Big Guava

The contracts weren't even that much...2 years 4.5 million for one and 2 years 2.3 million for the other. Cost them a 2nd and a 3rd for compensation for signing both.

I don't see this team having any issue drafting players. They have drafted numerous good players no matter where they have been in the draft.

With yesterday's win and a Boston loss, Bruins are now 1 point behind the Sabres and Sabres have a game in hand on them. Sabres will also likely pass Pittsburgh and Philly soon as they are 1 point behind them but have 2 games in hand on Philly and 1 on Pittsburgh... Time to celebrate being out of the basement! Let the sun in...uncork the champagne! 🍾 🍾 Sabres are now tied for 5th in goals per game with 3.26 this season and are the only team in the top 9 with fewer than 91 points. It's really, really hard to be this bad when you score like they do.

Season sweep of the Sens

Yes he has been terrible in virtually every way possible this year.

They get bad goaltending and they play bad defense. It's equal parts of both. Their goalies let in at least 1-2 goals a game that aren't NHL quality goals. See UPL's first goal yesterday. Regardless, it's still hard to score that much and not win more games.

Their goaltending is equally to blame. Too many bad goals, too often. UPL is constantly in bad position on many of these goals.

First time the Caps allowed more than 5 goals all season long.

Sabres are 3rd in scoring in the last 40 games averaging 3.40 goals per game but only have a .500 points percentage over that time. The next worst teams averaging 3.2 goals or more over that time frame are the Oilers at .588 and then the Leafs at .600. There are 5 more teams with higher points percentages than that. In other words, it's damn hard to score that many goals on a regular basis and not be winning a lot of games.

Lose to the 2nd worst team in the Eastern Conference(probably the worst by the end of the season once the Sabres play their 3 games in hand) yesterday and beat the best team in the NHL today. Sabres in a nutshell.

And they are kicking the Caps ass

Hopefully there is a lot of meat on the Rathbone

Band on the run?

Not saying to give him away, get what you can for him and get out of the contract that even as it might be reasonable for a starting goalie in the NHL is a big overpayment for a player who is not a starting goalie in the NHL. I mean a player with a career .898 save percentage in this day and age should not be a starting goalie in the NHL. It's hard to be that low when your save percentage last year was .910 in a season where you played 54 games, which means he has sucked much worse the rest of the time he has played. He leads the NHL in Goals allowed and out of goalies with 20+ games played he ranks 50th out of 56 in save percentage with an abysmal .885. In short, he sucks, so I am not sure what your argument is for keeping him is. And about not replacing him...they could bring in Michael Houser and get this level of goaltending most nights. If that's what you are getting anyway, why pay 5x the price? Stop deluding yourself into thinking UPL is going to be anything other than a disappointment. Just pay a vet minimum contract and you'll get the same level of goaltending...I mean Reimer has been outplaying him and it hasn't really been close.

Whoever the goalie coach is needs to be gone yesterday. I'm not sure who the goalie coach was when we started the drought but the goalies all were pretty good for the first 4-5 years and I remember many of us thinking they were going to screw us out of the #1 pick from stopping too many pucks. Even random goalies that they picked up in trades to replace people they traded. Hire that guy back again if he is out there somewhere. Honestly I'm not sure what they should do because Adams seems to have issues identifying quality goalies. None of the people he has brought in has done well here, except for Reimer in a small sample size and even then, his save percentage sucks too. Eric Comrie was a disaster. Carter Hutton was a disaster. Adams seems to not be able to identify what's important for goalies talent wise.

Having terrible positioning has nothing to do with defense. The first goal he is inexplicably cheating towards the pass when his D-man has it played perfectly leaving him just the shooter to worry about and he gets beat shortside which shouldn't ever happen in that spot...dude is broken. He is often in bad position and is allowing 1-2 goals a game that are simply not NHL level goals that should ever go in. His career GAA is under .900 which is a joke for an NHL goalie and the only time he has shown to be good was when he had something to play for like making the NHL roster his first time getting called up and then last year playing for a contract. Outside of that, he has sucked and sucked badly all too often. Seems like he gets comfortable and loses focus, doesn't put in the same effort and doesn't pay attention to details like he does when it counts. So yeah, please have someone take him so we can stop wasting our time waiting for him to play well while being comfy with a guaranteed contract.

Nobody is taking that contract and if they do thank God, it's a terrible contract

UPL is broken. First goal he gets beat cheating towards a pass when his D-man is in perfect position taking that away on a 2-on-1 and his job is to take the shooter. He gets beat short side which should NEVER happen on that play. Do your freaking job and stop trying to do someone else's! His positioning is abysmal. He needs to go down to the AHL and work on that badly.

UPL is a mental case at this point. His positioning is all wrong. On the first goal, there is a 2 on 1, his job is to take the shooter, the defenseman correctly eliminates the pass leaving UPL to deal with the shot and instead of being in the proper position he is cheating towards a pass that never comes and gets beat on the short side which should NEVER happen in that situation. Do your freaking job! Stop trying to do someone else's job. This dude is a basket case right now and he needs to be sent down to the AHL.

With the amount of parity and the fact half the conference makes the playoffs every year it is nearly impossible to have a missed playoff streak of this length...even thru sheer dumb luck and a few loser points or a hot streak they should have been able to make it by now. The fact the Bills are tied for having the 2nd longest playoff drought in NFL history and the Sabres keep reaching new highs with this playoff drought, now at 14 seasons, 4 longer than the Panthers in 2nd place in NHL history, and it's almost inconceivable that these overlapped for several years, let alone happened to two teams from the same city.

It's not on any individual player, it's on the collective mentality they are indoctrinated into when they join the team. Losing begets a losing mentality from the veteran players there who then teach the younger players the same losing mentality,and the cycle continues until it gets broken. Ryan O'Reilly won a cup and came here and had the life and energy sucked out of him from the losing. Eichel was supposed to be the savior and then turned into a whipping boy and leaves and wins a cup. Reinhart was a good player...leaves and becomes a 50 goal scorer and wins the cup. Montadour couldn't do much of anything here...leaves and plays a key role on a cup team. It's the same stuff over and over and over. Good players come here and do nothing but lose. Then leave and go to other teams and have a lot of success. At this point it becomes a self fulfilling prophecy after it's been going on this long. Almost have a feeling of "here we go again" and "nothing ever changes".

Yes...one that we consistently find ourselves on the wrong side of far too often over the last 14 years

Good depth to have, but better as a 7th D-man that can fill in spot duty.

Nice win...but another game with a sub .900 save percentage by UPL. In his last 12 games, he only has 3 games where he registered a .900+ save percentage. Pathetic.