Grading Tim Murray's Job

[StuckinFL]

Murray got fired because he had no idea what was going on with the team. There was zero communication going on between him, Bylsma and the players. He certainly knew the rebuild was going to take time, but he decided to completely tune out of the day to day stuff and focus only on the rebuild. He didn't actually want to do the GM work, he just wanted to do what he'd always done before: AGM stuff. Top that off with being a bit of a weirdo and there's just no way he was going to last. On a team in a better situation maybe he'd have been fine. But we needed a Wartime GM and he wasn't it.

I agree with this 100%

 

He only did some of his duties. For that he gets a solid D. We can talk all day about what moves were good and which weren't, how the drafts went, ect. but at the end of the day he didn't do his job as a GM.

[GASabresIUFAN]

I agree with this 100%

 

He only did some of his duties. For that he gets a solid D. We can talk all day about what moves were good and which weren't, how the drafts went, ect. but at the end of the day he didn't do his job as a GM.

So how does he get a D?  At which part of being a GM didn't he fail at?

Cap Management?  F 

Trades? F, Lehner, Fasching etc...

FA signings? F,  Moulson! Enough said

Asset Management?  F He wiped out most of our pipeline and young roster players to accelerate the rebuild

People Management?  F, How was that communication between management, the coach and the players.  Oh Yeah there wasn't any.

Roster Construction? F,  No secondary scoring from the forwards and virtually no offense help from the, plus no D other then Risto who could play 20 minutes a night.

Draft?  OK not an F, but also not great.  Jack and Sam were obvious picks, Nylander was a mistake, Guhle, PU and Asplund look like solid choices, Olofsson and Borgen look like later round finds (although neither has played a minute even in the AHL), and Johansson looks like someone to watch.  However missing on all three 2014 2nd rd picks has set the organization back some and odds are no one after Fitzgerald in 2016 is going to make an impact.   If all 9 guys I mentioned play 100 games for the Sabres (50 for goalies), TM will walk away with an average rating on his drafting which isn't worth shouting about consider Jack and Sam were slam dunks and our team was drafting early in every round.  Also no conversation of TM and drafting would be complete without mentioning the 2 firsts, 2 seconds (including pick 31) and pick 61 in 2015 (the deepest draft in years) TM gave away in his various failed trades. It also should be mentioned that TM drafted only 1 D with his 8 1st and 2nd rd picks despite trading away Pysyk, McNabb, and Zadorov.

 

I'll say again, TM was the worst GM in Sabres history.  I can't say he is the worst in NHL history because Mike Milbury was once an NHL GM.

Edited April 17, 2018 by GASabresIUFAN

[PerreaultForever]

If you want to live in the past, let's reset the bar and grade Punch Imlach instead. Murray is best forgotten. 

[Sabel79]

Nothing has ever been good enough, as judged by the deatrth of Stanley Cups in the cabinet. This is the norm as opposed to the outliers ina few towns. It's okay, the franchise is actively trying. Not well, but I'm personally a lot less pissed than I have been in most years since about 2002.

[bob_sauve28]

Nothing has ever been good enough, as judged by the deatrth of Stanley Cups in the cabinet. This is the norm as opposed to the outliers ina few towns. It's okay, the franchise is actively trying. Not well, but I'm personally a lot less pissed than I have been in most years since about 2002.

It's pretty hard to actually finish last. What are the odds of it happening after spending time and resources to get better? 

[Sabel79]

It's pretty hard to actually finish last. What are the odds of it happening after spending time and resources to get better?

 

Giving idiots time to use those resources demonstrably doesn't work. Hindsight vision being 20/20 yadda yadda yadda....

[Mustache of God]

For someone who was heralded as not giving any effs...well...I give him a giant F for his tenure.

 

Unless Asplund, Pu and a few other later round picks pan out that grade might be raised to a D.

[inkman]

A +. Just cause he's getting slammed for doing what every GM does. He made moves. Some worked, some didn't. We will look back on GMTM more fondly than now when the dust settles. Some people just have a never ending desire to denigrate GMTM.

[bob_sauve28]

A ###### +. Just cause he's getting slammed for doing what every GM does. He made moves. Some worked, some didn't. We will look back on GMTM more fondly than now when the dust settles. Some people just have a never ending desire to denigrate GMTM.

