Archie Lee

Hopefully: Dahlin and Power on the 1st pair. Elite and similar to Heiskanen/Harley in Dallas. Samuelsson with either Joker or Clifton would be a fine 3rd pair. Sign Brendan Smith and he can be with Bryson on the 4th pair and serve as the 14th forward too (and fight a few guys). That leaves Joker or Clifton as the odd man out (likely Joker) as we need to get a veteran 2nd pairing partner for Byram. Hopefully we are in on DeMelo, Roy, Tanev, Pesce. Johnson can go to back to Rochester and get called up if/when there is an injury; he’s on deck if we can’t afford to keep Byram after next season. The Russians are in the hole for 2026-27.

I don't remember this either. He has expressed that he would be cautious about signing a player in free agency out of concern that it is often the case that a good player who has reached UFA status will command a higher AAV or longer term (or both) than might be reasonable based on the player's age. I don't recall him saying that he would not take a player in trade who is on a long-term deal. Of course, the unsaid is always "the right player for the right price".

I agree, but I also don’t think he should. Adams can’t completely abandon the plan. If there is a team left that we could resemble it is Dallas. The comparables aren’t perfect, but Cozens is our Roope Hintz (who was splitting time between the NHL and AHL at Cozens age). Our backend is built to be like the Stars (UPL or Levi are Oettinger, Dahlin is Heiskanen, Power is Harley, Samuelsson is Lindell). Peterka or Quinn need to become our Robertson (or a reasonable facsimile). Benson is Stankoven and maybe Savoie comes up mid-season and we have two Stankoven’s. Tuch is something between Pavelski and Benn. What we are missing are the Marchments and Tanevs and a 3rd centre (and I think a DeBoer).

This is kind of the point I think. There are people making straight-faced arguments that the league was full of guys making $750-$800 K who are better than Okposo and Girgs, as though we would have been better this year with Ryan Lomberg and Steven Lorentz as 4th line wingers. The reality is that it is not players like that who make teams like FLA so much better, it’s players like Barkov, Tkachuk and Reinhart. It’s probably worth remembering (not directed at you), that when Adams started his rebuild he had no idea that Thompson was going to become a 30-40 goal scorer and 70-90 point man (and it still isn’t clear that he will be consistently). The goal from the onset was that the prospect and draft capital acquired in the recent tear down would yield such players. The plan I’m sure was showing patience for our prospects to develop. None are close to being elite level NHL forwards at the moment and I’m not sure any actually project to be. Getting elite level forwards will require a lot of patience or a big trade (we do have elite D and possibly G, in my view).

Re: Power, it is true that he needs to learn how to physically impose himself defensively. The risk I guess is that it just isn’t in his make-up and never happens. But he retrieves and moves the puck out of danger zones so effortlessly that I think we don’t even notice the positive impact he has on possession and zone time. He is much better than Byram in my view.

Brendan Smith fits this role and can serve as both the 8th D and 14th forward.

I have no interest in carrying water for Granato. Better coaches than him get fired all the time. That said, what is strange to me is to have the view that the Sabres are poorly built and missing many elements of a playoff team (very true) while simultaneously concluding that their head coach should have somehow squeezed a playoff spot out of them. It’s not unreasonable to conclude that Granato was part of the deficient make-up of the team. It is not at all or in any way strange to say that the Sabres did not have a playoff style or calibre lineup last year.

I’m not sure. Dallas is my pick and I don’t see a reason to change it. But the Oilers defensive play and overall depth is underrated in my view. If Dallas had McDavid and Draisatl instead of Rintz and Robertson (two great players, but not in the “best in the world” conversation), I would guess that we would see less of the Dallas 4th line as they would lean on McDavid and Draisatl just as the Oilers do. Goal is another thing.

I wholly agree with your 1st sentence and the last two. The middle part I’m not sure about. Granato never got an opportunity to coach a playoff style or calibre team. I’m not convinced he can’t adapt if given a team to coach that is built to win. That said, a change to the head coach position was needed to reset culture and expectations.

I’m fine with Granato’s departure. I just think it is a bit unfair to point out, correctly, that other coaches were sunk by bad goaltending while not acknowledging that the Sabres were sunk by other deficiencies. Coaching was one of the deficiencies to be sure (poor starts, bad PP), but we had a very young roster that was constructed the opposite of what you see with almost every team in the playoffs (little experience, no grit or toughness). The Sabres of last season did not have a playoff calibre roster. That sunk Granato as much as his coaching. I think the outlier in Granato’s 3 full years as coach was not last year’s disappointing results, but that he somehow managed to get them to within a point the year before.

Watching who the Oilers had on the ice late (aside from McDavid and Draisatl): Warren Foegele killing seconds in the o-zone with a great forecheck. Giant R shot D man Vincent Desharnais on for the last 90 seconds protecting the lead. Both UFA’s.

