GASabresIUFAN

People here are funny. Don’t trade Power because he has potential. Don’t trade Cozen’s because he’s still young and can rebound and we don’t have enough centers. Don’t trade for Pettersson because he’s only had one 100 season. Don’t trade prospects because they have great potential and will help us down the road. My favorite - Don’t ever trade for defensive defensemen. These are all arguments on this board about why not to make a move and you wonder why Adams doesn’t get a major deal done. There are never guarantees. Risks must be taken to try to fix the team. LV took a huge risk in acquiring Eichel and it helped make them Champions. The status quo isn’t working. Sure acquiring Pettersson is a huge risk. Maybe he never scores 100 pts again. So, but what if he recovers to 80 points a year? Doesn’t that make us better? What is we trade Power and use his cap space on two 20 minute a night defensive D. Doesn’t that make us better? To change the narrative here, Adams or his successor needs to be bold. The current plan is t working and never will.

I didn’t miss Benson. I was comparing the first 3 years of Adams reign of destruction. I also mentioned him in the sentence about the last 2 drafts.

What good is any of that doing the Sabres?

Yes. We thought for a while that Adams and his crew were doing a better job of drafting than the previous administrations. I'm not sure that's true any longer. TM produced 6 NHL players in his 3 drafts (Reinhart, VO, Eichel, Borgen, Hagel & nominally Lemieux). 3 others reached the 100 game threshold (50 for goalies) but never have been full time NHLers (Nylander, Asplund & Johansson). This is poor drafting by most standards especially with 25 picks in 3 years. Jbot has also produced 6 NHL in 18 picks (Mitts, UPL, Bryson, Samuelsson, Dahlin and Cozens). I suspect Portillo will be the 7th. Johnson may only be a AAAA player. Then there is Adams. He has 5 drafts so far. He had 27 picks in his 1st 3 drafts (including 6 1st rd picks and 4 2nd rd picks). So far we have just 3 NHLers (Quinn, JJP and Power). Kulich also looks like an NHLer, but not quite there yet. There are other possibilities like Novikov (6th rd in 2021), Rosen (1st rd in 2021), and maybe Kozak (7th round in 2021). But there are major disappointments like Östlund (1st rd in 2022) and Savoie (1st rd 9th overall in 2022 - traded for McLeod) and the 3 2rd picks from 2021 & 22 (Leinonen, Poltapov, and Kisakov). This doesn't mean others won't emerge from these 3 classes, but I'm not expecting anyone to make a major impact. The most recent two drafts look similar to the 1st 3 but I'm very hopeful on Strbak, Kieber and Helenius as players who can make a significant impact. Obviously Benson is in the NHL with a bright future. I've argued for a long-time that we need 3 full time NHL players a draft to become good. For the 9 years from 2014 to 2022 we have averaged 2 with some, like Borgen & Hagel, developing for other teams.

We have 3 young offensive D. We really only have enough PT for 2 and desperately need playmakers, centers and defensive D to make this roster whole. You trade from strength to fix the roster. Why is this so hard to understand? It also saves $8 mill a year which can be allocated elsewhere. Folks you have to give to get. Not every prospect is going to develop into a star player. Power, while extremely talented, is the worst of our 3 young offensive D, two of which (Byram and Power) are defensive liabilities. Our team has been one of the worst defensive teams for years. This needs to change if we are ever going to be a good team. Waiting another 3 years for Byram and Power to figure it out defensively is not a recipe for success. Someone you have to take a risk. Power doesn't engage physically despite his size and Byram does while producing the same offense. I think he can also be retained for less than Power is being paid.

Lol. This team doesn’t have enough quality centers, playmakers, or defensive D. What we do have is an excess of highly paid, defensively challenged offensive D and not enough PT to spread around to maximize their talent. We are at the bottom of the NHL again, so sure keep the 3 offensive LHD because that’s working so well. I get it let’s wait another 3 years and hope that Byram and Power improve defensively. That makes so much sense after missing the playoffs for 14 straight years. Let’s also sign Byram to a Power type deal so that are 3 “top” D, who don’t play defense very well eat up $27 mill in cap (1/3 of the internal cap). That makes even more sense. I get it, keep the failed status quo, don’t make any substantive changes to the lineup and just keep losing. Or….. maybe change course, move out a highly paid redundant player who has significant trade value and fix other parts of the roster? Nah, it’s so much more fun to just keep losing.

While much of this is true, I’d still make the deal. 100 pt scorers don’t become available very often and a good GM can add the right players around him to limit the issues with his “soft” play. I trade Powers and his $8 for him right now. Our Mr. Softie with a big contract for yours and we are only $3 “worse” off. I also think we are one of the few teams with the ability to add his contract that have shooters that would thrive with him and can skate with him. JJP, Quinn, TNT, and Kulich all have lethal shots. I’d love to see how they’d do getting feeds from an elite playmaker like Petterson. This isn’t happening however since our gelding of a GM would never take the risk.

He didn’t sit on his hands, he put his head in the ground. The fact that he still has a job shows TP’s lack of commitment to winning.

That’s hilarious. They gave up 35 shots on goal, 21 scoring chances and 6 high danger chances. UPL was the difference not the defense and 2 way play of the forwards. They were lousy as usual. Don’t confuse a shutout with good defense.

So what can we get for Power?