I didn't. I just looked back at it and thought what a joke he was. He totally failed, IMO 

[Sabre fan]

The old saying was and still is the team that gets the bets player wins the trade...EXGMTM got O'reilly who was and is by far the best player in that trade. he also got a amazing power forward that anybody would want in Evander Kane so he won those trades. I do agree he gave away far too many prospects in many of his trades and totally neglected Rochester. Of course you can only do one thing at a time and he seemed more focused on trying to do something to improve the big club. GMJBotto seems more intent on improving Rochester.

The fact is, if we had won those stupid draft lotteries and EXGMTM had been able to get McDavid that in itself would have changed things significantly.. The previous draft (2013) the Sabres had drafted d-men in Risto and Zadorov so they took who was the top rated forward in Sam Reinhart in 2014. Virtually everybody who attempted to rate the players in that draft had Sam at either one or two. EXGMTM did what anybody would have done in drafting Sam.

     In the 2016 draft, we yet again got smoked in the draft lottery getting pushed down to 8th spot where we took again what most projected to be the best player in Nylander.  How would things have been different if we'd actually won a draft lottery and got Mathews. or even Laine?  Suddenly EXGMTM would have looked like a genius if we'd got McDavid and Mathews.

    Maybe EXGMTM brought some of his demise in himself with some questionable trades, but the fact is luck played a huge part in his apparent failures when we lost the shot at McDavid and Mathews or Laine.

Edited April 17, 2018 by Sabre fan

[North Buffalo]

The old saying was and still is the team that gets the bets player wins the trade...EXGMTM got O'reilly who was and is by far the best player in that trade. he also got a amazing power forward that anybody would want in Evander Kane so he won those trades. I do agree he gave away far too many prospects in many of his trades and totally neglected Rochester. Of course you can only do one thing at a time and he seemed more focused on trying to do something to improve the big club. GMJBotto seems more intent on improving Rochester.

The fact is, if we had won those stupid draft lotteries and EXGMTM had been able to get McDavid that in itself would have changed things significantly.. The previous draft (2013) the Sabres had drafted d-men in Risto and Zadorov so they took who was the top rated forward in Sam Reinhart in 2014. Virtually everybody who attempted to rate the players in that draft had Sam at either one or two. EXGMTM did what anybody would have done in drafting Sam.

In the 2016 draft, we yet again got smoked in the draft lottery getting pushed down to 8th spot where we took again what most projected to be the best player in Nylander. How would things have been different if we'd actually won a draft lottery and got Mathews. or even Laine? Suddenly EXGMTM would have looked like a genius if we'd got McDavid and Mathews.

Maybe EXGMTM brought some of his demise in himself with some questionable trades, but the fact is luck played a huge part in his apparent failures when we lost the shot at McDavid and Mathews or Laine.

Yeh but, he gave away picks for Lehner, didnt do enough research on Nylander, gave away too many D, Bogosian trade was bad... though Kane came back and giving up Compher and Armia there are your wingers for Jack. attitude that he was too smart killed him, for his own good. JBots is building from ground up not top down. 1st rounders in a good draft shouldnt be given away. He did, he stinks. Edited April 17, 2018 by North Buffalo

[DarthEbriate]

I applaud GMTM on his candor and his ability to give us meme-ready ZFG tidbits. "How many words to make a draft selection by a host city" was a conversation.

He wanted LA Kings East (in their prime, not the descending team that just got swept -- Good job, Goldies!) and make our team tough to play against. His biggest pieces brought in did that. Lehner liked to tussle with forwards and lose his helmet. Kane and Bogosian could skate and hit. O'Reilly was tenacious. It was a solid goal and you could see him following his vision.

 

Where did he go wrong? Bylsma and the front office chaos... poor leadership setup. He didn't build from the ground up -- despite having tons of 1sts and 2nds to make that happen. Bogo and Lehner weren't dependable, and he continued to rush the kids along before they were ready for the NHL. We weren't in cap trouble, but his contracts were a major problem to depth and keeping kids in Rochester while they seasoned. Moulson = good, Moulson for five years = oh my! Meszaros to get to the cap floor and still tank = good, but 2 defensemen would have been better to keep young guys (yes, like Risto) in Rochester longer and away from the planned tire fire. Rochester suffered just as greatly.

 

Grade? Apology accepted, GM TM.

