Archie Lee

You did yeoman's work in making your point on Cozens. Frankly, you convinced me and I started seeing everything that you saw that was flawed in his game. "It doesn't matter what he does the rest of his career because he was never going to be good in Buffalo", is a bizarre take though. You have acknowledged in many posts the many things that the Sabres did wrong in their development and deployment of Cozens. I'm not fooled by Cozens's 1st three games as a Senator. Nothing would shock me, but it is obviously too early to draw conclusions. But if Cozens does turn it around in Ottawa and becomes something that resembles the player that he was projected to be, then it is absolutely the case that the same could have happened in Buffalo. Maybe not with Adams as GM and Ruff as head coach, but with the right coach, right system, right support. That's just obvious. Of course, the Sabres have no obligation to change direction in management or coaching to serve a single player.

I'm not saying Dahlin is above criticism or shares no blame, but it's pretty easy to reconcile, isn't it? O'Reilly, Ullmark, Montour, Reinhart, Eichel. How many examples are needed to draw a reasonable conclusion?

Good defensive structure is worth so much. I'm not sure about Sacco, but I'm sure with the Bruins there is some holdover from what Montgomery brought to them. When a solid structure has been engrained on a team, maybe when things start getting tough the default for players is to return to the structure. On the flip-side, when there is no solid structure, there is nothing positive to default to. The Bruins might just be the sort of team that is below-average talent-wise, but can squeeze out wins with structure, goaltending, and one star player.

On Power, I think there are lots of teams that fit in one of a few categories where acquiring Power would be appealing to them. Power has no trade protection. With the cap increases, his contract won’t be a problem for many teams; this is particularly so if he is getting 1st pair and 1st PP minutes and his offence increases accordingly. None of the western Canadian teams will be drafting top 10 this year. They are on a lot of No Trade lists. They either have no obvious #1 offensive d-man, or there are questions re: the long-term availability of the player they have (can the Oilers afford to extend Bouchard? Can Vancouver keep Hughes? Would Winnipeg like someone younger behind Morrissey). Power’s lack of trade protection may present an uncommon opportunity for such teams to acquire a future #1. Then there are American teams in the middle-top half of the standings who are not likely to be drafting high any time soon and who either don’t have such a player or the player is older (St. Louis, Washington, Tampa). In all the Cozens trade talk, it never occurred to me that he would be dealt to Ottawa for Norris. I think there are good trades out there for Power or Byram.

We should prep for this. It’s not going to stop. The discourse around the Sabres is going to be brutal. Wait until the lottery. The Sabres will be mocked mercilessly for being at the top of the draft yet again, with nothing to show for the last 4 times.

As crazy as this may seem, we can't sign a higher-priced UFA this off-season unless we trade a significant contract without taking one back in return. Just with pretty conservative contracts for our RFAs, we are right up against the cap with a full roster. Signing a truly big-ticket UFA, someone like Marner (won't happen), would mean moving out two contracts. I think change this off-season will come down to how well Adams manages to pulling off a couple of hockey trades.

The first part of your sentence, up to the comma, is all I have ever said. The second part, after the comma, is you making stuff up.

I support him in his endeavour to put pressure on ownership and management to improve the team.

I think he has a tonne of leverage. He starts by telling Adams he wants out. Then, if he isn’t moved by a certain date, he tells the world. His full NMC kicks in this summer on July 1. So the leverage is, trade him now when his value is high and there are lots of options, or trade him later when he’s pouting and his play sucks and you can only trade him where he wants to go. None of this seems consistent with Dahlin’s personality. But the leverage is there. Now, we could just say no, but the damage would be done. Terry, best to just fire Adams before it come a to this.

It is absolutely bonkers, that Adams looked at Dahlin and Thompson, two star-level, players, and concluded that the best way to serve them and take the next step as a team, was to surround them with kids under 23.

It’s incompetence. Adams isn’t unintelligent, he’s just not a good GM. I stand by my view that the early success post-Eichel (the better than expected outcomes in 21/22 and 22/23) had the adverse impact of convincing Adams he knew what he was doing. He found no reason to deviate from the path he chose, as the path was leading the team in the right direction (54 points to 75 points to 91 points). What he failed to recognize was that the success was driven almost entirely by the emergence of two players. Dahlin and Thompson went from being disappointing performers in 20/21 to star and then near super-star level performers over the next two years. This, I think, insulated Adams from reality. It was my hope that he was capable of learning from the lessons of the setback that was his do-nothing 2023 off-season. Sadly, the sham coach search leading to the Ruff hiring, the lack of any change to the d-corps, and the roll-back of a top-6 featuring Cozens, Peterka, Quinn, and Benson, was evidence that Adams had learned nothing. Now, inexplicably, he is going to get a third chance to show he can adapt and grow, on the job.

