Buffalo Sabres. 

Draisaitl does very well on Edmonton.  

A big part of their problem is that McDavid, Draisaitl, and RNH are their only top-6 quality forwards.  Their defense looks ok, but not above average.  They don’t have a proven starting goaltender.  That team does not have the talent to be good.  

It’s not a magic curse and it’s not because they some mysterious sad cloud hanging over the arena.

[Phil Housley should be fired.]

1 hour ago, PerreaultForever said:

That's the half empty half full point of difference I think we have most of all. I see him as an inbetweener and you see him as more complete. For me he's not great at either aspect just competent at both so I see him as a 2nd liner. A good 2nd liner, but a 2nd liner.   So if we were rival GMs I guess we'd have a hockey deal in the works ?

As for the +/- thing I know we lose a lot so it's hard to compare etc. but I do think the big negs for our so called top players is troubling. They allow a lot of goals when they are on the ice which says they aren't spending enough time in the offensive zone and not scoring enough 5 on 5. Whether or not they can backcheck is a whole other discussion best put aside here. They are not a line that dominates, contrary to some popular views.   I mentioned Ramsey because of his great +/- but I also think that is what this team needs. A solid line that can play up against top lines and shut them down, kill penalties and also score a little. That frees the top line from going strength against strength too, which they are failing at. I mean Ramsey Luce didn't outscore Perreault Martin, but they kept the other guys from scoring against them while they did their part. We really have nothing like that now.  

I totally agree.  They have no top 9 quality line that they can use in defensive situations.  I think it was supposed to be Berglund, not sure how well that would have worked over the season, but he decided to check out anyway.  Sobotka is terrible, Larsson cant produce anything offensively, and Mitts is not ready for something like that.

Eichel and Reinhart were +8 and +7 respectively at the end of January, so that’s something.  This whole team completely fell apart after that.

[Phil Housley should be fired.]

8 minutes ago, Kruppstahl said:

Right.  That doesn't happen very often in regular season hockey.  In the playoffs, when everything is amped up about 10,000 times, sure.

I can probably show you a goal from every game of the season where a guy scores an easy garbage goal from prime real estate and isn't touched by anyone, other than someone maybe trying to lift his stick blade.

Another hockey-ism that needs to go is "You aren't going to beat an NHL goalie if he can see the puck."

Right.  There are multiple goals scored in the manner in every single game that has multiple goals.  Goalies get beat clean 1-on-1 with no interference all the time.  Modern sticks and the number of guys with great shots allow for it.

It's usually quick snap shots or wristers from say 20 feet out and in.  You can beat an NHL goalie all day long like that if you are accurate with your shot. 

 

 

I suppose I would say that’s true.  I just watched all 25 of Reinhart’s goals from 2017-18 season.  At least 20 of them were less than 10 feet from the goal.  He only got hit at all on, I believe, 4 of them.

[Phil Housley should be fired.]

2 minutes ago, Kruppstahl said:

"Paying the price" is a hockey-ism that needs to go away.

This isn't the '90s and there aren't 300+ PIM enforcers in the league anymore, and very rarely, at least in regular season play, does anyone "pay a price" for getting to the net.  

That aspect of the game is mostly gone now, again, at least in the regular season.

When real hockey starts in the playoffs and injuries quickly mount, things are different.

 

Standing in front of the net and getting cross checked in the back 10 times, call it what you want I guess.

[Skinner Contract Watch]

7 minutes ago, PASabreFan said:

Not to be too harsh, but I am supposed to listen to posters tell me exactly how it's going to go down from here when they were sure Skinner was going to be signed by now? Long before now actually.

In the blind hog category I thought Skinner would go to free agency. Looking good at the moment.

I think everyone is just guessing best they can.  No one has to take anyone else’s view as fact.

Personally, I hoped that he would be signing by now and still hope that he signs, but I would rather he walk than overpay him.  I would probably consider anything above 7.5 to be an overpayment on a 7-8 year deal.

[Phil Housley should be fired.]

2 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

Reinhart has played 329 games for the Sabres. He has 85 goals and 117 assists. His +/-    -58

Forsberg has played 393 games. He has 145 goals and 157 assists. +/- +31

Johansen 281 games  50 goals 162 assists. +/-  +29

Arvidson 276 games 100 goals 84 assists +/- +38

So would I trade Reinhart for Forsberg straight up? In a heartbeat.     For Johansen? Less appealing but he is a better playmaker so yes. For Arvidson, yes. We desperately need people who can put the puck in the net. The line as a unit is better balanced though. We need another guy on that line who will carry the puck as well as Jack so he can find open spots and not have to fend of 2-3 defenders every rush. People say Jack takes nights off. Personally I think he just gets tired of being the only one carrying the load.

I know a lot of people don't put any stock in +/- any more but I still do. I think it still tells a lot about us. Incidentally, Risto worst ever currently at -145 vs. Craig Ramsey who ended +324.  A modern day Luce/Ramsey combo would be really good for this team.Heck just give me a modern day Bill Hajt. 

 

 

Ok.  I thought we were talking purely about the quality of the players as opposed to how well they would fit on a line with Eichel.  Also, I was talking about the players as they are today, not looking at what they were 3-4 years ago.  Also also, I see you take Johansen because he is a better playmaker and Arvidsson because he is a better scorer, when I’m not convinced that either is as complete a player as Reinhart.  Also also also, I don’t put any stock in +/- when comparing players on different teams, it could have a small amount of value when comparing teammates though.

[Phil Housley should be fired.]

5 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

Wow! I think I was saying something earlier somewhere about Buffalo fans having a tendency to overrate their players............... 

Any reasons why you think that Reinhart is definitely a worse player than Johansen, Arvidsson, and Forsberg?  

To me it looks like they are all relatively close.

[Phil Housley should be fired.]

58 minutes ago, PerreaultForever said:

I'm not suggesting things are all Sam's fault by any means. He is what he is, but I think what that is is not what we wanted him to be when drafted and never will be. He's a solid second line forward. If you think we can win with him as a top 3 forward I think you are wrong. For me that means we are lacking in talent. If Sam is my 5th or 6th best forward I have a good team. Not before. 

I think that Sam is just about as good as Nashville’s top forwards: Johansen, Forsberg, and Arvidsson.

Not that makes your wrong necessarily.  Nashville struggles with secondary scoring and has a terrible PP.

[GDT Nashville at Buffalo 4/2/19 7 PM]

12 minutes ago, shrader said:

I'm only taking that chance if he lingers on the market for a couple days and starts to listen on 2-3 year deals.

Last season he played through a pelvic area tear, pulled groin and broken ankle bone.  He hasn’t been the same this year.  He may not have every fully recovered.

Maybe he can get back to something close to what he was, maybe not.  He just hit 30 and has played a bruising style of hockey for 11 NHL seasons.  He could be fading for good.