[dudacek]

I think time will remember Tim Murray as being hoisted on his own petard of being a good judge of horseflesh.

I think his love for certain thoroughbreds led him to place too much trust in his own eye for talent and blinded him to the care and effort necessary for melding that talent into a team. He never understood he was dealing with people, not horses.

 

He acquired personalities ill-suited for leadership (Kane, O’Reilly, Lehner) and dropped them into a leadership role.

He acquired veterans to lead (Gionta, Moulson, Gorges) who could no longer play.

He failed to install the proper structure necessary to properly mould young talent (Reinhart, Risto, Eichel, Nylander) into pros in the context of a team.

He underestimated the importance of depth and having good role players.

And he hired a ineffectual blabbermouth to coach a dated strategy to a room that lacked the internal strength to compensate for Bylsma’s flaws.

 

He then neglected to either understand or react to the mess this stew was creating - a muddy soup of strong-willed “uncoachable” prima donnas too easily distracted into their own selfish patterns and away from the discipline and consistency necessary for winning - so that when it finally blew up, he had no answers for his angry boss.

 

I suspect Lafontaine’s plan was that he (Pat) would be the one providing the structure and human touch to balance Murray’s lack of both, but that was never really given a chance to happen and Pegula failed to fully recognize Murray’s fatal flaw until it was too late.

Edited April 18, 2018 by dudacek

[PASabreFan]

I think time will remember Tim Murray as being hoisted on his own petard of being a good judge of horseflesh.

I think his love for certain thoroughbreds led him to place too much trust in his own eye for talent and blinded him to the care and effort necessary for melding that talent into a team. He never understood he was dealing with people, not horses.

 

He acquired personalities ill-suited for leadership (Kane, O’Reilly, Lehner) and dropped them into a leadership role.

He acquired veterans to lead (Gionta, Moulson, Gorges) who could no longer play.

He failed to install the proper structure necessary to properly mould young talent (Reinhart, Risto, Eichel, Nylander) into pros in the context of a team.

He underestimated the importance of depth and having good role players.

And he hired a ineffectual blabbermouth to coach a dated strategy to a room that lacked the internal strength to compensate for Bylsma’s flaws.

 

He then neglected to either understand or react to the mess this stew was creating - a muddy soup of strong-willed “uncoachable” prima donnas too easily distracted into their own selfish patterns and away from the discipline and consistency necessary for winning - so that when it finally blew up, he had no answers for his angry boss.

 

I suspect Lafontaine’s plan was that he (Pat) would be the one providing the structure and human touch to balance Murray’s lack of both, but that was never really given a chance to happen and Pegula failed to fully recognize Murray’s fatal flaw until it was too late.

I like your words.

[Taro T]

I think time will remember Tim Murray as being hoisted on his own petard of being a good judge of horseflesh.

I think his love for certain thoroughbreds led him to place too much trust in his own eye for talent and blinded him to the care and effort necessary for melding that talent into a team. He never understood he was dealing with people, not horses.

He acquired personalities ill-suited for leadership (Kane, O’Reilly, Lehner) and dropped them into a leadership role.

He acquired veterans to lead (Gionta, Moulson, Gorges) who could no longer play.

He failed to install the proper structure necessary to properly mould young talent (Reinhart, Risto, Eichel, Nylander) into pros in the context of a team.

He underestimated the importance of depth and having good role players.

And he hired a ineffectual blabbermouth to coach a dated strategy to a room that lacked the internal strength to compensate for Bylsma’s flaws.

He then neglected to either understand or react to the mess this stew was creating - a muddy soup of strong-willed “uncoachable” prima donnas too easily distracted into their own selfish patterns and away from the discipline and consistency necessary for winning - so that when it finally blew up, he had no answers for his angry boss.

I suspect Lafontaine’s plan was that he (Pat) would be the one providing the structure and human touch to balance Murray’s lack of both, but that was never really given a chance to happen and Pegula failed to fully recognize Murray’s fatal flaw until it was too late.

Good post. Would expect further "hoisting him on his own petard" was his preference for guys w/ very high ceilings regardless of how low the floor was. Most of his draft picks and most of his trades (O'Reilly, Lehner, Kane, Fasching, Bogosian definitely, and even Kulikov to a degree) fit that mold.

 

Had he lucked into more than just O'Reilly coming close to that ceiling (& had he been willing to abandon Bylsma) he could've still been here.

