Archie Lee

I should clarify that DeBoer would get to change assistants, just like Ruff can but has chosen not to.

Yep. We would have a better chance of making the playoffs if we rolled back the roster with DeBoer as coach, than with changes and Ruff.

I would love to add Robertson, but I actually think we are a year late on such a big addition. Last year was the year to move two of Benson, Quinn, Peterka, our 1st rd pick for a Robertson or an extended Necas or Ehlers. We had the assets and the cap room to make the move last year. Now we have the assets but we no longer have the cap room. Acquiring such a player now means moving out equivalent or projected-equivalent salary. So adding Robertson would mean moving Peterka or moving two of Tuch, Greenway, Zucker, & McLeod. Or Samuelsson and Clifton, but replacing them with two very low-level contracts. It can be done, but it probably means multiple trades instead of one trade. Dallas would probably love to add Peterka in a Robertson deal, but if Peterka wants a $7 million AAV, it won't work for the same reasons that Robertson no longer works. Also, there are multiple teams with just as many good tradeable assets and far more cap flexibility; I think we will be beaten to the punch on players like Robertson by teams like Carolina, Columbus, Anaheim, and San Jose. We need to add some veterans to change our make-up. The vets that I would target are in the Demko, Nedeljkovic, Ferrero, Ceci, Rust, and Keifer Sherwood category. Peterka and Byram appear to be the big assets moving out. I think a skilled GM could add the veterans we need to change the make-up and direction of our team while not overly depleting our prospect depth.

In my view, this is how the rest of the league would see their order (highest to lowest): 1.) Peterka (68 points as a 22/23 year old; he is a potential elite 90 point winger) 2.) Kulich (gets the edge on Benson because he can play centre, is bigger, faster, and has an elite shot)\ 3.) Benson 4.) Helenius (potential centre) 5.) Östlund (potential centre) 6.) Quinn (trending down) 7.) Rosen (trending down) If I was going to tier them it would be: 1.) Peterka 2.) Kulich, Benson, Helenius 3.) Östlund, Quinn, Rosen

I like Quinn and still think he can be a player. I don’t see him as anything but a throw in here. If we trade 9OA, Kulich, and Östlund for Robertson, then we need to be really sure it will get us in the playoffs and that Robertson will extend. I’m not sure. I think the reason Robertson is available is because Dallas wants to contend for a Cup and they think he is at least a full tier below Rantanen as an overall player. What about Benson + 9OA? If we value Benson more than the other assets, then that is what Dallas might want.

Incredibly, Detroit included a late 2nd rd pick (Tampa’s) to get San Jose to take Walman last off-season. San Jose then traded Walman for a conditional 1st in 2026. Nice work Mike Grier.

On the puck over the glass thing, I agree with those who think it is a stiff penalty for what is now something that only happens by accident. I also agree that it is a bit absurd to watch players get away with physically assaulting the opposition, and then there is a penalty for an accidental stick stuck in the skates, or a puck over the glass. I've thought for some time that the NHL should experiment in pre-season with 60 second penalties for the non-violent "accidental" infractions. That would probably be too far "out of the box" in itself, but I would actually go a step further. I would experiment with the powerplay team starting the powerplay with possession. You could have a small semi-circle on the walls in the offensive zones and the start of a PP (just the start) would begin similar to an inbound pass in basketball. This would make the shorter PP's still critical as the defending team would not simply be able to kill the first 15 seconds with a face-off win and an icing. It's a little out there, I know.

Quinn for Marchment would be exactly that type of move. Every team in the league that wants to make the playoffs (and has the cap space) would take Marchment over Quinn for the coming season.

Frondell’s interesting in that most who rate him highly acknowledge your concerns. Yet he is still rated as high as #3. It seems he is seen as a safe pick. I haven’t seen him play. Is he Lundell with a shot?

