PerreaultForever

That's kept me going through the lean years. I thought it would flip by now but not yet. It takes a huge level of incompetence to stay this bad this long.

Well this is new. A lot of Sabres stuff on 32 Thoughts.

He's young, but it is a ridiculous ask.

I see no argument here. It's Dahlin. Seider is a little younger though so he might still come into his own next year. The better question might be who is better, Dahlin or Byram?

I totally disagree with this. You can't look at two old guys who are well past their prime, has beens even, and conclude from that that you don't need veteran leadership. The other word that gets tossed around is "pros". You have a lot of kids on your roster you need leaders to guide them. You will get better results in that sort of environment and you will build a lasting culture. Kids are fragile, kids get knocked off the path easily. Kids get tempted. Pros are pros. Talent is talent but heart comes and goes and you need guidance. But I said long ago KO should not have been re-signed, Girgs should not be re-signed for next year and EJ was a has been. The veterans you want are in their late 20s not their mid 30s. Adams on the other hand might just think he can wait and then in 3-4 years he will have his own.

I don't have the patience to keep waiting and waiting and the next one and the next year. I want to make the leap NOW.

Pittsburgh, Tampa, NJ and even Washington all also winners tonight.

I hope not. I want them to add a veteran 2-way 3C in the off season and if Krebs stays as 4th that's fine but Krebs as 3C isn't good enough imo.

Agreed. They currently need 5 teams to play substantially worse than themselves down the stretch and that's a big ask.

Well if Detroit hadn't taken a total meltdown nosedive lately there'd be zero hope. Now if all the forces of the universe align and we get lucky it's not impossible. Unlikely, but not impossible.

Well, that was just an outstanding hockey game. No but's, no qualifiers, no other factors, they simply outplayed the opposition. You could see early, although they pressured, Isles kept most of it outside and they took plays away but the speed wore them down and the Isles had no answer for it. They got worn down big time. Sabres handled the physical side, even dished a little out and just played a solid game top to bottom. We can ponder where this has been all year I guess. I'm sticking with the belief in the goalie idea. When you believe your goalie will keep you in it you elevate your play much like many Sabres teams did in the Hasek era. Maybe that's it, maybe it's something else, but whatever it is they have elevated their play and this is the hockey we were all hoping we'd see at the beginning of the year after last year's late surge finish. I still think it's too late, but you never know. It's no longer impossible. The only negative, if you want one, a minor one, is Benson is still taking too many stick fouls and that might cost us against a good PP team. Yes, Barzal dove on the second one, but that's what some good players do. You feel that stick on your skates and ooops, you let yourself fall. Benson's NHL timing is still way off but that's rookie stuff and it's just a pity we aren't deep enough to address that. Next season we need to hire an assistant coach who is a PP expert. I see they are experimenting now that they have Byram on the roster but it's a mess and they really don't know what they are doing. With this level of speed and skill the PP should be a LOT better than it is. If we miss, it's on Adams imo. Should not have signed KO. Should not have signed Girgs. Should have signed a goalie instead of Comrie and games were wasted on pacifying Levi's demands as well. We still need additions if we want to be legit next season, but it's very doable. Finally, I had fun watching Sabres hockey. That hasn't happened much in a long time.

This is the contrasting styles game I've been waiting for. How we play in this one should tell us a lot about what we really are or aren't.

That's valid. It certainly was a "hockey trade" and I'm glad we didn't just get prospects/picks for him. That would have been a true step backwards. The winner of this trade is maybe determined by which team signs their guy long term and the success/failure relative to that contract down the road. Both players at this moment seem to "fit" into their destinations.

I might be in the minority but I'm not a believer in any forms of double standards. If Conor Bedard elbows a guy in the head this year as a first offender he should get the exact same treatment as a Rempe or whoever. The league should evaluate if it's deliberate or not, and if it is, same punishment applies no matter who you are. First offence is first offence. The evaluation of the "goon" vs. the infrequent skill guy will sort itself out over time as they repeat offend and the penalties increase as a result of that. Eventually they get a reputation and maybe even get over penalized for it. Unless their name is Trouba of course.