Necas' status in Carolina perhaps hinges on their intentions with Guentzel.

I know nothing about this guy. He is obviously connected to Karmanos. Likely lost his job as his contract is up and he isn't a Dubas guy. Seems fine.

I’m not disputing this, but don’t recall him saying he wants to add a top 9 wing. I hope he does. If he does, though, it will mean demoting Greenway to line 4, or trading Skinner, Tuch, Benson, Quinn or Peterka (none of whom are being demoted to line 4), or buying out Skinner. I guess they could “Krueger” Skinner again, or trade Greenway, but I can’t imagine those options are in the plans. I’m still holding out slim hope (5% chance, maybe?) for a Skinner buyout. It’s a bit of a litmus test for me re: just how serious they are about making the playoffs this season. Though I’m holding out slim hope, I don’t think they are as serious as I would prefer.

Also, unless we are trading someone, or demoting Greenway to line 4, or buying out Skinner, there is no room in the top 9 (at least, not for a winger).

Back to the comparable Quinn trade, my primary reasons for rejecting such a trade right now, are that we have no need to move Quinn, and we don't have any particular need for the 23rd overall pick and/or Liljegren. Flash forward a year and lets say that we are in a position similar to Carolina is now, and we have made roster moves that make it impossible to re-sign Peterka, Quinn, Byram, Levi and Greenway and the decision is that Quinn is the odd man out. In that scenario (assuming Quinn stays on a steady positive trajectory and he is the best piece in the trade), would Quinn return greater value than #23 OA and a youngish right-shot 4-5 d-man? I'm genuinely not sure. I'm neither trying to over or under value any of these assets. Just asking.

Thanks for the thoughtful response. To summarize, your view is that a trade of Joker + #11 for Necas + #28 is not something Carolina would entertain because there is not a significant enough value gain in moving up to pick 11 from 28 to bridge the value gap between Joker and Necas. I think that is likely correct.

For many reasons, no. That’s nothing close to the situation Carolina is in or to what I asked or proposed though.

Every year I fall into the trap of thinking maybe the Sabres could trade for the guy who looks good playing with “insert Sabre player here”. Mangiapane looks good with Cozens.

Would Joker and 11 get Necas and 28?

Dudacek can give his thoughts on whether he would prefer that we just kept Mitts. His post on Necas is firmly in the real world though, where Mitts is gone. I like the Necas idea. Carolina loves their Finns and their D is going to have some losses this off-season. Maybe Joker ++ and we can get him?

There are very few "national" writers or commentators who know a lot about the needs of individual teams. If fairness, it is a lot of work to have a great handle on the prospects and a deep understanding of the needs of the teams that are drafting. There are a couple of non-team-specific hockey podcasts I listen too that I typically enjoy when they are talking about teams other than the Sabres. When they do Sabres talk though it often seems superficial and not well-informed. I think this is the case here. If Dickinson is there at 11, I don't think the Sabres will be scared off from taking him just because of their strong depth at left-shot D. If they take him though, it won't be because then need to add a dynamic two-way D threat.

I think Dudacek was correct to point out that the precedent is for these rebuilds to take significant time to yield results. That said, we did miss by a point in 22-23 and most of us now agree that there were moves Adams could have made to get this team into the playoffs, or to more aggressively compete for the playoffs, that season and certainly in the season just past. There is a degree of incongruence in the argument that this process takes lots of time when one considers how close we were to getting in just 13 months ago.

Something to remember about the rebuild that Adams undertook in earnest after the Krueger firing, is that the Sabres were not a team that had been good for years and was crumbing due to age and the wear and tear of playoff runs. He was starting rebuild on a team that had been bad for years. While he moved out Hall, Montour, Risto, Reinhart, Eichel and (not purposely, Ullmark), he was not in a position of starting from scratch. The team that he started a rebuild with had drafted in the top 10 every year post- Eichel-draft and had also fairly recently traded Ryan O'Reilly for future assets. Adams started a rebuild with a team that already had the following assets: Thompson (2016 draft), Mitts, Joker, Luukkonen (2017 draft), Dahlin, Samuelsson (2018), Cozens, Johnson (2019) and Quinn, Peterka (2020, the first Adams draft). Then he had the luxury of a 1st OA in year one of the rebuild with Power. The base of talent that already existed when the Adams rebuild started, is why we were able to come within a point of making the playoffs in 22/23. The disaster he took over was more due to toxic culture than to being bereft of talent; this was not a rebuild that was starting from near ground zero, such as what is happening in Chicago and San Jose at present.

I will straddle the fence here. I think Adams took over a disastrous situation, did a good getting things turned in the right direction, and then messed up by not approaching last off-season with enough urgency. Now we see if he can do what he should have tried to do last off-season.