thesportsbuff

(1) Chicago v. Minnesota (8) Chicago in 5 (2) Anaheim v. Detroit (7) Anaheim in 6 (3) Vancouver v. San Jose (6) Vancouver in 6 (4) St. Louis v. Los Angeles (5) St. Louis in 7 Eastern Conference match-ups- (1) Pittsburgh v. Islanders (8) Pitt in 6 (2) Montreal v. Ottawa (7) Montreal in 7 (3) Washington v. Rangers (6) Washington in 7 (4) Boston v. Toronto (5) Toronto in 7

Based on the trainwreck of a defense we iced this season, I think Ruhwedel is a lock for a spot next year. Incredibly early to make a real accurate judgement but he slipped into the lineup and, quite honestly, played much better than Myers and a number of other defensemen on the team. He took some tough hits but shrugged them off and didn't let anything affect his game. I like him a lot, I think he displayed a lot of "leadership" (in terms of how he plays, obviously I'm not privvy to his locker room presence). Absolute no brainer for me that this kid earns a spot next year, but then again, I thought the same thing about McNabb a few years ago. But I was pretty blown away but how seamlessly he fit into the lineup. Flynn I think has a tougher road ahead. He was impressive for sure, especially considering he wasn't even on my radar prior to the season, but in my opinion he maxes out as a third liner.. which isn't a bad thing, but naturally it's gonna be harder for a 3rd/4th liner to make enough impact to stay. I wouldn't be surprised if he makes the team out of camp next year, but won't be disappointed if he doesn't. Same with Porter, really, though Porter has proven to be an excellent PKer. If I had to choose one, I'd take Porter for now.

First, yes, I think DR will be back. He's made several good trades to jump-start this rebuild going all the way back to the Hodgson trade, bringing in a true leader/captain (Ott), the Girgensons pick for Gaustad, and now Larsson, Hackett and another first rounder for Pominville. But even if these trades mean nothing to you because the results have been the same, if you at least subscribe to the notion that Regier had previously been handcuffed by Golisano (which I do), then is two summers of mediocre free agent classes and a lockout-shortened season (that one of your UFA signings was unable to play for all but what, 5 games) enough to evaluate your GM? I don't think it is. In fact, because of Darcy's "foresight" (we'll call it that), I believe this so-called rebuild will be somewhat quick & painless. We have some pieces, some good young players, lots of draft picks to work with -- I don't think this is going to be like the Edmonton Oilers spending the better part of 8 years at the bottom of the league before finally almost making playoffs this season. I think the Sabres could very well make the playoffs next year if they make a couple free-agent signings and maybe a trade or two. Which leads me to.... As Chz put it, NFW I trade Vanek either. Vanek had a fantastic season and likely could have reached the 40-goal plateau once again had it been a 82-game season. He might not be as flashy or entertaining as a Stamkos, but he is definitely an elite goal scorer in the NHL and finally seems to have gotten his game to where it needs to be. Maybe a lot of that has to do with Hodgson. If they trade Vanek, they aren't going to get someone -better- than Vanek back, and without a Vanek, this roster has no imminent scoring threats. They need him, and with the movement of Pommer, Regehr, & maybe more, there should be no reason that we can't afford Vanek -- including extending him beyond next season. So I think the Sabres keep him. I felt the same way about Miller as I did Vanek until recently. I thought there was little sense in trading Miller given the limited amount of teams who would be interested (meaning less return) and the fact that we have no capable goalies behind him. But now I'm on the fence. Enroth has been great in his last several starts and Miller seems to be caught up in melodrama w/ the fans. I don't know. It seems more and more likely every day. I don't "want" it to happen but an extra $5 mil could be used up front if the right players make it to UFA.

I like him. Obviously it's too early to really say anything with certainty but he hasn't looked out of place on the NHL ice today. And he hasn't turned one over in our own zone leading to a goal against yet, so that pretty much makes him our best active defenseman.

Undoubtedly that's part of being a good player. But they seemed to have no problem finding open space and creating passing lanes the first 4-5 weeks of the season when Vanek-Hodgson-Pommer were making dazzling passing plays left and right. It's not that they can't do it. something about their powerplay system is preventing them from doing it.

