Pimlach

Some players could regress statistically and others are likely to improve.

I used to tell him “take of the hood” when I was young. He heard me and looked up straight at me, but I’m sure I didn’t originate that saying.

how about this guy?

That probably does not mean much but I can say I vote for both VO ( -21) and Bryson (-20) to sit and watch. We are playing a close checking hard working team, that has a +11 goal diff, and has very good goaltending. We need to be very solid in our defensive zone. Put 28-17-21 back together. Put JJP with Krebs and Greenway and tell him to stop thinking and just let it flow over 200 feet of ice.

What we are saying is that the was no place to hide a line with both JJP and VO on it, and no place to hide Bryson at all. They are common denominators in the goals against last night, no matter if they played against McDavid's line or the 4th line. It only gets harder as we get further into the race. The weaknesses will get more apparent. Adams and DG need to be honest about some of these guys in the off season. It is time to take a step and fine tune the roster.

Greenway and Martin might have a dance.

Well, it goes back to depth and someone had to center Peterka and Olofsson. He let Zemgus center Peterka and Olofsson, with Bryson and Power, and they gave up the 2nd goal. We really missed Jost yesterday. I want to see 28-17-21 back together tonight. We need the stability.

I finally caught up on this crazy thread. Since I don't live in Buffalo anymore I have no strong negative or positive feelings about Harrington. Graham has been all over the Bills coverage, now with The Athletic, and all over social media. I have seen him in other social media scrums in the past. He is comfortable in this environment. I think Harington's initial tweet was a bad one. His apology good enough for me, I understand how it came off bad, but I can see that it could have just been his cloddish attempt at adult humor (meaning he ignores his entire audience - or as you youngsters call it "tone deaf"). Going back years ago now, his explanation of why he shoo'ed away the girl from Risto's tirade was fine too. Not gonna nit pick how he did it, sure he could have been softer and explained things better. Some men do not have natural skills dealing with children, he may not have kids of his own, I don't know. Why does Graham need to pile on? Apparently this is a personal battle between two men who happen to be journalists. One is dredging up the past to discredit the other and using social media to rile the masses. Just a stupid waste of time.

We lost last night and thankfully so did the Sens and the Caps. We just used up our game in hand on Pittsburgh, so we are solidly 3 points behind them - we can make it up but the schedule is in their favor. Games against other playoff contenders, especially the Aisles, are double must wins. We have 3 games in hand on them and we can cut their lead to 2 points. This is a huge game. I sure hope that Jost, Muel, and Stillman are all playing.

Bring us a win and wear your Rico #7.

Hard to blame 1 guy in a team sport. The record you show says something, so does his -20 +/-, and I am sure the fancy stats track the +/- rating. I think the goaltending is still suspect. Some very good performances have been sprinkled in with a lot more mediocre play. Team defense has been talked about at length - a few better defensive players, more defensive depth, and the forwards working harder - it all has to happen. But, we have what we have. Adams did what he did and DG has gone on record as supporting the plan. This late in the season it becomes a battle of attrition. Now it is up to DG to put them in position to succeed and the players to respond with big plays.

are you the little tea cup?

I wouldn’t be saying that because I think our depth stinks. I would be saying that Anderson held us in the game until our scorers finally solved Stu Skinner. We had two good lines last night. With Jost out and Greenway learning our bottom 6 was not very effective at all. Bryson and Clague are not NHL defenseman on a good team and they should both be gone next year.

The Edmonton goalie stood on his head but we also sent some pucks right at him We didn’t have a match for their 4th line. For some reason that line really forechecked us and they scored the 2nd goal. We played musical forward lines with Tuch and Jost out. The bottom 6 was disjointed. Greenway played limited minutes on multiple lines. Zemgus was at C and Kyle was not on his line enough IMO. Also, with Samuelson and Stillman out we had both Bryson and Clague dressed. Not good against a team like Edmonton. We played ok but this game showed me how limited our depth really is.

Well Bryson fell down and turned over the puck in our zone for no reason, that started all the problems . Why did he fall? He also turned it over on several weak clearing attempts during the schmoozle. Girgensons fell right before the goal which left the shooter alone and wide open. We played this combo and the Oilers trotted out their 4 line, the same line that had the most sustained zone time on us all night. 78-25 71-28-77 Zemgus is not a center but there he is, centering the two weakest forwards we have. And Bryson is physically outmatched by their 4th line. I see our 3 weakest players were out there, with a rookie defenseman and a winger at center. We had the last change too. Do better with home ice matchups DG.

Your assessment is kinder than mine. He gives up pucks in our zone and in the neutral zone. He doesn’t sacrifice in the defensive zone and on the wall. Lots of slow lazy passes. He is one dimensional and we have enough goal scorers to make his skill redundant.

Of course it was McDavid. National game and the best player in the league scores a couple. The announcer tried too hard to be loud and excited, it wasn’t natural. He was copying Doc, but not nearly as good.

For Bryson it is overall strength that is lacking, lower and upper body. He just isn’t a factor. Some short players play big, he doesn’t.

Give him time to learn the system and to find his game and his role.

The team is playing consistently better so it’s getting easier to find the outliers. Bryson is the major one. VO is a guy that can score but he is hot and cold player that is ice cold right now and his 200 foot game lacks about 150 feet. JJP is thinking and therefore is usually behind the play, that could change. Clague has no physical game and is a 7/8. Bucci was not there tonight.

He was better than Bryson but he still is not good.

Hope we have Muel, Jost, and Stillman back tomorrow.

I thought it was a good game. Edmonton goalie was the difference. We had many chances to score and just failed.