That Aud Smell

Nice hit? Maybe “You’re next, big boy.”

Agree wholeheartedly, neo and d4rk. The supposed obligation to fight after a clean hit is among the dumbest things going in sports. Talking out of both sides of my mouth, I am. In my defence, we thought the hit was perhaps a bit late or cheap as we watched live. Just watched the goal broadcast. It was weak sauce. Needed RJ and a “how do you do?”

Tyrod practiced. On track to start.

Wassssup was pretty great. Dilly Dilly doesn't do it for me. Although an interview with the guy who was the creative force behind "Dilly Dilly" made me reconsider the matter -- he totally came off as a jolly, fun-loving sort of fellow, and he was carrying several extra beers around, so to speak. Maybe he's related to Santa?

Good takes generally, these two especially. I still believe that Reinhart projects as a good top-6 NHLer. But something's terribly amiss with him. I do think it's probably correctable. But maybe not. Pouliot gives me hope for JBOT as a GM. I agree on the Nolan issue. We actually stayed past the 5:00 mark, thinking there'd be a scrap. Excellent point on the thin line between success and failure. Not sure it showed up on TV, but Phaneuf got tangled up with Pominville (?) and was dinged and angry as a result, poking at Pominville with his stick. Then he went back over to the far boards and tried to make a hit, and got wrecked by someone (Risto?). He then limped off to the bench -- cat-calls raining down on him.

I went to the game. Getting through the 1st was rough — what an awful period of hockey. The 2nd was obviously quite entertaining. Yay. The first half of the 3rd, I think the Sabres had a shot or two om goal — no bueno. But then they had a few good shifts and piled up some shots, such that they didn’t need to win by taking 15 SOG and shooting 20%. A win’s a win. McKenzie said OTT is going to hell in a rocket, or something. I’d have to agree. The Sabres are still an under-achieving roster that played well for only about 40% of the game. But the Senators look checked the eff out.

I was hoping he would start to catch on and earn a spot. One step forward, two steps back, it seems. No, it does not. This one, though, sounds like a true influenza. I agree. But the guy's got to earn it -- make it impossible to take him out of the lineup. I'm inferring he started off strong, and faded. He's done that before.

I'm not suggesting that he's a manipulative genius. Maybe we're more talking past each other. I believe that he genuinely, truly believes the stuff he says and the beliefs to which he ascribes. I don't think that he's necessarily a simpleton about that stuff, though. I'm jammed up this week, and I can't clearly articulate my take on this. It's a somewhat complicated bit of business, I think.

Oh, FFS. Funny, too, how when young Kellen Winslow proclaims he's an effing soldier, there's blow-back for decades. Well turned. Yes, and yes. I think you misunderestimate him. More and more, I agree. I also will admit, though, that there's a path for that sort of BS to work in the NFL.

You’ll make your point in a stronger manner if you resist the urge to fall back on hateful, harmful turns of phrase for the purported sake of emphasis.

Well, now, wait a second. I'm not down for the broad brush of "Sean the Wrestler a/k/a the Jesus freak" stuff. He may be in over his head on some of this strategic stuff, but he's done a more than commendable job on a lot of other key items, I think. Maybe he isn't cut out for the job. But the fact that he took a path that a lot of NFL coaches would probably take doesn't seem to indicate, per se, that he's out of his depth. There's something to this. And to this! OTOH, it makes me nuts that the team's HC wasn't weighing the team's playoff hopes in the context of an OT game in December.

According to one Tweet, McDermott later specifically said that his decision to punt with 4+ minutes to go in OT was not informed by potential playoff scenarios. I'm telling you, man. Geeeez. The one potential saving grace (ha!): He kinda sorta suggested that there were things he would learn from the scenario, even while acknowledging the decision worked out in that instance.

Evidently, McDermott in today's press conference intimated that he was NOT focusing on playoff implications when he decided to punt, that it was, at most, one of many variables he would consider. He also seemed to say that a tie might have helped them under some scenarios. Welp.