I don't buy it. There is too much skill for their powerplay to be this bad. You watch a Penguins or even a Leafs powerplay and they move the puck, high to low, low to high, diagonal passes, moving targets.... Buffalo's powerplay we get the two point men playing catch at the blue line with an occasional pass to the half wall before it comes right back to the point. They are basically stationary, it seems. They waste time. Luke Adam's goal was the nicest PP goal we've seen all season and it comes on the most basic play a PP unit can run: a diagonal pass from the point to the opposite side winger for a one-timer. Unfortunately this play is NEVER available for Buffalo because they don't move the puck or their feet on the powerplay. Ehrhoff, Vanek, Hodsgon, Ennis, Pominville... these guys are good players. Maybe not GREAT players, but they are talented enough to convert with a man advantage. At least some of the blame has to go to the coaching staff... we watch the same guys do the same thing on the powerplay and get the same results. If the players are doing something wrong, the coaches would put different players out there. It seems to me (and again, I'm not a big X's and O's guy but..) like the players are playing exactly how the coaches want them to... otherwise there would be more changes made. Whatever "system" of powerplay they are running isn't working. IMO that's the coaches' fault. The same can be said for our PK, although I'll never blame the PK as much as the PP because it's always going to be risk vs reward on the PK. It seems to me like we stay responsible positionally and box out the slot, keeping shots to the outside and hopefully not allowing a cross-ice pass. Occasionally somebody will make a good desperation play out of instinct and clear the puck. But we watch other teams play super aggressive on the PK, keeping tight pressure on the points and constantly forcing turnovers or flubbed passes. Buffalo's PK is very ineffective as far as forcing bad passes... it seems to me like teams pretty much fly around our zone at will and pass with ease for large portions of powerplays. Our PK doesn't allow too many high quality shots unless someone gets caught out of position, but since we let them pass around so much, people do get caught out of position. I'm not an expert. To me, our struggles on the PP and PK are glaring, but given that it's the same story day-in, day-out leads me to believe it's the system we run more-so than the players inability to execute.

Pretty accurate quote. They can't break out for crap. Their "stretch passes" go for icings 8/10 times. Our "cycle" is non-existant -- I think the Foligno-Porter-Flynn line was the only combination that actually maintained possession in the zone by working the puck behind the net and having the balls to win a battle for it against Winnipeg. Last year it was the Stafford-Ennis-Foligno line who seemed to be the only ones who could cycle the puck that smoothly. It seems like the other lines rely solely on scoring on the rush or broken plays. Oh and our powerplay? It's a little better now (puck-movement wise), but for the first 2/3 of this shortened season I almost smashed my TV several times watching Ehrhoff and Pominville (or Ehrhoff and whoever) play catch at the point for 1:15 of the 2:00 minutes. They don't get the puck down low enough and therefor they never open up lanes to do anything creative. They just sit there and pass it back and forth at the point until Ehrhoff takes a predictable one-timer and gets it blocked. I saw a tweet from Mike Harrington the other day saying that Miller's 5-on-5 save percentage is .930 -- higher than his save percentage during his Vezina campaign. But his save percentage while shorthanded and on the powerplay are brutally bad. That leads me to believe a lot of this team's issues have to do with it's atrocious special teams, which is really no surprise, but just begs the question I've been asking since Lindy got fired: what good is replacing the head coach if the entire rest of the coaching staff remains the same? It's still James Patrick and Kevyn Adams running the special teams, no? I feel bad for Rolston because right now I'm not bringing him back next season, which is unfair since he didn't have the luxury of choosing his own coaching staff and was rather a figurehead.

Timely injuries to Vanek, Letang and Kovalchuk doomed my team. It was a good run. At least I take home the Presidents Trophy.

It's a fact that it didn't happen. I was just explaining how the rumors surfaced as a result of people getting too excited on twitter and why it was at least somewhat believable for a few minutes.

I give him an A for the trades. I wish we could have gotten a first for Regehr but I think the Murray trade kind of set the bar, and a lot of people might consider Murray the better player.

