Archie Lee
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Posts posted by Archie Lee
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Houser and Dell getting it done, mostly. Credit where it’s due. Since we had to turn it over to that duo, goaltending has not been an issue.
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18 hours ago, matter2003 said:
Surprisingly, Pittsburgh is 2nd, but the Sabres have a long history of having high numbers of injuries and longer recovery times. What is causing it? Can something be done about it?
Is it a training issue? Do they not let players get proper treatment for their injuries or issue to try nd prevent them from occurring? Are they too reactive rather than proactive? Do they not follow the proper workout regimens that end up leading to increased injuries? Nutrition issues? Not utilizing the Pegula's investment in the most cutting edge sports science to their advantage like the Bills have under McDermott, where they are always in the bottom 5 in man games lost to injury?
Clearly to be this consistently poor in an area, something isn't being done properly to help prevent them. There is no way over a 10+ year period a team can regularly be this injury prone.
What is the solution?
I saw somewhere else this morning a similar chart that went back over a decade. It showed the Sabres were middle of the pack and not that they were injury prone over a 10+ year period.
One other thing that might be a factor: the Sabres are out of contention early. Perhaps they have some players with injuries that they might play through in different circumstances. I'm not saying that any specific injured player on the team could have played or could now play with their injury; but in this of all seasons, there is no great reason to play hurt.
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Krebs may have just become an NHL player.
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13 hours ago, eanyills said:
The Canes, who are essentially fielding a second line with an AHL roster filling in the rest of their lineup are taking it to The Kings.
The decision not to postpone games because they didn’t want to overload their schedule down the stretch is looking like a smart one for them.
Not that anyone here doesn't already know this, but coaching matters.
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4 minutes ago, Gatorman0519 said:
I don’t have the Buffalo feed I’m interested in his explanation.
Basically, once the puck crossed the line it was not touched by Olofsson until after Dahlin touched up.
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Interesting that Biron shows why it was not offside.
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First I just want to say that this thread is precisely the reason that I frequent this site. Some of the commentary and analysis, from all points of view, is simply more thoughtful and more well written than what you will ever read in a newspaper or on a sports blog. It's just well done. So, thanks to everyone for that.
To add my $0.02, I am firmly in the pro-Adams camp. While I don't agree with all of his decisions, I think his moves thus far have ranged from good to not terrible. I recognize that some will view this as damning with faint praise, but after the last two GM's I find it refreshing that Adams is both consistent and calm in his decision making and mostly effective as a communicator.
I do worry about a plan that is seeing us have yet another "lost" season and where the intention is to have us, in-time, add what will be a 3rd wave of young, talented players to an environment where losing has been the norm. At some point a core group needs to emerge that you can win with and who you augment with trades, free-agents and your own entry-level players. I really like our young NHL players (Dahlin, Joker, Bryson, Thompson, Mitts, Cozens, Asplund) but it does not seem to me that they are near ready to be the core that the organization simply augments in order to become a playoff team. Do we just replace the so-called Jags with the Rochester crew and Power next year? That seems like a near certain bottom 10 finish again.
On the specific topic of goaltending, while I fully support Adams I think that it is to risk credibility to argue that he has not messed this up at least a bit. If Luukkonen was clearly NHL ready as even a 2A then the off-season decisions would be at least somewhat understandable. At present though, we don't have a single true NHL goalie. I would not advocate for making a trade like the one that Colorado made to get Kuemper, but we need an NHL goalie or this is going to be a lose-fest for the foreseeable future.
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3 minutes ago, Taro T said:
One thing getting forgotten in this is that except for the TB game, in the games that Anderson played, the team didn't get hemmed in their zone much at all.
Having faith in the goaltending goes a long way to playing the right way inside their own zone. Fix the goaltending & the in-zone play will improve appreciably. "Fix" the D & Tokarski looks serviceable again. Dell would still be costing them games.
The easier & quicker fix is to get a guy in the lineup that can bump Tokarski or Subban to backup & should he ever play again Anderson to that role. It'd take at least 2 other D & possibly 2-3 forwards to cover for the current goaltending.
(And this post wasn't specifically directed at you. Just your post seemed a reasonable spot for this reply.)
I agree with this too, except it is not an easy or quick fix once you get past day one of free agency.
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22 minutes ago, JohnC said:
As you noted there should be a worry about the mounting losses creating a psychology of losing that demoralizes the young core as it did with the last core. The situation that resulted in Jack/Risto/Reinhart wanting out primarily revolved around the issue of constant losing and the inability to foresee a change in the near future. Does anyone doubt that Reinhart was glad that he was on the home bench instead of the visiting bench in the Florida game?
