That Aud Smell

They play like their coach played.

Canes are good. There’s still time.

Carolina hounds that puck, man.

Back on the bench?! How.

The Cozens thing looks bad. I’m hoping it’s not an injury that ends in a -CL.

Gah - Cozens.

Be okay, Dylan.

I’ll be so glad when Eakin’s gone.

Carolina's a very good team. But f**k Rod the Bod forever. Milky Wheelwrights! Let's go, Buffalo!

I've seen this a few times here (maybe it's always been from you?). Seeing Samuelsson play these past couple months ... I just can't imagine him not among the top 2 pairings. He is already very good, and he is trending toward being an elite shutdown defender with very good transition skills and solid offensive instincts.

That's the idea, I reckon. I'd prefer to see "WR" in that top spot. There'd be a logical symmetry to extending Diggs and drafting a top flight WR whom they really like.

I gotchu. He does have a sort of brutal efficiency.

The Diggs deal is going to free up money (to sign a veteran DB, I hope) - his cap hit is reportedly now ~$10.5M this season and ~$14M in 2023 - before it jumps up in 2024 to ~$25M. And by that time, the cap should make that $25M hit quite manageable. I also wonder whether the team might be foregoing a plethora of cheap labor in this draft (because many of them would probably not make the team), and targeting a specific player (and trading draft assets to move up and get him).

I don't get this at all. He's our best fundamental #fancystats player while dealing with among the highest quality of competition the team faces. I can understand not seeing him as your RW1, but placing outside the top-6 seems a bit much. Unless, of course, we're into that "top 9" scheme and he's getting as much ice time as the other top 9 lines.

It can be challenging at times to have the top line have 2 average/less than average passers on it. Skinner is definitely a below average passer, imo. I think I heard Granato speak to how that line is a bit of an anomaly: No pure playmaker on it. Just three guys who hound the puck, want the puck, and more times than not shoot the puck.

There's an amusing account in unofficial Sabres Twitterland who had a thread last night about how the Sabres should be permitted to replace the last-qualifying-team from the east in the playoffs. Mostly for the lulz. But there's a kernel of truth there as well. 3 games over @deluca67.500 will do nicely, especially given the quality of competition. Started with "Granato has made Thompson into a very good top-6 NHL centre - holy crap!" Moved into "Dahlin is really coming around ... holy sh1t - Dahlin is awesome!" Now reveling in "Mittelstadt is an effing BEAST on the puck and may become a PPG player or close to it." Seriously. This team is good.

Foot on the gas until there are no more games to play. Let's go, Buffalo. Minced Wraps!

*This post* has me choking up.

I’ve thought that as well. What a gift that could be. Will be!!

I’ll read through this thread later. For now, I just want to say that I was on the road and at a college’s ‘accepted students’ reception until the end of the 2nd. I watched the 3rd on my phone - first at the hotel bar and then in my room. By the time the horn sounded and Rick was behind the bench, I was in tears. I could feel so much - just through that little HD screen. So beautiful. Thank you, Sabres. Thank you, Rick. Was just thinking this. When the camera showed his face before a restart in the 3rd - I saw intensity, passion, joy.

Edit to add: There's a player on the Sabres right now who I can imagine being effective with the sort of thing that Thornton did in the story described above.

This is an interesting insight. I will add: The younger players' inability to carry forward when he left was more a function of their own shortcomings -- not a proper leader in the bunch. But still - your point is a compelling one. Fair, fair. As for the weight training, I seem to recall it was when he would insist that players get in the weight room (after a loss, e.g.) that struck me as like *daaaaaamn*. The insistence that players consume lightly seasoned chicken and lightly sauced pasta with lots of easily digestible vegetables prior to a game mostly struck me as amusing, at worst, and very instructive, at best. The shutting down of the music is perhaps more emblematic of the kind of leader he was -- ultra serious, maybe even dour. But, like I said, there's many ways to skin that cat.* That 05-07 team does not perform at the level it did without Captain Clutch. No doubt about it. *There's a story I heard someone (a player) tell once about Joe Thornton as a captain. The team had lost a critical game of some kind - maybe even in the playoffs? And they were on the plane back home (San Jose?). The plane was quiet. Some mix of fear, anxiety, brooding, anger, resentment, etc. And Jumbo Joe gets up out of his seat, cracks a beer open, and starts this speech in the plane's aisle to the effect of "f**k's wrong with you guys, eh?! never lost a f**king hockey game before?! lighten the f**k up!" he's swilling brew, chugging shoulders, and then he starts talking about some dumb play he made that led to a goal against in the game, then ribbing other senior guys for dumb stuff they did in the loss. The story ends with the team turning things around immediately after that plane ride. It's a great story about leadership on a hockey team. Many ways, like I said. And some captains are capable of different speeds, modes, styles. I do get the sense that Drury had one speed, one mode.

I heard it’s a sellout. So glad for that.

I appreciate your putting a label on this -- it's what I noticed most of all. Dude was frequently a terror in the O-zone.