Jbot needs to go

[Wyldnwoody44]

2 hours ago, Scottysabres said:

Steak should never be frozen...…………..on the grill same day, or marinades for 24 to 48, depending on how good your marinade is. ? 

Unless we're talking tube steaks. They're always frozen in buffalo 

[woods-racer]

1 minute ago, Wyldnwoody44 said:

Unless we're talking tube steaks. They're always frozen in buffalo 

Mines always hot when it's doin the boogie.

 

?

[dudacek]

I’m not judging Jason Botterill on whether or not I think he wins enough trades, or what I think his prospects will become, or whether his vision for what this team should be matches my own.

I’m judging him on how poorly he has executed his own vision. Take a look at his moves and how well they fulfilled his intent.

(Mammoth wall of text incoming, but I’ll break it into multiple posts)

[dudacek]

Hired Phil Housley in order to install a more positive environment and a five-man attacking style. Phil lost the room, and failed to match the last season of the guy he replaced. Fired after two years. Obvious fail.

Traded a 3rd round pick for Nathan Beaulieu and signed him for a 2-year 2.4-million cap hit in an expansion draft effort to buy low on an emerging puck-moving defenceman. Nate had a disastrous first year, couldn’t find playing time in his second and was quickly traded for half the price we paid. Fail, if at a relatively small cost.

Traded Foligno, Ennis and a 3rd for Scandella, Pominville and a 4th, a move that was mostly done in order to bolster what was a horrible blueline. Scandella was bad last year for whatever reason, but otherwise the trade basically unfolded the way both parties expected. Pass

Signed Griffith, Tennyson, Johnson, Pouliot and Josefsson as low-cost free agent dice rolls. Each of these guys played, but basically at worse than replacement levels and essentially proved they weren’t real NHLers. Collectively they may have been the worst free agent class of all-time. Fail.

Edited February 21, 2020 by dudacek

[dudacek]

Signed Jack Eichel to an 8-year 10-million cap hit. Essentially, Botterill attempted to lock down his franchise long-term at a figure he hoped would look good as the years passed and Jack moved into the upper echelon of the league’s elite. Just two years in and the deal already looks like a bargain. Huge win.

Picked up Jordan Nolan on waivers to replace Nic Deslauriers who was traded for Zach Redmond to improve defensive depth. Redmond has been an asset for Rochester, Deslauriers remains in the NHL. Nolan is not and his role has not been replaced. Not worth grading, though interesting in terms of asset management and the weight Botterill puts on toughness.

Traded a 5th rounder for Scott Wilson, looking to add a speedy, reliable fill-in. This low-cost depth move that has delivered what Jason was looking for. Pass.

Traded Evander Kane for Danny O’Regan and what became a 1st rounder in order to recoup value for a player the team had no interest in re-signing, and free up cap space for an acquisition he liked better. I know there are some who will think we should have kept Kane and others who think there was a better return to be had, but that’s not what we’re evaluating here. We’re evaluating Botterill’s execution of his own vision. The bottom line is he got a first and a prospect. Even though the prospect failed, that’s generally market value for a top six UFA winger. Pass, if barely.

Signed Casey Mittelstadt and played him in Buffalo for a year and a half in order to develop him as a 2C. We aren’t discussing whether Casey was a good pick here. We’re discussing how Jason has decided to use and develop him. He entered as a highly touted prospect but hasn’t shown growth, or been particularly effective. He was eventually sent to the minors and now faces questions about his NHL future where none existed before. Fail.

Edited February 21, 2020 by dudacek

[dudacek]

Signed Lawrence Pilut in order to add a prospect with depth and mobility to the backline. He hasn’t cracked the team yet, but came at minimal cost and still shows some NHL promise. Pass.

Traded what became a 4th rounder for Conor Sheary and Matt Hunwick in order to add speed and secondary scoring to the middle six (and perhaps some depth to the backline, although that’s highly unlikely). Sheary made the Sabres faster, scored a career low 14 goals last year and looks poised to have a similar total this year. He brought little else and has been benched at times. Hunwick brought nothing but his salary burden. Sheary has done what he was acquired to do, if in somewhat disappointing fashion. However, his contribution has been outweighed by the $5.2 million cap hit the trade brought with it for two full years and its accompanying opportunity cost. Fail.

Did not qualify Robin Lehner and let him walk for nothing because he decided the risk of Lehner’s well-publicized personal issues were not worth the required salary commitment. Lehner pulled his life together and put together back-to-back good seasons of legitimate starting goaltending, while Buffalo has struggled to find the same. I doubt there is a poster on here that wouldn’t give Botterill a pass on this one, but based strictly on the results, it can only be called a fail.

Signed Rasmus Dahlin and played him immediately in Buffalo. The kid has become the highest-scoring teenage defenceman in history. Easy pass.

Traded O’Reilly for a 1st, 2nd, Thompson, Berglund and Sobotka for reasons that have never been made public. It is hard to dispute, however, that an organizational decision was made to move O’Reilly for the best package available by July 1. None of the three players acquired in the trade are playing in Buffalo and the biggest hole in the lineup is a 2C shaped exactly like ROR. Huge fail.

Edited February 21, 2020 by dudacek

[dudacek]

Signed Carter Hutton to a 3-year, 2.75 million cap hit to be a leader and nominal starter in net while Ullmark and eventually Lukkonnen were groomed to replace him. Hutton has had some spurts of good play but has mostly shown himself incapable of being a #1. Since a good October, he has been a below-replacement-level NHL goalie. Fail.

