PerreaultForever

I would guess Arizona is on all 206 of those lists. Probably at the top. I think Canadian teams, especially the cold ones like Winnipeg are on a lot of them as well. Some players probably don't want to be in Quebec for the French language issues. Some players might not want to go west if they don't like the long travel schedules. After that the smaller markets and perennial losers and that's where Buffalo falls in. I have no doubt Buffalo is on quite a few of those lists but it's still only a small percentage of the league. Another thing to consider is most of the guys with NTC contracts are the star forwards and bigger names and that's not what we really need. We might have trouble getting that top 4 D man but the character veterans we could also use should be easy to find. You also have to consider what @Brawndo said above. They have cap space and assets. They should be able to make a deal work that some teams won't be able to. For example, say a top contender needs a top 6 winger bad. Or a 2C like say Lindholm in Calgary. But they don't have the cap space to make that happen but they have several good D men with salary. There's your 3 way combo right there. We can also add an expiring contract along with a guy we want to make a deal happen. There are literally hundreds of possible ways you could make deals like that work, and sure, some of them might not be possible because of NTC aspects but KA can do better than just Robinson and/or Greenway. That's why he gets the big bucks and it's time he earned them.

You trade the guys who you, as an organization, don't think are developing the character/drive/work ethic you want and also the guys who are similar to guys you already have that you are happy with. I kind of get the feeling they drafted a lot of the same type of guy because they figured they'd only land a few of the ones they drafted at any position but felt it guaranteed they'd get enough. If you end up with too many left or right wingers for example, then you have one or two to move for a D man or a veteran. It's not that complicated to create a balanced prospect pool and you simply trade extra assets for deficiencies on your roster. When you draft you have to look at BAP first, and if a guy like Benson falls you look hard at it, but you also have to lean in the direction of need as well at this point and if a type you need is a few spots lower maybe you bump him up your list a little. Why we didn't draft Warren when we had the chance for example boggles my mind. 6'6" 220 pound D man. Nope, definitely don't need that. imo Granato would be a great coach for Rochester, but not in Buffalo.

Come on, you're making me agree with @LGR4GM again. Stop it. We can't cross the streams. No trade/move clauses definitely exist and there will be players who don't want to come to Buffalo but there's still a ton of players who don't have that. Not everybody gets one. RFAs definitely don't have them among others. You may have to over pay. You may have some reluctance. But I cannot believe the idea that nobody wants to come. If that's the case, they should just announce that publicly and move the damn thing cause that would be a death bell.

Because they aren't drafting big/heavy guys or an abundance of goaltenders. They have 3 goalies up along with their only good D prospect. Savoie and Östlund are small as well. It's what they do.

I'd have to take the time to comb through rosters for that but I'm sure there'd be deals out there if you worked at it. You could have several possible targets: 1. A team looking to reboot/rebuild. Dumping their vets for youth 2. A team looking to get younger/faster or a team that wants to go more run and gun offense. 3. A team looking to trade defensive prospects for offensive ones. 4. A team in the hunt that wants to move salary from their cap to add a different type of player if maybe they have an abundance of the type you want. So maybe they have a young stud D man waiting in the wings and can afford to move a veteran D man so they do it for a prospect and they also have cap room to deadline add or even turn around and flip your prospect for that add. There are many many possibilities for a creative GM. The thing is if you want to flip a prospect you have to do it either when he is truly really good (at which point you might want to keep him) or before other teams start to have doubts. Rosen, for example, might have had more value last year and his value might drop if he fails to make the roster out of camp next year. In other words you need to flip your Nylander before other teams realize he's not that Nylander and while teams think he might still be.

Ville Leino has a ghost?

Yes, I know, but every year they disappoint so where do you expect the conversation to go? If the team/Pegula is making an error, and it's the same error, over and over and over again then Sabrespace has the same conversation over and over and over again and, we get it, why doesn't Pegula??????????????????

You have to hope Wahlberg can turn into Hornquist. If he can develop that net front skill maybe his skating can be good enough. He's a different type of player so I think that is good. I wouldn't say Östlund was "better" than Savoie but he did look fine at this level and they are both fast. Östlund just looks SO SMALL to me. I just don't know. They are both less developed versions of guys we already have so trade them both while their stock is high imo.

Not picking him really bugged me at the time and still does. idk about the Russians. It's possible. It's a hope. Canada line juggling now. The current combos not working. Cellebrini not looking great today. Swedes match his speed and are playing a better team game.

I wish they would do what I've wished they would do for many years. Hire an experienced hockey guy as a Director Of Hockey Operations or whatever you want to title it but above the current GM and coach and Pegula just stay in Florida and stay out of it. That guy would then analyze the team and evaluate the players and their character, work with a coach like Briere did with Torts and point out all the slackers that had to go and they would restructure this thing into a proper hockey team in a few years. It won't happen. But yes, I'd be a happy man if they named Gallant head coach.

