Robviously

Given their needs, Ennis and Sekera for O'Reilly might make sense for the Avs.

If Darcy is smart (ha ha ha, I know....), he'll look for another center in the first round this year. 1. You can never have too much depth there. 2. There's no guarantee that the guys we have are going to pan out anyway. 3. If everyone does pan out, just move a guy to wing and you're still in great shape. 4. We're still good on defense with McNabb, Pysyk, Gauthier-Leduc, and McCabe already in the pipeline. So basically I think we still have plenty of room to add O'Reilly as another center.

Why wouldn't they just sign him though? Losing a 1st round pick that's around 25th overall isn't a big deal at all. The Sabres losing their no.1 pick this year could be a big deal (although I continue to believe with all my heart that they'll get enough garbage points to draft around no.12 overall).

Miller has never single-handedly won a playoff series. Forget about "yearly basis."

Regier is waiting for another contract extension before he does anything.

Well, this is it. This is the post that made me want to give up on this team. When is the last time the Sabres had enough grit? Never in my lifetime that I can remember. But for the second year in a row we're talking about trading one of the best power forward prospects they've had in years because we need something else. And hoping to make up for it later. So we trade Foligno for O'Reilly. Then we trade someone to get a replacement for Foligno. Then we trade someone else to replace the guy we traded to get the guy who replaced Foligno. 'Round and round we go. Maybe we can trade Grigorenko to get a guy to replace Foligno's grit. And then we can trade Girgensons to get a guy to replace Grigorenko's skill. I'm so sick of the Sabres making trades to fix problems that also create other problems -- all because they can't decide if they're trying to win this year or in the future. Note to everyone: Darcy Regier does not have a plan to win the Stanley Cup. He just wants to keep the team competitive enough from year to year that they can't justify firing him. He does not have, and has never had, a blueprint or idea for what will make his team a contender. Are they fast or skilled or tough or big or what? Nothing, because there's never a long term commitment to building a specific type of team. He just haphazardly tweaks the roster a little each year. I don't know if it'll be O'Reilly but we'll probably make a trade and it might even be enough to help us finish 8th this year. Yippee. And then a year from now we'll be having the exact conversation again. "I wonder if we could get ________ for Stafford and Sekera...."

Last year's trade deadline was a seller's market. Tampa Bay ripped off a few teams for high draft picks as well. That wasn't Regier; that was the market helping us. And, actually, we should have taken advantage of it more than we did.

He fought Lucic in juniors! Get him!!!!1!

Possibly, but that really shouldn't concern us. O'Reilly isn't so good that we absolutely, positively have to have him "at all costs." Our GM should be trying to land him at a price that works for us. If someone beats it, that's life. Get started on the next trade. We could offer something that no one would beat: Grigorenko and our next 10 first round picks. But that's not going to help long term.

To me it's way more about what each guy can do over the next few years. Even when Ennis is scoring, it's tough to see him as a long term solution for us. He gets knocked off the puck pretty easily, which nullifies a lot of his speed and skill.

That's exactly what I was referring to. Trading Pominville for a ~22 year old is basically changing the team's timeline and I don't think Vanek and Miller would see themselves spending the next 5 years here while the Sabres concentrate on getting guys who are 22 and under.

Not yet. Last I heard he was skating with the team in a red "no contact" jersey but that he'd hoped to be back around the middle of February. I guess they sent him to the University of Michigan to get looked at and everything was OK. I'd be fine with the Sabres/Amerks not rushing him at all though.

Really important point in bold.

Pominville for O'Reilly would shake our franchise to the core and probably have a ripple effect where we have to trade Vanek and Miller too (since they'd never want to re-sign if we did that). It'd be the biggest trade of Regier's career by far though and pretty much completely alter everything we're doing as a franchise. More realistically, Ennis and Armia/McNabb would probably get it done, but I feel like we'd be giving up too much and Colorado would have to throw something else in. I'd agree to some combination of Ennis/Stafford/Sekera and Pysyk/Gauther-Leduc/Catenacci in a heartbeat Not interested in trading Grigorenko, Foligno, or Girgensons. Those guys are all a part of the team I want in the future.

They faced a ton of back-up goalies during their "epic" second-half comebacks the last two seasons.

There are no easy answers. The Sabres are paying for years of bad work from Regier right now, Ruff is way past his expiration date in Buffalo, and Pegula missed his opportunity to clean house two years ago and give the organization a fresh start. If we have a massive fire sale (which I doubt Regier would ever do) or if we just completely crash and burn this year, how does that affect contract negotiations with Vanek, Miller, and Pominville this summer? Would they even want to stay? Does it mean we're trading them this summer too? And would Regier ever do that? The only good news is that it seems like this is a year where it won't matter if you pick 1st overall, or 2nd, or 3rd. There are some awesome players available. But knowing the Sabres, they'll string together just enough wins against back-up goalies to land the 10th overall pick and we'll be back to square one next year.

I don't think so, since Dustin Brown has played in all 11 of the Kings' games this season. I'm open to packaging Ennis and Armia for O'Reilly but we'd need more in return. Armia has the highest ceiling of the three and Ennis and O'Reilly might basically be a wash in points per season.

Agreed, although if we're sending Ennis AND Armia, Colorado should have to throw in some more since Armia is almost certainly the most talented of the three.

This was the thread winner, BTW. Whatever we're doing with the 2nd and 3rd lines isn't working, so why not find out what Grigorenko can do with some skill around him? Plus he scored his first goal on the ice with Foligno so maybe they can mesh. I also like the idea of Stafford and Ott playing together. Anyone who trades for Vanek would be trying to win right now, which means they'd only be willing to trade prospects and picks (i.e. not a no.1 center or a "real center" or whatever). This also means you'd have to find a team with the right prospects and picks to make trading Vanek worthwhile in the long run. That would be a challenge. The best case scenario for the Sabres is probably just re-signing him so that he's here as a veteran when guys like Grigorenko, Armia, etc. hit their prime.

Which would easily be the most exciting thing to happen to the team in years.

Kevin Sylvester's show tomorrow should be epic. "Well, I don't know what game you were watching, but I thought the Sabres played great. That could easily have been a 10-2 victory!"

Meanwhile, back in reality.......can't wait to see how Ruff decides to shake things up for Friday night. :P

He's won two division titles in his head coaching career. One was with the 2007 all-star team and the other was 2010, the year Tyler Myers brought our team back to life (before he mysteriously turned into a total disaster).

I was going to buy one that said: "Maybe Next Year..."

That'd be a sweet job to get right now. Three first round picks this summer and a couple of those could be in the top 5. Not a bad place to start as a GM.