Archie Lee

This would not bother me. It is inevitable as the cap rises that some star players will want shorter deals. If Dahlin extends for 5 years, that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to be here or that he is gone at the end of the deal. It means he is here for at least 6 more years and if things go as hoped he will re-up down the road. Nothing here to worry about in my view.

This is what I think. The Sabres org has never been as down on Joker as much of the fanbase is. Also, they didn’t target two right shot D-men just to move one of them or Joker to the left-side. Further, D-pairings are nebulous. Penalties, injuries, in-game performance and the score of the game will dictate how many minutes each player gets and who they play with. You might start a game with 3 balanced pairings, but that is rarely how the game will play-out.

Pronman ranking Levi where he did means he projects him to have an NHL career as a tandem goalie. I think he is low on Levi, but I’m not sure it is the insult many are reading it as.

I think the Matthew’s deal is fine for the Leafs. Instead of an initial 8 year deal, they get him for 9 years with the cap hit going up 14% in year 6. He will be a UFA when he is 30, meaning the Leafs have him through his prime. We will see if Matthews starts a trend here. I still predict Dahlin will sign for 7-8 years at just under 10 million per. But I won’t panic if he extends for 4-5 years.

Re: Bouchard, I’m not sure they are comparable. Bouchard was the 10th O/A pick and didn’t become a regular until his D4 season. Also, the Oilers and Bouchard would have much preferred a longer term deal, but the Oilers’ cap situation makes it impossible. Power was 1st O/A, and was impactful in the NHL by D2, and the Sabres don’t have any cap issues that would prevent a longer term deal. If Power is bridged I would expect the AAV to come in slightly higher than the Dahlin bridge deal.

I'm no scientist. I think the evidence, as I understand it, supports that there is life on other planets in the universe. It's basically math. It's both extraordinary and not extraordinary at the same time. Not unlike the reality of how we all exist as individuals. There are billions of us on the planet earth. Yet, as individuals we are all extreme long-shots. Change almost any moment in the life of your biological mother and father prior to your conception and you don't exist; now multiply that by all that needed to go right for your parents to be conceived, your 4 grandparents, 8 great-grandparents, etc. The same math kind of applies to life within the universe I think. It's extraordinary that life begins and evolves in any one place, but there are 100's of billions of stars in our galaxy alone. That life exists elsewhere would not be extraordinary. As for aliens traveling to earth, this seems highly unlikely to me. I'm older. It seems to me we are going through a moment similar to the 60's and 70's where distrust in government institutions has led to people drawing unlikely conclusions from things that may be unexplained but are not unexplainable. Also, as a Canadian, there is no widespread conspiracy theory/belief that I am aware of that involves the Canadian government hiding secrets on alien visitations from the public. Why do these aliens focus so much of their time and effort on visiting the USA?

It’s too early to predict. Last year we got our first look at the elite “I’m a man now” game that Dahlin can play. We are a year or two away from seeing that with Power. Re: Samuelsson, I think it is possible that he is our 3rd pairing left shot D this year, likely paired with Johnson. I don’t think we targeted right shot D as UFAs with the goal of keeping Joker and Boosh out of the lineup. I think the underlying numbers showed the reality of the Sammy/Dahlin pairing was not quite what the perception was. Add in that Samuelsson has yet to show he can stay healthy and I think reducing his minutes is something they want to do in 23-24. Also, I could be wrong.

This is possible, but not likely in my view. Barring a trade or injury, Olofsson is likely part of the opening night line-up and will be given an opportunity to play himself in or out of a consistent role. I think they would have preferred to trade him earlier in the off-season, but there is just no market for wingers in the NHL (which, by the way, should be a cautionary tale about the value of our smaller, unproven, not-guaranteed to play centre in the NHL, forward prospects). By the time Quinn is ready to return, other injuries will have occurred. Olofsson will, I think, get a solid opportunity to keep himself consistently in the line-up. I think they try to capitalize on his contract year status; 30 goals is not unrealistic. It's very possible that 6 months from now we look back and laugh at how we fans were generally so ready to just move on from Olofsson.

The team was one of the highest scoring teams in hockey last season and still missed the playoffs. The reason they missed is because they gave up too many goals. The head coach has been absolutely clear in his statements that the goal was to create an offensive identity for the team and for its individual players, and to eventually introduce tighter defensive concepts as part of a progression. Despite of this fact (our coach basically telling us that this was the plan), it is still the case that certain players have become emblematic of the team’s shortcomings. The 3 players who we have primarily singled out are UPL, Jokiharju and Olofsson. Granato and the assistants are all back. Therefore, to get better defensively we must remove defensive liabilities. I think the team will be better defensively when there is a team commitment to doing so. I do think that happens this year and that the 3 players I mention will be just fine. I’m not making a prediction, but I suspect a healthy Olofsson plays a middle 6 role for us all year (someone will be injured by the time Quinn comes back). 20+ goals is likely and 30 is a possibility.

Turgeon was the guy for me. I am similar to him in age and he and Mogilny were really the only two star players of my actual age-group. I also have a soft-spot for players whose shortcomings, fair or unfair, end up being symbolic of the team's failings. There is no going back and there is no knowing what would have happened under different circumstances (the Butterfly Effect and all that), but Housley/(Hawerchuk), Andreychuk, Turgeon and Hasek are hall of famers. Mogilny should be. Benoit Hogue and Uwe Krupp were better hockey players at that point in their careers than Randy Wood and Randy Hillier. Mike Ramsey still had a little mileage. As much as I love Lafontaine and recognize his injuries were unforeseeable, we were barely .500 with him and ultimately won nothing. I always thought the trading of Turgeon was an over reaction and shortsighted.

