RochesterExpat

The point is to make the playoffs. Missing the playoffs so your goalie can “develop” is unacceptable at this point for the franchise. GMKA made a bad bet and he lost the season as a result.

"The Sabres used to suck. They still do, but they used to too." ~ Mitch Hedberg, probably

It's also harder to notice defensive players than offensive. I watch AHL.tv and the camera work... needs work. Novikov definitely slumped for a stretch after a pretty noticeable start, but he's been pretty steady as of late. His point totals aren't bad for an AHL rookie d-man at 35 GP, 1G, 12A, 13P. I know +/- may be a pretty garbage stat, but the only active D with positive +/- are Novikov at +12 and his current D partners, Metsa (+6 / 23GP) and Laaouan (+1, 1GP). Novikov leads the entire team in the stat at +12 and the next closest is a multiway tie at +6. Of course, only 6 active skaters on the Amerks are above zero, but that's a different issue. To go back to my bit about his utilization, he's not shooting nearly as much as the other D guys and his shots-per-game was higher in the KHL. That's definitely part of the reason for the lone goal in 35 games. Given the struggle he had with the culture shock of moving here, I think they will choose to keep him in Rochester and it would be understandable why. If he gets an NHL look, I would guess it is during a decently long home stretch. We have a four game home stretch starting tomorrow and there's the five game stretch from 3/27 to 4/5. Either of those would make sense to me. It's also possible they don't want to call him because Rochester is contending for a playoff spot and they'd rather have him experience that.

The 'skating issues' is a holdover from his scouting report pre-draft (2022) that said he was "slow" and clearly written by someone who spent five minutes watching tape from one game and didn't do even basic research. As I said in one of the many prospect threads during the off-season, the KHL tracks on-ice skating speed. Novikov was the fastest defenseman on the ice for either team (both top speed and average speed) for the majority of games he played in during the 2022-2023 season. In multiple games, he was straight-up the fastest skater on the ice for either team (top speed, not average). He was the only defenseman to repeat achieving the top game speed across the entire KHL for the full season as far as I could tell. That's wild. It's also worth noting that you can't maintain a high average speed if you don't know how to be agile and use your curves as well. It's one thing if he was always the fastest skater, but it's another entirely to average as the highest skater (note: the average is among D-men only--he never had the highest average speed in any game but neither did any defenseman in any game as far as I could tell and that makes some sense). The margins for being an outlier on speed isn't enough that posting the fastest speed is going to just automatically raise your average to the highest as well. You need to continue moving and keep your momentum in order to do that. I don't think his speed has been utilized as effectively in Rochester so this misguided perception continues to exist. He hasn't joined the rush as often as he did in the KHL or during prospect challenge/camp. It's not to say he isn't willing to join, but he tends to side more defensively in play. I think this is by design from the coaches who are more focused on positioning with him than maybe other defensemen on the team. Likely because of his status as an NA rookie. Lastly, it's worth mentioning that he's openly talked about how difficult the move to Rochester has been for him and his wife. We sometimes forget these are 20 year old kids moving 5,000 miles away from family and friends to a place with a completely different culture and language. Seth Appert talked about it as well and said that Novikov and his wife had a bit of a culture shock, but they're adjusting well now.

We've done jokeception at this point. We're in too deep.

I’ve got some bandwidth so I’d like to deep dive on the subject of overused Sabres buzzwords. Lots to unpack here so let’s drill down. ”The future is bright in Buffalo.” ”If we can pull off a [previous number + 1] streak, we’ll be back in the playoffs.”

The heat death of the universe.

Time to start looking at who the top 10 are in the draft and sort by 'highly skilled undersized perimeter forward' so we can figure out who we're drafting.

The first four years of my life the Bills were AFC champions. I’m a glass half full kind of guy.

Just because you said this and the Sabres are anything but predictable with goaltending, I expect Comrie to get called up and get the net.

Samuelsson and Clifton was interesting.

The Canadians must have set some kind of record for missing the net.

Kind of a funny observation, but Kulich passes the puck too hard for his teammates.

He’s not a terrible goalie as far as skills go, but he is a good example of a head case. I don’t think Buffalo will do any better from a sports psychology perspective than Toronto was doing except maybe if you bring him in, send Levi to Rochester, and tell Samsonov how confident you are in him and basically try to fix his psyche (no idea how that actually works). Then you have to give him 15 of the next 20 starts to try and get the ball rolling… which completely kills any chance of the playoffs and only might get Samsonov in a mental place to play next season—after his contract expires.

Was this transaction simply because Jost didn’t clear waivers before practice so Buffalo was above the roster limit? Doing a paper transaction for Yohnnie got them to the correct roster size? I’m honestly confused.

Not to beat the dead horse, but one big difference between the post-lockout Sabres team and the current roster is the leadership aspect. Just look at how many players from that era are hockey executives in some capacity. Besides the obvious ones like Briere, Grier, and Drury as current NHL GMs, former players like Hecht (DEL assistant coach) and Kotalik (Extraliga Assistant GM) are in leadership roles as well. Not to mention Ryan Miller who is now a consultant I believe. Hell, even Vanek is a scout. And those are just the ones off the top of my head. Which three from the current roster do you think will be an NHL GM in 15 years? Can you even think of one?

This win just makes me more upset at this team for how this season is going.

Cleaning out the chicken coop. Which I actually did during the third period against the Blue Jackets. It didn’t even need to be done. I just decided I’d rather be surrounded by chicken ***** than watching it on the TV.

If your Sabres excitement lasts for more than four games, seek immediate medical attention as this can lead to permanent emotional damage.

I’m not suggesting they are in any way available or should be made available. But as far as “caring” if the player is traded, the above list is pretty much how I feel. it’s also possible I’m overvaluing Tuch’s trade value because the above is predicated on it being a proper haul. If it’s not, he moves to the first group bordering on second, and I would very much care if he were traded. As for Power, I don’t like him. I didn’t when they drafted him (I wanted to trade the pick). I hope I’m wrong about him but I just don’t see him being a value 1OA. I don’t even really know why I don’t like him. That’s the worst part. But given his draft pedigree, I think the rest of the league values him higher than I do. Hence his placement.

Yeah it’s just why I hate these questions. It’s hard to know what’s realistic for some players. I guess I’d look at he roster like this: Players I would keep because I don’t think the value is there due to the players being undervalued by the league and the return wouldn’t offset the loss: - JJP - Mitts - Quinn - R Johnson - Benson Players I would keep because I don’t think the value is there due to star player status making deals nigh impossible to predict or balance and would rather keep than risk: - Thompson - Dahlin Players I would keep because I admit I probably overvalue: - Levi - Cozens Players I would be willing to trade and who expect would be valued appropriately: - Tuch - Joki Players I suspect the league overvalues: - Power (former 1OA) - E Johnson (“veteran” presence) - Clifton (it worked for Risto!) Players never going anywhere for anything inbound so take a bag of pucks if you can: - VO - Jost - Krebs - Comrie - UPL No idea how the league values them: - Skinner - Greenway

It’s kind of a silly question because there’s infinite upside to letting any player go. Would you give up Dahlin for at Makar and MacKinnon at 50% retained plus 4 1sts? Of course you would. If you genuinely would never give up a player/prospect no matter what, I guess we should start calling you GMKA.

Boy I sure am glad that our starter came in for relief and played up to expectations.

Nice to see neither team has quality goaltending. Nevermind that was deflected