I'm not a pessimist regarding the near future of the Sabres. The organization seems to have a number of high end prospects ready to make the jump next season, or soon thereafter. But my fear is that another season laid on top of the past few seasons will dispirit this promising young core to the point where some of them will want another place to play.
Like you, I am not a pessimist re: the team's future. I am somewhat worried about the impact of continuous losing on our current crop of young players (especially Dahlin, who seems to wear every loss). I'm further worried that we are about to add a 3rd wave of young players with several of Samuelsson, Power, Krebs, Quinn, Peterka and Luukkonen joining the team in the next 4 to 10 months. I think it is unrealistic that this 3rd wave can just replace the likes of Hagg, Miller, Eakin, Caggiula, Hinostroza and Tokarski and have us take a step forward in the W/L columns. Experience does matter and my guess is that some of the "JAGS" are currently better hockey players than are the young players we are exited about.
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36 minutes ago, JohnC said:
The Sabres would have a better record if Ullmark was our primary goalie. Few people would argue otherwise. But I'm not convinced that this would be a playoff team because the defensive coverage is atrocious. It's obvious why so many are fixated on our goaltending deficiencies. It's a problem that is starkly evident. However, when you have below average backstopping along with weak defensive coverage then your goaltending deficiency becomes exponentially worse. When mediocre goalies constantly get bombarded with ripe scoring chances then you get this repeated flurry of goals in short periods. The Florida game, among other games, was an example of this. How many people truly believed that after the Sabres scored the first three goals that the Sabres would coast to a victiory? I didn't.
This team has a number of issues that go beyond the goalie issue related to the overall talent level of its roster. I just don't see this front office willing to expend resources to significantly upgrade the position this season. It's going to be a tough year.
I agree with this.
Without Dell in net our save % is .908. If we had a .908 in the games that Dell played that would be a difference of 8 goals; factor in the empty net goals that occur when you are trailing late and it perhaps works out to a 10-11 goal swing in the positive direction. That likely makes us around a .500 points % team or slightly better. I don't think it makes us a playoff team.
The reasonable debate is over what impact losing has on a team and in particular on young players. We do have some experience with this.
Is the development of young players negatively impacted by losing? In the long run, will the high draft pick we get this year because of losing have a more positive impact than the impact that could be gained from us being a more competitive team now (if not a playoff team)?
I suspect it has more to do with the leaders in charge (Adams/Granato v. Murray/Blysma v. Botts/Housley/Krueger) than with the short-term win/loss outcomes. Here is hoping Adams, Granato and the rest of the hierarchy know what they are doing.
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4 hours ago, woods-racer said:
Ullmark is the real surprise. At his $$ and term he needs to turn that around or that will be a Skinner type contract.
Ullmark is fine. I think, as with lots of things NHL related, there is overreaction to the early part of the season. Ullmark has a .914 save % which is ok but not great. The Bruins signed him to be their 1A or 1B, with Swayman, for the next 4 years and nothing that has happened so far suggests that was a bad move.
Vladar is having a great start to the season, but the fact that Markstrom is also having a huge positive save% spike suggests pretty strongly that their #'s are partially related to the team they are playing in front of. My guess is that if you flipped Ullmark/Swayman to the Flames and Markstom\Vladar to the Bruins the save %'s would stay with the teams, more or less, and not with the individual goalies.
If the Bruins are having regrets on Ullmark, and I highly doubt they are, then I would take him back in a second.
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It's probably too soon to state he would be a first rounder if a re-draft were held today. I'm not sure the height thing would factor in too much though. In a re-draft, which is not an actual thing, you're just re-ordering the players based on how good they are now. Juuse Saros is 5'11" and he definitely goes in round 1 in a re-draft of 2013.
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The only game that Tokarski has been outright terrible in was the Blue Jacket game. I don't know what happened to him in that one.
I wonder sometimes about just how insecure guys like Tokarski and Dell must feel. I realize that they are not making big NHL money, but the difference between their NHL salaries and their minor league salaries is life-changing. Of course you need your goalie to be mentally strong, but I wonder if Tokaski was negatively impacted by Granato's decision to go with Dell in the Ranger game. Tokarski had been playing well, then gets run out of the game against Calgary (no real fault of his own in that one), Dell comes in and plays one solid period against the Flames and then gets the next start. Tokarski might have been feeling the pressure in the Blue Jackets game and maybe it got to him momentarily. Hopefully he is back. I hope we show a little faith in him and don't over react when he has a bad outing or a great game.