The problem is Power or Byram need to anchoring their own pairing. Neither should be paired with each other or Dahlin. So do really want to be paying Power $8 to be a 3rd pairing D? How is that going to help his development? This stupid Adams experiment of 3 scoring D to push offense has already failed because his precious offensive defenders can’t defend and there isn’t enough PP time to go around. This claw was obvious the day Adams acquired Byram and we have been living with the fallout ever since of a lack of centers of offense and terrible D play on defense. Time to end the experiment.

We can no longer wait until he develops some D skills at 25. We need to win now with the core we built. Byram gives us exactly what Power does. Same upside offensively and the same development needed defensively except he is willing to try defensively which Power isn’t. Time to move on and get other pieces we need for a redundant but value player.

From the Athletic. https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/6049845/2025/01/09/buffalo-sabres-midseason-report-card-2025/ I think my C- grade is to high.

Power and Byram are both lousy defensively. Power is worse because he flat out refuses to engage physically. Since they both produce about the same offensively, but I'm going to be able to re-sign Byram for less than 8 mill a season, I'm trading Power. It's really that simple. We don't need 3 offensive first LHD. We need one for the top pair (Dahlin) and one for the second pair (Byram). We need some RHD and Tallinder type players to partner with Byram and Dahlin. If I can move Power to help get partners for Byram and Dahlin, I'm making that deal right now.

This isn't the best example for your theory, but we do need more grinders to toughen up this lineup. Have a tough player or two who can play in the top 6 forwards would be nice.

It's actually nearly impossible to build a team solely through the draft even if you are good at talent evaluation. Let's say a rebuilding team averages 9 picks a year and hits on 3 players each draft. Over 7 years the team will develop 21 players. Seems simple, but in reality, those 21 players may not be from the positions of greatest need and by the time the 3 guys from the last draft become productive NHLers, the guys from the first draft could be ten year vets and moved on from their initial team. If you look at most teams that utilize the draft and develop strategy, you may see 10-12 drafted players at most on the roster. The Sabres are currently at 12 drafted players including callups Kulich and Kozak. We also have been using this draft and develop strategy for over 9 years (Jbot and KA) and we haven't developed and kept enough defensive D, playmakers or centers. To make the strategy work, the GM has to find trading partners to move out excess prospects to fill holes in the NHL roster and you have to find the right FAs and that may include taking a big $ risk on a guy or two.

I'm not going to lie and say UPL has been good this season. He hasn't. He has been average and certainly not as good as last season. What I will say is that I don't think it's all his fault. I think he is actually playing his heart out. The problem is the defense. We simply give up way too many high danger chances. We also don't block shots at a high rate. I put UPL in the "core" because we have committed to him and I think with a better defense he is good enough. I also think Levi will figure out the NHL and the team will have good goaltending between the two of them. Call me an optimist. If I was the GM, my Sabres core would be JJP, Benson, TNT, Tuch, and possibly Quinn up front, Dahlin and Byram on defense and the UPL/Levi combo. I'd look to keep Zucker and possibly Greenway. We are also probably stuck with Samuelsson, but as a 3rd pairing guy, he might be salvageable. Everyone else, I'm not interested in keeping. Power and Cozen top my trade list. My add list includes 2 top 4 defensive D. I'm also looking to add two experienced centers with one proven playmaker for the top 6. From a prospect standpoint, I like Kulich, Helenius and Novikov. I think they'll be able to help the team over the next few years. I can see Kozak being a medium term player on the 4th line.

The COVID 2021 draft was very interesting. One thing I remember besides all the Russians were 3 CHL players drafted in the 3rd, 4th and 7th rds who had very similar D+1 seasons. I was very interested to see how each guy developed. They were 3rd rd (pick 95) LW Josh Bloom - 32g 39a for 71 pts in 68 OHL games --- Now in the ECHL (traded to Van for Riley Stillman) 4th rd (pick 97) RW Oliver Nadeau - 35g 43a 78 pts in 65 QMJHL games - Now in the ECHL (plus 4 games in Rochester) 7th rd (pick 193) C/W Tyson Kozak - 32g 37a 69 pts in 66 WHL games - Now called up to the NHL after 2 plus season in the AHL) This just illustrates how hard it is to make the NHL and how much the draft is a crapshoot with the COVID years being an even bigger crapshoot.

what do shrinks say; that you have to first acknowledge a problem before you can fix a problem. Terry still doesn't acknowledge that he is the problem. The funny thing is that despite my very negative attitude towards the team, the coaches, Pegula, Adams and many of the players, I actually think this version of the Sabres, with a core of UPL, Thompson and Dahlin, can be saved.

quote from the Dread Pirate Adams

When you hire LaFontaine (no experience), Tim Murray (1st time GM), Jbot (1st time GM), & Kevyn Adams (no experience and 1st time GM) to run your organization, I'd say hiring judgement is significantly lacking. TP got lucky with McD and Beane. Maybe it's time to invest in real experienced leadership and remove your self from the equation. No guarantee that will work either, but it stands a better chance than the mess he already created.

That's what I thought. I'm feeling much better about winning the Power Ball now.

Terry Pegula in discussions with Kevyn Adams

… and talent.

So the current spine is; Cozens McLeod Krebs Lafferty Is it any wonder this team struggles to score and win hockey games?