I will try my best. Okay, how about this. Remember when I wanted us to draft Warren? I was looking at that shot of him pushing the one Swede and thought holy crap he's big. We could use that. Now go ahead and tell me why you're glad he's not in our prospect pool.

Östlund's goal was a nice bang in. I liked that despite his size he still went to the net. Savoie made one move too many which is something I see him doing often. He needs to simplify and SHOOT. He over used his speed on that breakaway. He could have slowed a little and made the shot. True about Poitras. He was good on the PK but he cost them the first goal for sure.

Watched Philly shut down and dominate league leading Vancouver tonight. Weird what happens when you actually teach a team to play defense.

Again, those sort of stats are misleading. Who is he on the ice against? Who else is on the ice? It all matters. As a quick example, you're playing Boston, Dahlin is sent out against Pasternak's line. Clifton gets sent out against Jacob Lauko's. End of the game Clifton ends up with better stats because Lauko's line didn't score and Pasternak's did so that makes Clifton the better D man statistically speaking. Like that.

Thanks for the details which confirm what I said. He and Pegula did not see eye to eye. Patty didn't want to work for an owner who meddled. To the original point though, it IS the moment the franchise goes south and stays there. Patty put a voodoo hex on it maybe.

Officially. But did he? Exit packages along with letters of resignation and NDAs are not exactly a new thing. Him and Pegula did not see eye to eye that is obvious. The rest is just details.

Disagreed with Pegula simple as that. I think it's obvious Pat had his own vision and wasn't going to work with an intervening owner. So basically he said "no" and that was that. Bring on the stream of yes men. I mean the minute JBot said "no" out the door he went as well. Okay how about a buck fifty then? I will go as low as a dollar.

Just for clarity, the reason I keep mentioning Hathaway (besides the fact he'd fill a need) is he signed LATE in free agency. Lots of teams either passed on him and/or wouldn't meet his price> I cannot believe Philly (projected to be a bottom feeder) was high on his list. He took the best money he could get as he got worried. Have to believe he'd have taken an offer from a young (and projected to be up and coming) Buffalo as a result of that. Heck Boston signed Heinen from a PTO and even he's far better than Jost was.

In fairness he has yelled at refs. We've seen the occasional on the bench outrage. Don't think I've seen him yell at players though. More significantly I don't think he benches players for poor performance. Not the main guys anyway. Benching a rookie or a Jost or Olofsson doesn't really count. They also seem to get rewarded too easily and mediocrity is accepted. Remember when Torts took over Philly? Called them all fat and lazy and had them doing sprints for hours until some of them puked. Some people here laughed about the dinosaur. I can't speak to all teams, but I know the accountability threshold in Boston is really high, but they also have a really strong veteran leadership core that functions to get the most out of players. There's a lot of internal competition to be great. The lack of that in Buffalo is on KA not Granato. To your second point most definitely. I said this in the Boston game thread I think but the TNT guys nailed it in the second intermission. "too many of the same guy" and the prospect pool is pretty much more of the same. That's most definitely on KA. I know a lot of people might scream don't trade away the future but imo at this point you either move several guys off the roster or you move prospects for the things we need now (which we needed in free agency but didn't act on) imo we still need 1 good veteran goalie, 1 solid big defensive defenseman, 2 tough 4th line grinders and one bigger veteran winger who will drive the net (or a 2 way 3C and you move Mitts to the wing, either way but a leader type). They don't have to be top level guys but they do have to be hard working character guys. That's what we need now, and that's likely what we will still need next year and none of that is waiting in Rochester, Europe or any other junior league. and I would be fine moving any combination of Savoie, Kulich, Rosen, Östlund etc. to get those things if need be.

I think Granato is a good coach for the NCAA or as an assistant. He could play good cop/big brother/best friend under a hard ass Tortorella type head coach. The system he is using doesn't work in the NHL and his game management is atrocious. I'd also say he's a poor leader/motivator but that also falls on the (lack of) leadership. There are too many nice guys around and not enough warriors who want to win badly at any cost.

Stop telling people what they can or can't do.

It's funny how the analytics matter when you like what they say, but when they are bad they become meaningless or there are "other" factors. I heard him talk about how he really liked the first 4 minutes against Boston before the Bruins scored. He thought they possessed the puck well in the offensive zone. Which they did. Good analytics. But not one mention of how all that possession was around the outside perimeter and they didn't actually generate a single dangerous scoring opportunity. Those would be the other bad numbers. Granato has no real answers.

Sure, but I suspect the timing/market isn't right. Johnson definitely and Okposo maybe are deadline type players for cup run teams. D depth is always a deadline concern for teams so a veteran cup winner, easy deal unless you're greedy. Okposo has a little grit so the right fit if the salary works. Maybe the Islanders would want him back? He'd be a fit on what they have and do. I'd also trade Girgs and Olofsson, all the UFAs but I doubt there'd be much interest in them.

Yup. 2 million was nuts for a lesser version of what we already had. Philly got Hathaway for 2.3 as an example of what would have been better for us and what we needed.

They should move him (and Okposo) at the deadline.