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2 hours ago, dudacek said:
Neither Holtby, nor Koskinen are good.
Until you compare them to Dell.
If Dell had Tokarski’s .904 save % it would mean 4.5 fewer goals against in the games Dell has played. Maybe that equals 2-4 points in the standings from the Leaf and Ranger games.
Jonas Johansson currently has a .905 save %.
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6 minutes ago, Eleven said:
Giroux got a penalty for this. Not Bergeron, Giroux: https://streamable.com/92dk3i
I’ve watched a ton of hockey for more years than I care to say, and I have zero idea what gets a guy tossed from a face off circle.
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This game fits entirely with what I thought the Sabres will be this year. I think we will be an NHL .500ish team that finishes 24thish overall. Over a long 82 game season we will have some games where we sneak up on good teams who are not at their best. We will also have games against good veteran teams that are near the top of their games and when those nights happen we will struggle to keep it from being bad. Last night was one of those bad nights. There will be more.
A reasonable goal for the team is to finish 5th in the Atlantic. To be the best of the bad bottom half of the division. To pass Mtl, Ott and Det. To be a bad but young NHL team that is on the rise.
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1 hour ago, Taro T said:
Skinner IS playing better, but he's still Skinner. For all the criticism Miller & the other D took for the late turnover, that puck was right on Skinner's stick. Any other winger would've won that board battle & gotten the puck out of the zone.
It'll be interesting to see where Skinner ends up when Olofsson comes back. People seem to be forgetting that Olofsson was the team's leading scorer when "that 70's line" was intact. Expecting that Olofsson will go back there & if Mittelstadt's wrist ever heals that Skinner will be back w/ him.
It might be how it goes, but I think you keep Skinner with the players he is producing with. We have a good potential line coming off injury over the next 6 weeks (hopefully) in Olofsson, Mitts and Tuch.
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10 minutes ago, bunomatic said:
Thats my point. This team is cheap. We lost Ulmark because we are cheap. Ownership and management could care less if we win so people will not pay to see the game. Why bother ?
I don’t think this is accurate. What Adams is doing is setting a value for a player and then not exceeding it. Paying more than value for a player is how you end up with Skinner and his contract. Adams has decided that he is not going to unnecessarily handcuff himself by giving out contracts now that will hinder his ability to re-sign Dahlin, Power, Cozens, etc. 3-4 years from now. This is also the reason why they did not consider retaining on Eichel. None of this means it is guaranteed to workout, but they have a plan/philosophy that they are currently committed to.
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21 minutes ago, PASabreFan said:
Your last sentence suggests we cannot live in a world where public figures are ever criticized, because we never know what they have going on. If you believe that, you really shouldn't be here.
As for your problem with "dumb," would you really prefer, "depressed ice hockey cognitive ability"?
I’m not suggesting Dahlin, or any public figure, is above criticism. Just that words like “dumb” are unnecessarily provocative and possibly harmful. Particularly in the thread title of a home team fan forum. I understand you and others would disagree.
Since you asked, my thread title for this topic would be something like: “Can we expect Dahlin to figure it out?” or “Will Dahlin ever become the player we drafted?
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I thought Cozens looked good last night, save for one bad turnover at the opposition blue-line that led to a breakaway.
While I would not object to him going to Rochester for a period, my first preference would be to let him play with Mitts and Olofsson when they come back (hopefully this week). Let him have a stretch playing with two players with offensive skills that match his and who are predictable in what they do on the ice.
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I'm not trying to "fix the internet" here, but I just want to say that I think the title of this thread is terrible and should be changed. I think it reflects poorly not just on the OP and the site but on all of us who post here. There are ways to express concerns about a player's skills, effort or Hockey IQ without using words like dumb or garbage or trash; particularly on a home team forum.
Recent events inform us that players may have things going on off the ice that can impact how they perform. It would be good if we tried to be mindful of that when we post.
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It works under the cap until Mitts, Joker, Tuch come off IR. If all 3 were off IR today and 3 players were sent down to make room it would put us around 2 million under. By the time they come off IR someone else will probably be going on IR so no panic to acquire another contract at this point.
I think it is a solid deal and falls between the boatload we hoped for and the disaster we feared. If Thompson turns out to be a legit middle six centre, then we now have 3 potential centres in Mitts, Cozens and Krebs to fill out the other two top 3 centre positions. Cozens and Krebs would both be fine to very good on the wing. Tuch is a good top 6 winger. Picks are picks.