 

Doubt he ever gets the chance to be a GM again, but if he does wonder if he'll temper that riverboat gambler attitude & grab a mix of the high risk/ high reward guys along w/ some surer things that almost definitely won't be 1st liners but will be second liners you can build around? Would guess the answer is no, but also guess we'll never get the chance to find out.

 

Hoping Botterill ends up like he seems - somewhere in between Darcy "only make trades you definitely will win, foregoing opportunities to improve your club" Regier & Tim "there's 3 aces on the table, but still have a chance to draw to an inside straight flush on the last 2 cards" Murray.

[bunomatic]

I think time will remember Tim Murray as being hoisted on his own petard of being a good judge of horseflesh.

I think his love for certain thoroughbreds led him to place too much trust in his own eye for talent and blinded him to the care and effort necessary for melding that talent into a team. He never understood he was dealing with people, not horses.

 

He acquired personalities ill-suited for leadership (Kane, O’Reilly, Lehner) and dropped them into a leadership role.

He acquired veterans to lead (Gionta, Moulson, Gorges) who could no longer play.

He failed to install the proper structure necessary to properly mould young talent (Reinhart, Risto, Eichel, Nylander) into pros in the context of a team.

He underestimated the importance of depth and having good role players.

And he hired a ineffectual blabbermouth to coach a dated strategy to a room that lacked the internal strength to compensate for Bylsma’s flaws.

 

He then neglected to either understand or react to the mess this stew was creating - a muddy soup of strong-willed “uncoachable” prima donnas too easily distracted into their own selfish patterns and away from the discipline and consistency necessary for winning - so that when it finally blew up, he had no answers for his angry boss.

 

I suspect Lafontaine’s plan was that he (Pat) would be the one providing the structure and human touch to balance Murray’s lack of both, but that was never really given a chance to happen and Pegula failed to fully recognize Murray’s fatal flaw until it was too late.

Well said. Pretty much sums it up. 

[DarthEbriate]

As an extra thought exercise...  what would GM TM's Vegas Gold Squadron Jedi Knights look like at the beginning of this past season, and also now today?

[bob_sauve28]

As an extra thought exercise...  what would GM TM's Vegas Gold Squadron Jedi Knights look like at the beginning of this past season, and also now today?

He would have turned to evil and  hunted down and killed the Jedi Golden Knight...

[GASabresIUFAN]

I think time will remember Tim Murray as being hoisted on his own petard of being a good judge of horseflesh.

I think his love for certain thoroughbreds led him to place too much trust in his own eye for talent and blinded him to the care and effort necessary for melding that talent into a team. He never understood he was dealing with people, not horses.

He acquired personalities ill-suited for leadership (Kane, O’Reilly, Lehner) and dropped them into a leadership role.

He acquired veterans to lead (Gionta, Moulson, Gorges) who could no longer play.

He failed to install the proper structure necessary to properly mould young talent (Reinhart, Risto, Eichel, Nylander) into pros in the context of a team.

He underestimated the importance of depth and having good role players.

And he hired a ineffectual blabbermouth to coach a dated strategy to a room that lacked the internal strength to compensate for Bylsma’s flaws.

He then neglected to either understand or react to the mess this stew was creating - a muddy soup of strong-willed “uncoachable” prima donnas too easily distracted into their own selfish patterns and away from the discipline and consistency necessary for winning - so that when it finally blew up, he had no answers for his angry boss.

I suspect Lafontaine’s plan was that he (Pat) would be the one providing the structure and human touch to balance Murray’s lack of both, but that was never really given a chance to happen and Pegula failed to fully recognize Murray’s fatal flaw until it was too late.

So in other words he had no idea of what he was doing? I glad you finally agree with me. Now if only I can get you to agree that trading a 1st for Lehner was an over payment. ;)

[Thorny]

Our team was so broken and run so poorly for so long that we think 2nd and 3rd rounders are busts because they aren't playing in the NHL only two years after being drafted.

If we were run properly, this would have/should have been Grigorenko and Zadorov's first year playing for the big club.

Grigorenko shouldn’t have been playing in Buffalo until 6 seasons post draft?

[SwampD]

Grigorenko shouldn’t have been playing in Buffalo until 6 seasons post draft?

He is right now only 23 years old.