The Sabres currently have 15 forwards whose skill, contract, or developmental progress, puts them in the NHL or at an NHL calibre for next season (Thompson, Norris, Benson, Peterka, Mcleod, Tuch, Zucker, Kulich, Greenway, Quinn, Malenstyn, Krebs, Lafferty, Kozak, Rosen). The Sabres don’t have the roster spots or the cap space to just move out Byram and some picks and prospects for upgrades. Sure, they can dump 4th liners like Lafferty or Krebs or Malenstyn, but their salaries are such that dumping them only makes room for comparably paid players. We don’t have the cap space to add another Zucker or Greenway unless we move out a comparable contract. We could move an overpaid D-man like Clifton, but we want D upgrades which would mean paying more for the new D-man than we are paying Clifton. To summarize, we can’t keep every young NHL player (except for Byram) AND add multiple quality veteran talents. Change will mean some good young players (Quinn, Peterka, Byram being the most likely), will need to be moved. Otherwise, it’s just mostly status quo. This is the reality of our roster situation.

The top 5 aren’t falling to us. Frondell likely goes top 5-7 too, I think. After those 6, I can find traits and upside in your 6-13 (and Mrtka) that would leave me feeling good if we drafted any of them. Cheers for the work!

Obviously the series is far from over, but it is interesting to watch how the moment can draw performance out of players. Kapanan, Podkolzin, Walman, Klingberg, Connor Brown. All available to any team for peanuts (or less). All laying it on the line.

Any discussion on Rossi and the Sabres, should include a discussion on who he would replace at centre. Norris makes little sense. While there are question marks on the durability of Norris, the concept of his two-way game means Rossi is not an upgrade. McLeod also makes no sense. McLeod is the ideal 3C who can play up in the line-up, kill penalties and match-up with the opposition’s top line. Kulich…is where Rossi is an upgrade (maybe). Rossi is 31 months older than Kulich, and is coming off a 60 point season, and is the playmaking centre the Sabres don’t have. Rossi (assuming he has another level of offence to come), Norris (healthy), McLeod, and Krebs, could be a pretty solid centre spine. Still real young though. I wonder about a Peterka/Kulich for Rossi/Ohgren trade. I think Minny would need to add. It doesn’t help in the grit or experience categories. I think I would pass on my own idea.

In a vacuum, I would be excited for a Robertson acquisition. I’m not sure it would be a slam-dunk though. Robertson’s production and defensive metrics have been produced while playing almost exclusively with one of the best two-way centres in the NHL (Hintz), on one of the league’s top 5 teams, under elite head coaches (Bowness, then DeBoer). I would not go so far as to say he is fully a product of his environment (clearly he is talented), but we might be trading for a 70 point winger whose great two-way metrics were driven by his centre and team structure.

I may be wrong, but I think Peterka holds far more value than Norris. Peterka, I think, is viewed as a potential star scoring winger (he is practically that already). Norris would be viewed as a huge injury risk with an enormous contract.

Agreed. The Sabres started last season with a top 6 of: Peterka / Thompson / Tuch Benson / Cozens / Quinn It is not that any of those players were not NHL ready, it is that 4 of them were 23 and under. Then, when the first injury happened, we called up 20 year old Kulich. And Krebs was our 4th line C. And Byram and Power were in our top 4 D. And Levi was our back-up goalie. Most of these guys were ready for a role. All of them on the roster, in key positions, at the same time, was not a plan for success. It was a GM in over his head.

Jarmo doesn't thrill me. But I could actually see this scenario playing out with one change: I don't think Jarmo accepts Appert as his HC. I think Adams likes Appert, and I think Appert is seen as a potential replacement for Ruff, but I don't think it's an etched in stone thing. If we see Jarmo ascend to GM, I think he picks his own coach. I actually think that Lindy Ruff would be the sort of coach that Kekalainan would hire (which is not a positive for me).