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29 minutes ago, Pimlach said:
He is not a boy anymore. This is year 4. He is 6’3” and pushing 210 pounds.
I want him to be fine. I want him to help himself. This crap has been going on too long.
See last year.
Dahlin can be sneaky dirty at times. The video posted here shows it. That scrum started with Dahlin cross-checking both Pastrnak and Marchand. He throws the occasional reverse body check as well.
I thought that game last year had showed he was ready to cross the line and fend for himself. I was a little disappointed in the recent Boston game when he allowed Marchand to own him a couple of times and never responded. I wonder if the puck to the mouth the game before had an impact; he may not have wanted to get punched in the mouth if his mouth was already sore.
On a side note, it is hard not to like Tokarski. I forgot how he jumped in on that and how Pastrnak backed down as soon as it looked like he might get a blocker in the face.
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1 hour ago, Let's Go B-Lo said:
Let's understand something, despite the narrative, the pressure isn't getting turned up on the Sabres right now. It's squarely on Jack Eichel. Why you ask? Jack Eichel wants to play in the Olympics. An event that only happens once every four years. He knows that if he's not healthy and in playing shape he's not going to be chosen and he won't have another opportunity, possibly ever, to play in that event.
Any posturing you see from his camp now is an attempt to bring this to a conclusion in a time frame in which Jack can have his preferred treatment, come back, and go to the Olympics. That's all. It's not that his grievance case is suddenly better, it's not and it isn't going to be. It's not that his value to the Sabres will be further diminished if he's not moved a month from now. ALL of the time pressure is on Eichel right now. The Sabres have him on LTIR and his financial impact on the team is the same today as it will be 3 months from now. It makes zero difference to them when this happens it doesn't happen. As of today, that is the Sabres leverage. "You want to play in the Olympics? Then here is what needs to happen. You dont want that? Well shucks, I guess we will see you for your exit interview in April." That will change as the drop dead date for the Olympics passes but, for now, that's the situation.
A significantly lesser, but still relevant, factor is the longer the Sabres look semi competent on the ice without him the more he looks like a petulant ass and the less pressure the Sabres have to do something immediately. Nobody wanted the Sabres to start 0-15 and get routinely booed off the ice more than Jack Eichel and Pat Brisson did.
I'm firmly in the Sabres' camp on this matter. I think the Sabres' are taking the good faith position that the only safe surgical procedure is a fusion. I think that the Sabres have zero intention in pressuring Eichel to have a fusion if he is not comfortable with it. Finally, I agree with their stance of not trading Eichel for less than fair value just because there are some teams that are willing to roll the dice on the ADR procedure. If a team is willing to allow Eichel to have ADR then they should pay the appropriate trade-value based on the assumption that Eichel will be able to play at a high-level for them. The Sabres have no legal or moral obligation to simply give Jack Eichel's playing rights away because he and a handful or teams are prepared to assume the risk that comes with him resuming his NHL career post-ADR.
That said, if I ever come to the point where I think the Sabres are trying to put any pressure on Eichel to have a fusion then my view will change. Nobody should ever be forced or pressured to have a procedure as invasive as a cervical fusion. At some point if there is no remedy for this impasse via trade or grievance, then Eichel will need to make a decision on whether he intends to continue his career by having the fusion or if he is going to retire from hockey. That should be his decision alone.
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Getting to know Devon Levi
in The Aud Club
Posted
I think it is entirely reasonable that Adams and his management team placed a value on Ullmark and stuck with it. Giving a player an extra year or an extra million in AAV or a NMC (or all 3) is how you get in trouble. That the Sabres don't have cap issues this year and won't next year doesn't mean they won't have issues in 2-3 years. Giving a player more than his determined value just sets a precedent for other players to demand the same. It might be a pipe dream that we will eventually be a team like the Bruins or the Lightning where players will want to be here and will accept slightly below market value in order to stay with or come to the Sabres; I don't think you get there though by setting the precedent that you will overpay.
That said, I personally valued Ullmark at the same level as Demko, 5x5, and would have tried to get him at that before free agency. I don't like the NMC he got from the Bruins, but would have given him some trade protection. Also, I don't think the above references to the respective save %'s of Ullmark and UPL this season make an argument for not signing Ullmark. Unless you have a Vasilevskiy, you need 2 goalies. Having Ullmark at a .916 save % as a 1A who transitions to a 1B or 2A over the course of a 5 year contract would have been a solid use of $5 million in cap space in my view. Losing Ullmark has left us needing two goalies instead of one.