NFW. Reason being:

I guess he did say that, didn't he? That's nonsense, of course. NFW McDermott didn't know the W-L situation -- he just happened to think punting there gave the team the best chance to win. Which really does seem illogical to me. Would I rather take my chances on getting a long yard, or kick the ball away and put the other team in control of the ball? Webb's improbable throw and McCoy's dash in the snow totally bailed out McDermott.

In the context of one of his rants against the punt call, I heard Schopp chirp "faith-based" during the post-game show. Amen, I say. My youngest is now a relatively decent Madden player on his Playstation. There have been two, maybe three, distinct game-management situations that McDermott has botched (if forward-thinking, strategy-based logic is to be endorsed) that my kid, who's either just started or is not yet in middle school (depending on how you measure it), immediately rebuked and decried. (The other one I recall specifically is when McDermott, for no reason I could detect, ran the clock down to :09 before kicking a FG against the Chiefs before the half. Why not let it run to :04 or :03?) It seems astonishing that NFL coaches can't, won't, or don't get that sort of stuff. With regard to the Colts game, it seems like such a simple proposition: Taking into account the time remaining and what the team needs in order to preserve its playoff hopes, what are the odds of winning if you try to get a yard at your opponent's 41, versus the odds of winning if you kick it away. What does the data say? I am sure it strongly favors going for it. There must be more to it than McDermott just not knowing about this sort of stuff, or just not getting it. There must be. But what? Is there some human relation/motivation factor that's not being accounted for? Do HC's find that the D is primed, locked, and loaded if you pin the opponent behind their 20 and affirmatively turn the matter over to your D to help save the game? ANd do HC's find that the D is correspondingly on its heels if you turn it over on downs at the 41?

I legitimately know who no one is. Anymore.

Let's Go, Buffalo! Right there with you, bruvner.

I found this to be a really good articulation of what I've been feeling about this team. Bylsma perhaps did a commendable job of working around the limitations and patching up the flaws of this core group (even if that's not what he *meant* to do, per se -- but his style and system were able to hide a lot). Housley has taken the training wheels off, so to speak. There's no more hiding. It's sink or swim. (Sorry to mix metaphors.)

As LTS notes below, the modern game is such that defenders routinely launch themselves at intended receivers. It is part of the game. If you're an LB or DB trying to make an NFL club and don't have that sort of impact play on tape somewhere, you're not getting picked, signed, or invited to a camp. Agreed with most everything there, especially the bolded. I think that Mitchell does a fair job of pointing out the inherent hypocrisy in the NFL wanting those sorts of dangerous plays (because it's good for business), but also reserving the right to punish that sort of play when it's politically expedient for the league to do so.

I don't agree with everything he said, but you should give the Mitchell rant a listen (I'm inferring you did not). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQmhCGuC0wU Part of his point is that the game of football is so fluid, fast, and variable that some hits end up being unclean through no fault of the defensive player. He described a play he had on Eifert two years ago in which he had intended to jump so as to tackle Eifert in his midsection (gut), but then the ball was mis-thrown and so he wound up making contact with Eifert's head. It's a fair frickin' point.

This is an interesting inquiry. The current location is largely for the lifers, the varying shades of #BillsMafia (not just the table lunatics -- all of the game day diehards). It's definitely not for me. But if I could just go downtown to go to a game? That very well might change things for me.

Well, now I need Bulldog to stop lurking and come in here and back me up. Three separate times within 20 minutes of game play, I saw Eichel moving at a pace and with a purpose I had not seen from him in a while. Small sample size, etc. Even so.

Srsly. I'm not gonna know who anyone is. Which is probably a good experiment in and of itself.

I'm debating whether I should go with den udda lukten or den aud lukten. I sorta like the former, as it acknowledges the Aud/odd play on words a bit.