VO was 7th among forwards in time on ice last year. His corsi/fenwick stats were similar to players like Peterka, Cozens, Jost. There were stretches of time last year, despite what some will say, where he was one of our better forwards. He has weaknesses in his game and there are stretches where he can be a liability. It is clear the team knows this and indications are that VO understands this and is committed to trying to improve in those areas and, by extension, become a more consistent player. Whether he can at 27-28 is a fair question. I thought he would be traded this offseason. I'm not going to be upset though if we start the season with a 28 goal scorer who is a good teammate and in his contract year, in our middle-six. I would not be shocked if VO ends up as the 13th forward many nights. Likewise I would not be shocked if he plays with Cozens and Mitts and scores 35. Also, I'm fine with starting the year with any two of Levi, Comrie and UPL as our goalies.

I would love to add a true top 4 D to partner with Power. I don’t think it is critical though. Last year we started with Bryson and Fitz in the 6-7 roles. If we add another D that pushes Bryson to 8-9 (behind the new guy, Stillman and maybe Clague and even Johnson) then I think our depth is quite a bit better from a year ago. Add in incremental development still coming for Dahlin, Power, Samuelsson and (IMO) Joker, and I’m ok with adding a depth defender. Mikkola is my prediction.

I’m in the “it’s ok to be patient” quadrant of the fanbase. That said, I get excited about potential moves and opportunities for roster enhancement. The Quinn injury is terrible. I feel for the kid. But, some contending teams use situations like this as opportunities for roster enhancement. A roster space just opened up. We can give it back to OV, who the coaching staff did not trust down the stretch. We can give it to the best youngster in camp, knowing they might be overwhelmed at times (like Quinn and JJ last year). Or, we can go out and add a veteran who makes the team better. If we add, we can do so knowing that more injuries are likely and when Quinn is ready in January there will be others likely on injury reserve. I suspect we won’t add. But Max Domi, as an example, might make us a better team.

I looked it up. It’s a word. Awesome to learn a new and cool word today.

Listening to the Adams clip, I don’t think he is saying anything he hasn’t said before: If the right deal is there to move up, or move back, they will be aggressive and make it. The key words are probably “the right deal”. I doubt the right deal will be there. I’m ok with all this.

Simashev is far from a consensus top 15. While the Sabres have picked 6 Russians in the past two drafts, they have not used a 1st on a Russian player. It may be that there comes a point in the draft where a Russian is simply the BPA on their board and there is no logic to taking a different player. But all factors included, they might see #13 as too risky.

I heard on multiple podcasts that the director of Central Scouting later clarified that he had Morin as the top North American d-man, not the top overall.

I won’t speak for the original poster, but likely this is because Cozens has already “hit” as a prospect and the others haven’t fully done so yet. Also, going by birth year, Quinn is the same age as Cozens and Krebs. In my view, the oversight is that Krebs is worthy of being included in the 1st poll. I think Krebs is going to be a key core piece for us. (queue the Krebs trade)

Thanks for this. Great work. From my “research”, the most likely to fall to us are Moore, Pelikka and, to a lesser extent, Benson. I would be very surprised to shocked if anyone else in your top 11 fell to us. The most likely to move up and be gone at our pick are Willander, Wood, Perreault and Danielson. I have my preferences, but won’t find it hard to get behind almost every player in your top 24, the exceptions being Cristall and Brindley. Nothing against those two, but I think they are higher risk and should go later than 13.

I don’t think so. While Seattle found a way to keep Shane Wright around the NHL for a bit and get him some AHL time, the general thought is that it was a tough year for him. I’m not sure that the best path for Savoie is to spend a year going from Buffalo to Rochester to the World Juniors and then to the WHL. Better to just be either an NHL player or a WHL player in my view (with the world juniors in there if he is in the WHL).

He has Benson falling to 14. I know we have drafted many smaller scoring forwards the last two years, but passing on Benson at 13 might be one that haunts a team. Cristall at 45 would be amazing.

I’m fine with either a 7-8 yr extension or a 2-3 year bridge. The long-term deal locks him up and provides cost certainty. The bridge opens up the possibility of having him on our blue line for the next 12 years. The Dahlin bridge seems to have worked fine. Maybe it is going to cost us an extra $1.5 - $2 million in AAV for the first 5 years of his next deal, but it also gets us 2-3 additional years. If Power wants a bridge and then 3-4 years from now he can demand more then Dahlin, then that will mean he has turned into the extraordinary player we think/hope he is and also that the cap has gone up.

You are right that it would “start the clock”, but the clock is probably starting in the next 12 months regardless. Also, I think that to say that is the “big reason” it won’t happen is to dismiss that there is an actual thought-out and long-term plan in place If Hellebuyck is available the price will be high. We can meet it, but it will be painful. There are contenders who will want him. Also, an extension will likely be in the Skinner range for AAV. This puts us in cap trouble earlier than we need to be. There are good reasons to not acquire Hellebuyck that go beyond the GM delaying expectations and protecting his job.

I haven’t read every post in this thread, but my sense is that in general people would take Hart if the price was low. The price you suggest is not getting Hart. The price you suggest is next to nothing. If we can get Hart for next to nothing then I am fine with acquiring him. The cost will be a lot higher than what you suggest though.

If the key here is the cap % of the Makar and Fox deals, then, regardless of whether that is referring to the cap % in year one of their contracts or today, the deal should come in with an AAV under $10. Also, note that Makar’s was for 6 years and the Fox deal was for 7. I’ll guess 7 x 9.7. Which would be pretty great.