IKnowPhysics

The poll options pidgeon hole my situation a little. 1) I'm out of town, so I try to go to as many local away games that I can (1 or 2 if I'm lucky). But I also come home for Christmas, and then I go to every game I can (2-3 usually). 2) The atmosphere could be rowdier, but I'm not turned off by it. I'm usually just happy to be there, usually with family or friends I don't get to see often, and I'll stack a couple of beers and a pretzel on it as well, so I have a great time. So "it's fine, but not because I don't care what's going on around me" or "the fans aren't rowdy enough, but it's enough to not make me not have a good time." I yield opinion to enthusiastic STHs with good taste, as they have to endure the nightly game presentation and atmosphere 41 games / 3 games ~ 14 times as much as I do.

Awesome? Maybe. Weird? Fo sho. There's a redditor that thinks there's two (or possibly more) fake college football teams in existence. These are non-accredited online schools that claim to have real football programs. The thought is that they exist to make money by getting paid to play against real (and often struggling) D1-AA and NAIA football teams and losing big. One of the "schools" suspected of being fake is the College of Faith, whose curriculum consists primarily of a third-party online bible study. The NCAA D-II University of Arkansas Bull Weevil's defeated College of Faith by a score of 78-0, breaking several school records. The school's football team, the College of Faith Warriors, seem to have many logos, including an obvious, blatant rip off of the Sabres' third jersey logo:

The duplicitous edge of tankdom. We will have a team that does have the effort required to win. We will have a team that does not have the talent required to win. We will have a team that will consistently want to win. We will have a team that will be unable to win consistently. We will want our team to fight hard to win. We will want our team to be hard fought to win. We will cheer when we win some games. We will cheer when we lose more games. We will want your youth to turn to "grown ups." We will want to turn to grown youth, "up yours."

A notable aside: Buffalo has the highest "percentage of avid NHL fans" among US markets at 33%. But make no mistake, that metric is ######. Do you think folks in Seattle, a city that's never had an NHL team, are going to google "nhl" at any rate comparable to Toronto, a city with an NHL team, some of the league offices, and a fervent fan base. No wonder the article concludes that Toronto should get an expansion team.

Retail space comes pre-haunted.

PAStutterFan? Well, they did get rid of Nicholas Picholas.

The new Rockpile? "Hey, Ted. Anybody ever try to build vertical hockey rinks? Look into that for me."

They'd have to. Nashville (Smashville) has done an excellent job getting fans engaged. Only having an NFL team to compete with has helped in the entertainment dollar arena. Tampa's done a good job too. Florida, Columbus, Phoenix have all failed to do this. Even Dallas and the Islanders have more recently failed to do this. Carolina's been slipping again too. AEG (owner of the LA Kings and others and manager of several arenas) and MGM broke ground on a 20,000 seat arena on the Las Vegas Strip in May. That's the fuel for the Vegas rumors. Meanwhile, Seattle's willing to build an arena if they secure a team first, but the NHL may not want to expand there until an arena's built. You'd think they could straighten this out, but they might get jumped by LA.

Milwaukee - no change. Las Vegas - improved slightly. Population growth and big-money sponsorship still doesn't quite outweigh non-traditional market and the fierce entertainment competition. That said, it can't be any worse than Florida, and if new owners can get season ticket holders, they might be able to spark a new desert revolution. I also think I've been underrating the travel fan base to this town. I think people would go to Vegas to watch their home team play. It's not enough to rely on, but it's a few percentage points of revenue. SLC - no change. KC - no change. Houston - my outlook is more down-turned. The three competing sports teams make it look like a difficult prospect. Especially when competing markets in more traditional locations don't have year-round (read: three) pro leagues. Sacramento - the Kings are staying. The outlook is poor. Indianapolis - not sure that hockey could usurp or compete with NBA in the Hoosier state. Possible but not very attractive. Seattle - hype is getting spun up about Seattle. The 14th largest TV market doesn't have a major pro sports team between the Superbowl and the MLB season. And the fans are pretty pissed they lost the Sonics.

Also, I've written lengthy posts before about expansion in the US (thread didn't consider Canada) here and here. Since that ######'s three years old already, maybe it's time for an update.

If I'm league Commissioner and I don't have to expand *right now,* I wait for Seatlle to build a stadium. Then expand to QC. If I gotta expand immediately, I give the team to QC, who's just about stadium ready. Then wait for Seattle to drag their feet. Dolla dolla bill y'all.

Agreed. I believe the major factor commanding the position of our draft pick isn't whether they'll make the playoffs, but whether they can punch through the first round.

Fixed.

Ahem. The New York Islanders can Mike Wilson a Leino-ing Connolly.

If you're going to be a stickler for language, go fix the ###### auto-censor so you can stop having to edit my posts.

I think he went down to Rochester so that Nolan could get a look at McCabe and others.

Lulz. Seriously though, let's get back on track. The New York Islanders can jump in a lake.

Hey, when there's already a "F#cks" and an "F'N" in the titles on the front page and I post a "Suck A ####" (proactively censoring myself) that gets moderated, I get to post referee ranting gifs for fun. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sy9FRli7ODg

He starts game four. Just kidding, EJ Manuel to the Super Bowl.

