Doohickie

Standing up to the onslaught pretty good so far, taking a few counterpunches.

You can take that to The Bank!

Yeah, I'm a little disappointed they didn't give it to him this year.

Eh. If you look at his twitter, he seems pretty combative himself. Other sports writers shrug it off but he seems to take it very personally.

John is a member here: @john wawrow

But you still didn't explain what the numbers mean. I don't want to know though... the point is I think the NHL encouraging sports betting is a terrible idea.

He also came up with the Flint Tropics thing. I think he's a "leader" in the room much the same way John Scott was. You need your serious leaders (Follow me, boys!!) but you also need people in the room to keep things light. I think Eakin falls in the second category.

Why would that be a curveball? Portillo is a year older. If he wins the NCAA championship, what more would have to accomplish in college? This was the most likely scenario since the start; the second most likely scenario in my mind is both of them signing.

I hate everything about gambling odds, most of all when the broadcast prostitutes itself by going over this stuff during the period break and utterly failing to explain it in an understandable way. (but thanks for starting the thread 😉 )

You're right but don't burst my bubble. 😉

I did.

Eh. I don't live for your approval.

And I really think Eakin is teaching the kids how to take faceoffs. FO% from the Nashville game: Eakin: 56% Cozens: 67% Mitts: 50% Thommer: 75% Okie, Skinner, Asplund: 0%... but hey, they're wingers. Overall: 53% Now tell me again how we're a bad FO team. Anyway, came here to post this:

But you want to hang onto all three for the time being since you don't know which one is Ryan and which one is Mika. If we end up with Mika and Marty and another team ends up with the Ryan Miller goalie I'd be pissed.

Lucky. I've made lots of other pronouncements and they were flat out wrong. When I came out with that, I didn't even take it seriously. It was before Mitts was injured; how could a brand new (at the NHL level) center hope to put up those kinds of numbers. Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while. 😄 😂😂😂😂😂 I think it was a last ditch effort.

Also, this: Part of this is the backcheck thing I'm talking about. Part of this is the forecheck effort. Recently it seems that more often than not, the Sabres are outshooting the opposition in every single period of a game.

Expounding on that a little: If you want to show me you love the game, are playing for the crest, etc., etc.: Backcheck. Backcheck like a mofo. Backcheck like your mother is playing goal. It's not a high skill thing, but it's what shows me that you give a *****. The Hinostrozas, the Okposos, the Girgensonses, really all the veteran forwards on this team, are poster boys for that sort of hustle. When Jack was here I think he we too cool for that.... not that he *never* backchecked, but a lot of the time he just didn't seem to care. Reino was similar. When they did, they were good at it but they didn't do it consistently. I think the backcheck thing with this team, lately, is evidence that the culture has changed. Play hard. When the other team has the puck, play harder. That's something this team hasn't had in a while. They seem to be getting it now.

Meh. I like Neil Diamond but that's not one of his better songs.

I think Krebs is going to be a special player... maybe Tim Connolly (before he had his concussion problems) kind of ceiling. You may not know who that is, @elijah, but he was a Sabre from 2001-2011 and oh by the way grew up on the same street as Alex Tuch (there was a pic floating around right after the trade showing NHLer Connolly with a bunch of the neighborhood kids, one of which is Tuch). Anyway, he was a good player for the Sabres for a while, and could be dazzling with the puck. What impresses me about Krebs is just how hard he skates on the backcheck. He has good vision on offense and I think will be a great setup man, but right now he is tenacious on the backcheck. As soon as the Sabres lose the puck in the offensive zone he makes it his mission to be the first Sabre to the puck carrier and take it away. That's something a lot of young offensive players take a while to learn but he seems to do that naturally.

Still listening, but the biggest thing I take away (heavily paraphrased) is that ROR wanted out because he could see the Sabres were going in the wrong direction and the locker room sucked. Also they mention that STL won the trade since they got their Cup, but now the trade is swinging the Sabres way with Thompson. Hard to make out much about Krueger except that they all seemed to think he had no business coaching hockey.

The discussion starts just before 10:30

And I think with KA they finally have a guy they trust and don't feel the need to try to steer the team.