It was widespread on twitter, but not from anyone legit. For those who weren't refreshing twitter every 10 seconds like me, let me kind of outline how the Miller-for-Ovechkin rumors came to be. Note: I'm not using exact tweets or sources since this was several days ago. The Pominville trade was broken by the TSN guys, but would not be confirmed by either organization for quite some time after. Shortly after the Pominville trade was broken, several reporters mentioned the Capitals had made a deal but had no idea who was involved yet. Because the Pominville trade had not yet been announced officially, it led to speculation that the Sabres were involved in the Capitals deal. Darcy would not confirm whether the Sabres were "done" or not until after the JP trade was approved. By this time, the trade deadline had actually passed, but deals continue to roll in... Paul Hamilton was on the radio saying he heard Stafford had been traded. The alleged Washington deal still hadn't been announced (or broken at all), so pretty much everyone on twitter put two and two together that Stafford was going to Washington. After all, Darcy would have said if they were done, right? Suddenly (lol), a tweet surfaced from someone in the media saying that the Capitals had sent out a note saying the press "will really want to be at this press conference" or something along those lines. Basically, implying that it was going to be a "big" trade. Given the speculation over a Miller trade in recent weeks, and that twitter had already convinced itself that Buffalo was involved, some dreamers (including myself) thought for just a very few minutes that an Ovechkin trade was possible. In the end it was all just hype... created by twitter. Buffalo eventually confirmed the Pominville deal and declared they were done trading. The Washington trade was Filip Forsberg (2012 1st round pick) for Martin Erat (+ a prospect i think). So not really as big of a trade as you might have expected.

I still don't care in the least lol

Thanks for the heads up! I'm a GameCenter subscriber but it's nice to be able to watch games on TV without having to stream them. Another note for those interested, Pominville is expected to debut tonight against the LA Kings, game will be shown on NHL Network in the US at 10:30 EST.

Hate to complain about refs but what exactly did Weber do to earn the second half of that double minor? That's the third "unsportsmanlike" call against buffalo in the last week, none of which were deserving...

He's just being modest.

Bummer for Niagara. Lots of time left but I don't see them coming back, that was a Sabres-esque collapse to start the period.

I had read previously that players submit their updated lists before each season, but according you (and Vogl today), that's incorrect. So did Andy Strickland just completely make that up?

What a beast. Could have been a different season if he were here.

I don't have a link for you, but I'm pretty sure the CBA has put stipulations in place that prevent teams from re-signing a player immediately after utilizing an amnesty buyout on them. I probably read it on twitter or some random article when the lockout ended.

Tampa wouldn't do it. It's one thing for a Stafford with 2 years left, but if you're eating 2 mil of both salary AND cap space for the duration of Vinny's contract--- you're talking having dead space on your roster for 8 more years? Doubt it. I made a post earlier in this thread about how retaining salary in trades works, for those who want to look it up. Or just google it.

yeah... noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo thanks.

Good idea to use picks... End of year UFAs: Leopold - 3rd Regher - two 2nds based on Murray trade... maybe a 1st to the right team Scott - 6th or 7th (doubt anyone would even take that) Hecht 5th (doubt anyone would want him) End of year RFAs: Hodgson - value wise, 1st + 2nd at the least. Untouchable to me anyway, though. Flynn - 5th, 4th if we're lucky because he's youngish & looks not bad so far in the NHL Weber - 3rd to the right team Enroth - 2nd.. has proven he can win at times, had a rough stretch but has never really been "given the reigns" to see what he can do as a starter. The "Big Three": Miller - 1st + 2nd, maybe two 1sts tbh. not gonna be easy to get another goalie of his caliber or even a starter. Vanek - two 1sts, maybe additional 3rd or 4th Pominville - 1st + 3rd... harder than i thought to value these three in picks ^^^ The Huge Contracts: Leino - 3rd.. still a good player, despite salary. Myers - 1st + 3rd... dont care about his contract, someone would take it Ehrhoff - 1st i think. too important to give away for anything else, and a very manageable contract The Young guys with Contract Time left: Ennis - two 1sts... i doubt very much that any1 would pay that, but i wouldn't do it for less personally.very close to untouchable to me Gerbe - 4th... love the kid to death but i doubt many teams value him much higher than a 4th. Foligno - 1st... again, not sure people would pay that, but his (potential) importance to the team puts him close to untouchable for me. The Others: Kaleta - 4th because someone needs a pest... he is a good pest Ott - true value maybe a 2nd but i wouldn't trade him... Stafford - 2nd to someone who thinks they can find 30-goal stafford again Sekera - 2nd, solid defenseman/ maybe a 1st to the right team. Porter - 5th, 6th, probably nothing.