I agree. Lots of comments out of Ottawa that their GM, Staios, was not enamoured with Norris’s game. It’s pretty clear that this trade was as much about two teams moving on from players that they no longer had faith in, as it was about them acquiring players that they coveted. With that in mind, it might be more likely this does not go well for either team, than it is that it will be a win/win.

Ok, but if Cozens finds his game in Ottawa, the important variables won’t be the water, or the humidity, or the cuisine. The variables will be the hockey environment: who he plays with, what he’s asked to do, how well he is coached, what the expectations are, etc. If Cozens turns it around in Ottawa, then it means he WAS capable of turning it around and that the reason it wasn’t working here was less Cozens and more Sabres (of course, way too early to conclude anything).

It’s happened twice in hockey, that I recall (Lemieux and Lindros). Not for over 30 years though. There hasn’t been an organization pathetic like the Sabres are, in the 30 years since Lindros. I could be wrong, but I think the national discourse on the Sabres is going to be brutal in the off-season; particularly in the podcast universe, where I think a lot of younger people get their hockey info.

G Great post. Two comments. 1). I’ve been a defender of UPL’s, but I’m not letting him off the hook. He has to be better. No question his poor play has been a significant factor. 2). The one thing I would add to your list, is Ruff. The big selling points for Ruff (aside from the history), were accountability and structure. There have been no signs of increased accountability. For what it’s worth, I never really thought it was an issue. I think the team performed about as reasonably could be expected under Granato. The team’s failures under Granato, were related to their shortcomings (experience, grit, etc.) and not to a lack of commitment, caring or being accountable. As for structure, this was always a myth when it came to Ruff. Last year’s Devils were a great example. Yeah they had injuries and goaltending issues (all Ruff’s recent teams have goaltending issues), but if he had established anything close to the sort of “structure” that we have been told he establishes, the Devils would not have sunk from 3rd overall to 23rd. Teams with “structure” don’t implode in that fashion.

Honest question: how close are the Sabres to having an elite prospect say: “Don’t draft me.”?

RE: Islander d-men, Pelech is, I think, a LHD. Pulock and Mayfield are RHD, but both have full No Trades. I think we will need to look elsewhere.

This isn’t quite true. I understand what you are getting at, but Granato did get a positive result in his first two full seasons. We can revise history (I’m not accusing you of doing this) by ignoring that those teams far overachieved expectations, but the reality is that Granato oversaw back to back seasons where the team had a 20 point followed by a 17 point improvement. The Sabres were expected to be at the very bottom of the NHL in 21-22 and to be nowhere close to the playoffs in 22-23 and they finished much higher in the standings than expected both years. Again, I’m not pounding the table for Granato, but the backslide last year was in no small part due to the putrid off-season Adams had (Erik Johnson and Clifton replacing Lyubushkin and Stillman; that’s it). And the backslide wasn’t huge. Last year, Granato “failed to move the needle”. What’s happening this year is so much worse than “failing to move the needle”. The Sabres are awful. We are moving closer to year two of Krueger level-bad, than to what we were in Granato’s full seasons. It’s not all on Ruff. Some of it is, I think, related to players simply knowing they are defeated. Our GM preached accountability, and then took none on his own shoulders. We are seeing the end result of two years of mismanagement and neglect. Ruff is part of the problem. He is not part of the solution (as a HC anyway).

Peterka only spent one year in the AHL. Quinn spent two...sort of. There was no OHL season in 20-21 and the AHL played a shortened 29 game season with no playoffs. Including the 10 game playoff run in 21-22, Quinn played a total of 70 AHL games and Peterka played 80. I don't think there is any one player that was pushed into the NHL too quickly. More generally, none of Cozens, Krebs, Peterka, Quinn, Benson, and Kulich needed to be in the NHL as soon as they were. With the possible exception of Cozens, since the WHL played a shortened 24 game season in 20-21, there is just no evidence that any would have been hurt by staying in junior, or the AHL for another year before graduating (maybe Cozens, as the WHL played a shortened covid-season in 20-21, that might have provided no value to his development). Collectively, we simply had/have, too many young players on the team at the same time. Better yet, a couple of Peterka, Quinn, Benson, Kulich, and Rosen, should have been traded for veterans over the past two off-seasons. We would still be quite young with a decent prospect pool.