I'm not really against it. Might teach the kid a lesson, but imo it does go against previous precedents and there's a lack of consistency there. First offence is supposed to be lighter for a play like that. If that's the new bar that's fine, but it has to be applied to ALL cases going forward.

okay okay, but you know what I mean. He's an offensive defenseman not a defensive defenseman. Where exactly he sits on that continuum idk yet.

Haven't seen enough of him here to know. But I do know that Colorado considered him a lesser Makar and he was considered an offensive D man and not a defensive one. He's not that big for one. I'm not sure what his height and weight is now but he looks lighter/thinner. I will have to see more to know how he handles net front pressure and how he actually defends. For one, he won't be used to how poorly most of our forwards back check and thus if he gets confused on whether or not to stay in front or follow down low his D might suffer. I mention this because I've noticed lately that Clifton has started to park in front more and not chase. Thus he has looked better on D. This was because in Boston he was used to following the man down low and forcing him outside or behind the net because he knew there'd be a forward coming back into the slot and/or taking away the trailer. In Buffalo the pass back was to an open man and he was getting killed on it looking out of place behind or to the side. This happens to all our D often. I haven't seen Byram enough to be able to add anything definitive on him yet. I saw very little Colorado over the last few years. If I remember correctly he wasn't great against Seattle in the playoffs but that's a bit vague on the memory.

Yup that would be true, but it was unsustainable wasn't it. Adding Karlsson has proven to be the kiss of death for teams. If Power grows into being a defensive force on the defensive side of things I would be fine with the big 3 on D but I have my doubts about 3 offensively minded D men with big salaries on the same team. I personally think 2 is more than enough and the other 4 need to be defenders. Preferrably big and physical. It should be exciting while it lasts though. They do provide a lot of offensive skill.

This is definitely a possibility. I said earlier I wouldn't be surprised if one of Jokiharju/Samuelsson/Clifton gets traded in the off season. Jokiharju if contract talks are way off but more likely Samuelsson. Philly would love to have him I think.

That has been the case so far. We have one style that we want to play and that perhaps we even excel at when we are "on". The trick will be being able to adapt. You see I want to build a team that will have playoff success, not just get into the playoffs. The way we are going, even if it does come together as per the "plan" I can see this problem coming and want to avoid it.

That's true, the 3 dmen who produce offense aspect is front and center. My additional question would be who provides the defense? Amusingly earlier on Byram's pairing was with EJ. Are we going to try to win 8-7 every night?

Well that's fine, and maybe it'll work out but I'm just thinking ahead. We will have a much clearer picture when we see what happens with UPL. That's the first cap/contract issue. I said long ago I figured Mitts would get traded simply because they had an idea of how much they'd pay a 3C, they saw him as a 3C but he saw himself as a 2C and that was a great divide so he had to go. Byram sees himself as a top pairing D. He is a top D guy for sure in terms of his offense. The issue for me is just Power and his contract. 30 million for 3 D is a LOT. I asked this earlier so for the capologists out there is there any team out there that has 30 million on their top 3 D? I don't think so. I could be wrong.

That's not wrong, and maybe Byram is worth the money more than Mitts was but we already paid Power a lot so I'm not sure it'll work. We pay him a boatload and that window we are building will be really small unless the cap goes up a lot. A really lot. I really don't want to end up stuck like the Leafs having to try to cobble together a bargain basement bottom six and depth D. It's a recipe that fails. It'll be very tricky to make this work as Quinn, Peterka and others also start to come up for raises.

I agree with you that "pace of play" is their thing and that's how they want to play, and if teams let them play that way they will have success. I don't think Jost and VO had a lot to do with it but BB definitely does. He clearly thrives in that wide open attack mode game. The question I still have is can they impose their will on teams that don't play that way. Teams that take away time and space. The Islanders game should be a good look at that. I also don't believe you can make a team of all fast and skill work both in terms of the cap (as skill guys are usually more expensive) and in terms of the lack of physicality. It's a recipe for playoff failure. I'd rather we built a more balanced roster with the bottom 6. Speed is good all around, but we need more physicality to go with it.

At this stage of his career I don't think you want that to be a thing. He's too young and physically under-developed. Yes, he's a big body, but he has not reached his peak development yet. Kid still needs to add muscle and he will. Consider Dahlin and how much stronger he looks this year. Able to take hits and deliver them. If Power is still not hitting people at 23 we have a problem. Not yet. Power is YOUNG. The expectation for some is way too high right now.