I could not be more down on the Adams/Ruff combo. I think it is the worst combo in the East and maybe in the league. It is hard for me to find anything Sabre-related to be hopeful about. But, I did find the article to paint a bit of a good news / bad news scenario. The good news, is that I didn't read anything in the article that made me think a good GM could not thrive under Pegula. I don't see anything here that supports Pegula is forcing Adams to make bad decisions. Pegula, to me, just wants to be involved, kept in the loop, and listened to. He didn't force Adams to trade Eichel and Reinhart. He didn't force Adams to sign Cozens, Samuelsson, Power, and UPL to long-term deals. He didn't force Adams to extend Jokiharju at $3 million or sign Lafferty at $2 million. He approved these things, but he wasn't the driving force behind them. A capable and qualified GM with good leadership skills, would make better decisions and have no trouble convincing Pegula to support his plan. Pegula's big flaw, is that he has failed, repeatedly, to identify the right person for the GM position and, after 2 big misses, he compounded the mistake by insulating himself from outside opinion. The bad news is pretty bad though. That Pegula is stubbornly sticking with Adams is not good. With each year that passes without the Sabres getting it right, they drift further from credibility. Their reputation (the franchise, the brand, Pegula's) just becomes more and more damaged. There is zero reason to think they are on a path to getting it right this year. I know I'm drawing an arbitrary line here, but since 2020-2021, Adams is 0-5 for the playoffs, Ruff is 1-4, and Kekalainan is 0-4. This is not the group of men that any serious professional sports franchise would entrust with ending a 14 year playoff drought. I think success can happen under Pegula. Not with this group of men in key roles though.

On Reinhart and Eichel finishing top 5 in the Selke voting (along with Ullmark's Vezina and O'Reilly's Conn Smythe). What more evidence is needed of the general incompetence of the Pegula-era? Since the Regier firing, the franchise has been rudderless. No plan, no leadership, and a lack of skill and aptitude in the most crucial GM position, has led to the squandering of valuable assets. As of now, there is no reason to think this is over. On Maurice's record in Florida. The year prior to Maurice taking over, the Panthers won the President's Trophy under (mostly) Andrew Brunette. In 2022-23, Maurice was one Sabre win (and two end of season Pittsburgh losses to bottom of the standing Chicago and Columbus) from missing the playoffs in his first season as Panther coach. If instead of the Panthers sneaking in and going on a long run to the finals, had they missed the playoffs one year after finishing 1st overall, who knows what Panther ownership does in the spring of 2023. Had Adam been more proactive at the 2023 deadline, the Sabres might have stopped the Florida juggernaut before it ever got traction.

My view is the Bills are bordering on great because of Josh Allen. Had they not found Allen, then Beane and McDermott would have prioritized bringing in a veteran QB who would have helped them be a good, if not elite, team. Of course, Pegula might have fired them after a couple of 10-7 WC seasons, but I think the Bills have been in good hands with Beane and McDermott.

“Career suicide” is a strong term. I think this is similar to the Ruff hire. Kekalainen, like Ruff, I think is well respected in the hockey community, but not necessarily highly regarded for his recent work. If things get worse here rather than better, it certainly isn’t going to help Kekalainan get a new GM job (well, maybe in Buffalo). It’s also similar to the Ruff hire in that, like last off-season with Ruff, you can expect that every perceived “good” move made by the Sabres this summer will be touted as having “Kekalainan’s influence all over it”. That is, as with Ruff, until those moves don’t work, in which case it will be all Adams’s fault and Kekalainan will get the “how could he have known it was this bad” pass.

Thanks for this. I get it, Karmanos and the analytics team were not in place in 2020. I remember being very excited when they announced "Buffalo selects from the Ottawa 67's...", thinking it would be Rossi, and then being very disappointed when it was actually Quinn. I can't remember the exact statistic, but there was something about Rossi's draft year scoring level that historically has always translated into a star-level player. But, it was less than a year ago that a pretty common view among fans on this board was that Quinn was nearly untouchable. So, I'm not sure we have the final outcome of this just yet.

And Housley.

Sure, but I was asking why some in our front office would have a bias against Rossi when they drafted Savoie and Benson. It doesn’t seem that our front office is averse to drafting smaller players. That we passed on Rossi for Quinn, setting aside our individual opinions on whether that was a good decision, doesn’t mean they didn’t like Rossi (necessarily).

Why did they pass on him? Was it just that they saw Quinn as a better prospect, or were there perceived flaws in Rossi’s game? The same front office drafted Savoie and Benson.