The Buffalo Sabres are in possession of the following selections relevant to this thread in the all-important 2015 NHL Entry Draft ( ):1st round selection from the New York Islanders. Stupid, stupid Garth Snow. 1st round selection from the St Louis Blues. 2nd round selection from the New York Islanders. Stupid, stupid Garth Snow. Therefore, it in the interest of the Sabres that both of these franchises immediately begin sucking a severe amount of testicle. Post your updates and curmudgeonings about these two teams here. Team: New York Islanders Last five regular season finishes: 2014: 26th, 79 points, drafted 5th 2013: 16th, 94 adjusted points, drafted 15th 2012: 27th, 79 points, drafted 4th 2011: 27th, 73 points, drafted 5th 2010: 26th, 79 points, drafted 5th Average: 24th, 81 points, drafted 7th Approximate chance of winning the draft lottery: 4.7% Logo Ranking: 25th Big offseason pickups: ######in' nothing. Stupid, stupid Garth Snow. But Liger wants you to know: Summary: The owner of the lowly New York Islanders has been unable to fix the biggest problem with the New York Islanders: himself. Charles Wang ###### everything up and Sabres fans should be rooting strongly for Wang to do everything he can to help his team out this season. He's the King Anti-Midas, where everything he touches turns to ######. And his laughable hiring and illogical retention of his General Manager Garth Snow is his crown jewel. Even the team's current mascot, Sparky the Dragon, was a cross-promotional trainwreck with an AFL team that went defunct five years ago. This is the team's last year in the league-worst, dilapidated Nassau Coliseum before they move to the overpriced, horribly sight-lined Barclay's Center. One of the few bright spots on the team is John Tavares, who is dragging the rest of his team tooth and nail, to the good graces of just-competent-enough Head Coach Jack Capuano. He was good enough to let Kyle Okposo finish ahead of him in the points race. I'm not joking though- beyond Tavares, Okposo, and Nielsen, no one on this team can play hockey. Andrew MacDonald lead the defensemen with 24 points in 63 games, but was a -22 on the season, good for 866th of 886 NHL players. Team: St. Louis Blues Last five regular season finishes: 2014: 4th, 111 points, drafted 21st 2013: 6th, 103 adjusted points, drafted 22nd (traded to CAL) 2012: 3rd, 109 points, drafted 25th 2011: 20th, 87 points, drafted 11th (traded to COL) 2010: 15th, 90 points, drafted 14th Average: 10th, 100 points, drafted 19th Approximate chance of winning the draft lottery: butthole% Logo Ranking: 3rd Big offseason pickups: I'm too lazy to look them up. Summary: A not very well-liked Ken Hitchcock trolled the ###### out of the league in 2012 when he won the Jack Adams Award for finally shaving that stupid mustache off his face and horse-whipping a young Blues team from 20th to 3rd in regular season standings. However, new-found regular season success hasn't translated to playoff success (see also: San Jose Sharks), as the Blues have only won 8 of 21 playoff games and one series. This is beneficial news for Sabres fans because it means that their first round draft choice is probably 5-10 spots better than it would be. Despite turning down the services of Ryan Miller, the Blues believe they're not going to get much worse by riding Brian Elliot, who hasn't played more than 38 games in a season for the Blues, and Jake Allen, who hasn't played more than 16 games, period. The Blues season - and the Sabres first round selection - hinges on Elliott's ability to not ###### this up and/or avoid fatigue. Sabres fans should already be on his twitter feed posting beer and steakhouse advertisements so that his physical training goes right to ######. However, with former Sabres goalie coach Jim Corsi on board and his record of skinny-as-###### meth-addict-looking body weights of his protege goalies, this could be a tough sell.

I've had an S4 for a while now. I like it. It does everything I need pretty well, battery life is alright, and the HD screen is nice. It's got a lot of fancy ###### that I will sometimes ###### around with (like eye scrolling and S Beam), but none of that's necessary for me.

The only pre-draft player in the past ten years to be labeled a generational talent is Sidney Crosby. Examine the Pengunis' win record and their achievement in the playoffs after his sophomore year: 1 Stanley Cup, 1 Stanley Cup Finals loss, 1 Conference Final, 2 Conference Semifinals, 3 Conference Quarterfinals. Eight seasons, eight trips to the playoffs, two SCF appearances with one win. I very much dislike that shithead, but he's an elite talent that contributes to his team. Remember pre-Crosby Penguins? If Pittsburgh doesn't draft Sydney Crosby, they might not have replaced the igloo and may have moved the team. Crosby's existence transformed that franchise. Now, it helps that he's been surrounded by a fundamentally sound roster (at times), including a first selection overall goaltender in Fleury and a second selection overall center in Malkin. The 2nd round picks have contributed as well. Examine the last seven SC winners. Detroit, Pittsburgh, Chicago (x2), Boston, LA (x2). Only Pittsburgh has that generational talent. But every team, including Pittsburgh, has a large amount of elite talent. Think of the "hockey household" names on those teams. Think of how many players on those teams you'd like to have play for the Sabres. Now think about how you acquire a core of elite talent. We need to draft well. We need to hit on our 2nd and some 3rd round selections. We need to acquire guys that support elite and possibly a generational talent. We can draft these players or we can trade for these players. But the players that will ultimately define our team are the elite and generational talent that we'll have to draft. These players are extremely difficult to trade for and you're lucky if you can draft them. But best chance to draft those highly influential players is to tank the ###### out of the season.

Perhaps you've seen him at Tim Horton's?