Interesting. I never looked at the overall prospect rankings, but how can they justify that if they have Toffoli ranked higher in talent and probability to succeed? Intangibles? Importance to the team? I mean it makes sense given that there's much more hype around Grigorenko than Toffoli, but I'm just confused how they arrive at that decision if they think Toffoli is better and more likely to succeed. So maybe Toffoli isn't quite a Grigorenko, but he's still the top prospect in their organization. Depending on their own expectations of him, it seems like he'd be a player they'd want to keep around, if for no other reason than his entry-level salary. The Kings have plenty of cap room for this season, but have four UFA and eight RFA to potentially re-sign and stay under next season's projected ~$64m cap. Perhaps they know they're going to lose some important role players this summer, thus why they'd be willing to trade Toffoli to better themselves this season. In any event, I'd be ecstatic if they got Toffoli for Stafford and Regehr, even more so if they threw in a pick. I'm just trying to temper my own expectations. I also still have my doubts as to whether Buffalo would even trade Regehr at all, despite what the media is saying. I think they'd do it for the better of the organization, but out of respect to Robyn, they would seek 100% approval from him before doing so. Not sure that Robyn would grant that given all the talk about not wanting to move his family around etc etc when we brought him here.

I don't see any way they'd do that deal AND give us a pick for Regehr and Stafford, unless Buffalo retained some of Stafford's salary... but even then. I'll be honest, I had virtually no clue who Toffoli was before these rumors started coming out last week, but a little bit of research tells me Toffoli is their version of our Grigorenko. He's the top prospect in their system and HockeysFuture.com has him rated higher than Grigorenko in both talent and probability of success. Granted those ratings mean basically nothing in the long-term, but would you trade Grigorenko for another team's Stafford and Regehr? Of course, the team's are on opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of their situations. LA coming off a cup win and loaded with top-end talent while Buffalo is desperate for any high-end prospects we can get... so it's feasible for LA to sacrifice a prospect to "win now," but it seems like a high risk move for LA if Toffoli goes on to be a top line center in Buffalo. For what it's worth, Joe Morrow has equal ratings to Grigorenko on HockeysFuture and was traded from Pittsburgh (stacked) to Dallas (rebuild-mode) for a rental player that some consider "over the hill"... so I guess it's possible.

A team can retain up to 50% of a player's contract in a trade, which includes both paying 50% of his remaining salary and absorbing 50% of his cap hit in so-called "dead money" for the remainder of his contract. The opposite would be true for the team acquiring said player, as they'd take on the remaining percentage in both salary and cap hit. While this may not be so useful for some of the bigger contracts (nobody really wants $4+ million in dead money), it is a perfect scenario for a player like Drew Stafford to be traded with added value. These are some other guidelines to this change in the CBA taken from this article, which basically explains what I typed above: 1. Teams can only have three contracts on the books where they’ve retained salary in a trade 2. Teams can keep only up to 15 per cent of the salary cap in a given year, meaning they would max out at $9.645-million under the $64.3-million cap that’s likely to be in place in 2013-14 and 2014-15 3. Only 50 per cent of a contract can be kept 4. A contract can only be traded in one of these deals twice So let's go back to Drew Stafford, since most of us would take what we can get and run in return for him in a trade. He has two years left on his contract after this season with a cap hit of $4 million. Personally, I think Stafford has slightly more value than people give him credit for, but certainly $4 million seems absurd for a guy who's only scored 4 goals and 11 points all season. Nobody is going to give up anything of value for that. But, if Buffalo decided to absorb some of his cap hit in a trade -- I don't think they'd do 50% ($2m), but maybe something like 35% (~$1.5m) -- he becomes an affordable player for that team. Whoever traded for him would take on a cap hit of just $2.5m, which is almost a steal really considering he did score 51 goals and 102 points in the two seasons preceding the latest lockout. Someone would take a chance on him, and would probably be willing to give up more than just "a bag of pucks," so to speak. We would get something of value in return (maybe a pick, maybe a roster player) and rid ourselves of Stafford for just a little bit more than it cost us to re-sign Hecht last summer. To me, that makes things very interesting. Stafford at $4 mil, you're practically begging someone to take him off your hands and you really can't work him into any packages because it feels like it'd almost have to be solely a camp dump scenario. But all of the sudden, it's almost like he's a B-level prospect in terms of trade value because he can play in the NHL and can be reasonably expected to score 20-25 goals for just $2.5 mil. That opens a lot of options for various packages, be it with prospects or even other roster players. It gives him legitimate value, perhaps in a trade for Iginla or Bobby Ryan.