JohnC

The encouraging thing about playing Krebs with the two grizzly vets is that it forced him to play a more disciplined and tighter style of game. What the insertion of Krebs into that more defensive line demonstrated is that Krebs can adjust his free floating and loose passing brand of hockey and make him concentrate more on puck retrieval and possession. Especially in the third period of the San Jose, Krebs worked hard, along with his linemates, to keep the puck in his own zone. Or another way to describe it is to value the puck and the possession. Something he had problems with. Don Granato showed that good coaching includes experimenting to put his players in the best position to succeed. The next challenge for the coach is to find the right strategies to get Mitts and Olofsson back on track. I know that @LGR4GM doesn't agree with me (expecting a barrage of assaults) but I do believe that these two players are salvageable.

Is that why you have your orthopedic doctor in your contact list? 🤡

The most intriguing thing about the practice lines that DG is assembling is having Krebs on the Girgs and Okposo line. If that reshuffling has a positive effect on Krebs's play, that in itself is a good thing for the youngster and for the team. No one can argue that the Sabres are a finished product, far from it. But if you can develop a youngster within your system and have him contribute, then that is another added piece to the puzzle.

He's entitled to his opinion. He can follow the team in any way he wants to. That's his prerogative. It's just that some people work hard not to be happy.

I'm in the disappointing category who thought that Mitts was going to be a good NHL 2 or 3C. It hasn't materialized. But even when I had higher expectations I never, or recall others saying, that he would be a $10 M player. (There may have been a distinct minority who elevated the player but the prevailing view was that he could potentially be a legitimate player in this league. Right now, the tide is going against him. That's disappointing. But that doesn't mean that he is completely washed up with no chance of salvaging his career. I believe he needs a change of scenery to reinvigorate his career. The issue I have with @PerreaultForever is that he creates an outlandish premise and then foists it upon others. That is a cheap and unworthy ploy.

No one is anointing anyone. That's your capstone fallback response to everyone. Much of the commentary about a number of the youngsters is positive for the simple reason is that their play is positive. Are Power, JJ and Cozens playing poorly? Isn't their recent play encouraging? And not all the commentary is indiscriminately glowing for players such as UPL, Mitts and Olofsson. You don't think that they have been harshly criticized? You are painting a false picture that everyone, but you, has been sucked into the vortex of delusion that their team is on the verge of hoisting the Cup. That's not true, and never has been true. Following a rebuilding team is different from following a Cup contending team. (Stating the obvious!) To get from point A to point Z is a process, sometimes excruciating so. It's not necessarily a steady upward trajectory. That's where we are at. And most of us understand that. What you are basically saying is call me when you get there. In the real world you don't get to your destination unless you travel the road.

What you are basically saying is that "it could be" or "could not be". It could be "heads" or it could be "tails". It could be on the "right" or it could be on the "left". We could "win" or we could "lose". There are no guarantees because in life there are no guarantees. Tell me something that a stupido like me doesn't already know. 🤡

What progress are you referring to regarding Krebs? He has been struggling. I thought the coach putting him on the Girgs and Kyle line was a smart move in that it forced him to play a tighter game within a line structure. I thought in the third period when this line kept the puck in their zone that it was a valuable lesson for how to play a NHL game. I'm not giving up on Mitts. (Although my expectations for him are waning.) As you point out at the minimum, he has value as a second PP member. The best thing that could happen to him and the organization is for him to get more of his game back. He would then have more value on the market. I'm starting to come to the conclusion that he needs a change of scenery in order to reinvigorate his game. I remember DG saying last year that Mitts was one of the best players in training camp, then he got hurt and never seemed to get his game back. How quickly the storyline on a player can change!

What's also encouraging about the scoring chart beyond the +/_ is the wide distribution of goal scoring. That's a positive side that the roster is better balanced and not overloaded by one depended upon line.

He had issues both off and on the ice. I think he did get his life straightened out.

I'm far from being done with Olofsson. It's easy to feel giddy after a win against a tanking team at the end of an extended and exhausting road trip. But what happens when the Sabres face the inevitable injuries? We've seen that spiraling down phenomenon two often. Are you going to argue that we have enough talent in reserve? When this team is in-tact, even with its known deficiencies, this team can compete with all teams. However, what it doesn't have is an excess in talent who you can casually get rid of only to have created another void when a player or two is out of the lineup.

The broadcast had a graphic that showed our three rookie players in Quinn, JJ and Power, combined, have more points than any rookie group on any team in the league. And watching our guys no one can deny that there is still so much more room to grow.

You go in circles. I don't know what you are talking about or what your point is. To say prospects are prospects is like saying a horse is a horse and a mule is a mule. I'm admittedly very obtuse but I'm aware of that.

Barnaby got playing time in the NHL. It's more likely than not that Pekar never makes it up to the NHL.

Don't buy @PerreaultForever's postulation that stardom was predicted for Pekar. No one who was sober projected Pekar to be a high level NHL player. Quite the contrary. The issue was whether he could ever get to the highest league. There was some noise about him because he had a Marchand nuisance style of game. It was simply a mirage.

When you blame a GM for a problem he wasn't involved in then you are being unreasonable. He took over a struggling hockey operation and made a major change in the roster and operation. If you think that there was going to be a quick fix, then you are being unrealistic. It's called the real world, not a fantasy world.

Putting Krebs on a line with Okposo and Girgs was an intriguing move. As @Doohickienoted it forced him to simplify his game and play a tighter brand of hockey. This was an interesting move by the coach to change the dynamic who seemed to be struggling and searching for his game.

He'll deserve the monetary reward. He's playing really well and putting his young wingers in a position to thrive. What's exciting is that you know that the line he is driving will continue to get better. Our top two lines are good. Steadily, the pieces are falling into place.

It's exasperating when you watch the same problem over and over. It's like when we repeatedly watched Risto cluelessly chase a man leaving the front of the net uncovered. There's no question that Krebs is a pass first center. But sometimes you have to react to the situation and go against your first instincts.

I'm making a prediction: The Mitt/Krebbs/Olofsson line will score a goal in this game. I'm putting my credibility in on the line. When one doesn't have much to give, there is not much to take. 🤡 I have a simple recommendation for Krebbs and also Mitts: If you have a shooting lane, freaking shoot it!

Why worry about another team's goalie. When our own goalie is sinking the ship I would be not pointing fingers at another team's deficiency. When one's own furniture has a lot of dust it takes a lot of nerve to critically tell another person that they need to apply more furniture polish.

Especially for a Sabre fan, no one should be mocking the goaltending of another team. That's like Al Capone calling someone else a crook.

You make an interesting observation (maybe intended or not??). The one thing that KA has done well so far is identify players and project what they would be worth in the present and their worth in the future. With a couple of his identified valued players he has been able to get earlier deals that would be organization friendly than if he waited for their contracts to run out. Two obvious examples of that are Samuelsson and Tage. Both of these deals were good deals for the respective players in that it gave them immediate security while those same deals were extraordinarily good value deals for the Sabres in the short and long-run. With respect to Mitts, as you point out, the player is going to determine his contract value to this franchise. And that is how the GM wants it to be.