It's going to take some time to sort out if this was a good trade for the Sabres. My one prediction is this: it will become clear fairly quickly that Dylan Cozens was not single-handedly dragging the Sabres down from being a team that could compete to make the playoffs to being a basement dweller.

I did a little research this morning. https://records.nhl.com/records/general-manager-registry In the post-expansion era of the NHL (back to 1967-68), there have been 6 general managers who have made it through their first 5 seasons as GM with one team, without making the playoffs. Max McNab, Washington. McNab was not the Caps 1st GM. He took over in year two and held the job for 6 full seasons before being fired early in year 7. Incredibly, he was later hired by the Devils, where he also never made the playoffs. 11 years total, no playoffs. Eddie Johnson, Pittsburgh. The Pens never made the playoffs in Johnson's 5 years there, from 83-84 through 87-88. He then was hired by Hartford, where he did amake the playoffs 3 years in a row (though the Whalers weren't that good in those years). Mike Milbury, New York Islanders. Milbury did not make the playoffs until his 7th season on the Island. He did not work as a GM again after his time in NY. Don Waddell, Atlanta. Wadell was the GM of the expansion Thrashers. They did not make the playoffs until year 7. He eventually redeemed his reputation with Carolina and now with Columbus*. Doug McLean, Columbus. McLean was the Blue Jackets 1st GM and never made the playoffs in 6 years. He has not worked as a GM since. Steve Yzerman, Detroit. The Wings have not made the playoffs in 6 years under Yzerman. As of today, they are 2 points out of the last WC spot, but are on a 3-6-1 slide. Yzerman did make the playoffs 5 times with the Lightning, including making it to the cup finals in 14-15. Adams will join the list once this season is over. So too might Bill Armstrong in Utah, who has been with Arizona/Utah for the same 5 season stretch; though, Utah is still in the race, 4 points out and playing good hockey at 6-3-1 over the past 10. Basically the 6 can be split into 3 groups. 1.) Guys who worked for expansion teams (McNab, Waddell, McLean). 2.) A local legend who built a great team as a GM in another city and is now getting every benefit of the doubt (Yzerman). 3.) Two men considered among the worst GM's in history (Milbury and Johnson). I will let you slot Adams into the category you think he belongs in; for clarity though, he doesn't qualify for categories 1 and 2. *On Waddell, am I remembering correctly that there was a brief moment this past off-season, before he signed with Columbus, where there was speculation that he was coming to Buffalo as POHO? Or was I just dreaming?

Why the HaHa! I think Benson will be fine. But the situation isn’t great and it’s reasonable for people to have concern about the impact of the Sabre environment on any player (Benson included). It wasn’t long ago that the idea of trading Quinn was openly mocked by people projecting a 40 goal and 80 point season. Things can go south quickly.

I thought that pretty much everyone, both teams, looked flat. There were even a couple of times where a Sabre half did something that would normally have set Bennett off and Bennett just seemed to shrug and skate away. It was an example of two teams who knew the likely outcome in advance and decided, for the most part, to just get through the game without anyone getting hurt. The exception was the 4th line types (Greer/Dunne) who can’t afford to take a night off. Kinda sad to watch.

You are talking about fan expectations. I agree they fell short there. I’m talking about what the people who crunch the numbers thought was realistic for last year’s team. The analytics community was pretty clear in their view that the Sabres overachieved with their 91 point season in 22-23. When Adams did nothing to improve the team that off-season, the point projections for the Sabres for 23-24 were around 83-85, which was where they finished. I remember listening to a podcast where the analysts were saying that the Sabres were the team that most people will disagree with them on, because the Sabres were viewed as up and coming. But the numbers simply did not support they had the talent level of a playoff team.

I don’t have the analytic communities pre-season point projections for the Sabres in front of me. My recollection though is that in Granato’s first two full years we exceeded expectations and then last year we slid back to meeting expectations. It wasn’t like we collapsed last year, we just played more or less to the expected level. I’m not longing for Granato, but in hindsight, from an outcome standpoint, what stands out is not the 23-24 regression but rather that he managed to get this team to 91 points and just short of the playoffs in 22-23. This season, in contrast, has been a disaster. Part of this is likely out of Ruff’s control (it’s not all on Ruff). But for much of the year there was a bit of a narrative that Ruff just needed time to coach the Granato out of the players. It is a bit of a unique outlook to blame the last coach, who produced better outcomes with arguably less to work with, instead of the current coach.