Traded Pu, a 2nd, a 3rd and a 6th for Skinner in order to add a first line goal scorer, particularly at even strength. Skinner scored 40, many of them in dramatic fashion. He’s had a dramatic drop-off this year, but still a huge pass.

Signed Sam Reinhart to a 2-year 3.6 million cap hit to get a closer look before deciding to commit to him long-term. Sam’s point to cap hit ratio is among the best in the league for non-ELC players. The contract is a bargain right now but has raised questions about whether it was short-term pain for long-term gain. We’ll find out this summer. TBD

Claimed Remi Elie off waivers as a dice roll on a young speedy physical forechecker with former second-round upside. Elie did little over a couple NHL months and hasn’t returned. Fail

Traded Guhle and a 1st for Montour in order to add a mobile top-four puckmover to the defensive top 4. Hasn’t been a home run, but has more or less met expectations on what became a crowded blueline. Pass

[dudacek]

Hired Ralph Krueger in order to install and better communicate a simplified version of the fast, five-man hockey Botterill wants the team to play and to fix the morale problem that seemed to have settled over the room. Ralph seems to have made progress on both counts, but has yet to get the team over the hump. He seems to be the most respected coach to come through here since Lindy. TBD.

Signed Skinner to an 8-year 9-million cap hit in order to keep him from walking in free agency. The deal seemed about $1 million too much at the time given Skinner’s comparables and career but getting him to sign was generally applauded as big win for franchise morale. So far, the deal has looked like one of the worst signings in NHL history but it’s very early and no one expects Skinner’s current play to last. The deal still has seven more years to play out. TBD

Traded a 2nd and a 5th for Colin Miller in order to add another puck-moving defenceman. The problem with this move is not necessarily the play of Miller, who has been mostly fine, it’s the fact he’s been in and out of the lineup due to the crowded blueline. That’s led to questions about whether this trade was needed at all. The departures of Scandella and Bogosian appear to have cleared that hiccup. Pass.

Signed Lazar, Hammond, Gilmour and Dea to low-cost deals in order to provide leadership in Rochester and call-up depth in Buffalo. All four have been useful, and Lazar may even have an NHL future. Pass

Traded a 3rd for Vesey in a bid for ES secondary scoring and forward depth from a pending UFA that he could flip or re-sign. Vesey hasn’t scored much, but he has scored a bit, and he has improved our depth, if not dramatically. Will he be traded? For what? Will he be re-signed? For how much? There is still another shoe to drop here. Likely a fail, but officially TBD

Signed Johansson to a 2-year 4.5 million cap hit in order to bolster the top 6. Johansson has been the Sabres fifth-best forward and  brought a noticeable skill boost with him. His production, however, has been pretty limited and he has not adequately filled the role asked of him. Most like him and he has improved the team, but this is a review of Botterill’s work, not Mojo’s. He’s a good middle sixer brought In to be a top sixer and used over his head as a 2C because that’s the best Jason could come up with. Fail.

Traded Nylander for Jokiharju in an exchange of youngsters their teams had lost faith in. Jokiharju wasn’t supposed to make the team but he did and he’s thrived under a fair amount of responsibility at 20. There’s always going to be a lot more to the story with players this young, but right now he looks a good bet to be a valuable piece of the Sabres long-term future, while Nylander did not. Pass.

Traded Scandella for a 4th which was flipped for Frolik in order to clear a logjam on defence while addressing a hole at forward. Scandella was later proven to be worth considerably more than 4th. Frolik has helped the PK, but otherwise has not filled the hole up front at all. Fail

Edited February 21, 2020 by dudacek

[dudacek]

The above does not rate the prospects Botterill has drafted and developed, nor the organization he has assembled; I don’t think we have enough info yet to do that. And I think it’s pretty clear that he has manipulated the cap to give him great flexibility this summer that he has yet to have been able to use. So his hand has yet be fully played out.

But his transaction record shows a disturbing number of miscalculations on what the players he was acquiring were capable of doing, or how they were going to fit with his overall roster. An embarrassing number.

And that doesn’t even address the holes that have existed in this roster for months that he has failed to address.

I posted elsewhere that 12 of the 14 teams that missed the playoffs the spring Murray was fired improved by at least 10 points in one of the next two seasons. Botterill’s Sabres were actually worse both years. And this is a man who inherited a team with Jack Eichel and Ryan O’Reilly and was gifted Rasmus Dahlin.

I think this team isn’t that far from turning it around. I think Botterill has us in a great position to make a huge splash this summer. And I pray for all of us that he won’t be the one to make it.

There’s simply no evidence he can.

Edited February 21, 2020 by dudacek

[Indabuff]

Cliffnotes: Botterill sux

Just kidding.  I look forward to reading this  tomorrow when I have ample time.  Thanks for the in-depth dive ahead of time.

[PerreaultForever]

1 hour ago, dudacek said:

I think this team isn’t that far from turning it around. I think Botterill has us in a great position to make a huge splash this summer. 

Can you elaborate on this cause I'm seeing this as just some wishful thinking.

[GASabresIUFAN]

@dudacek

interesting wall post and mostly fair although I disagree with some of your conclusions but I agree with you overall conclusion that this team isn’t that far away.

Where I quibble is that you talk about the move bringing us closer or farther from his vision for the team.  I might rate the moves by class.  Dumping ROR is a class one move because it involved a core piece and it moved us further away from the goal because it failed.  By the same token re-signing Jack and trading for Skinner were class one moves because they moved us significantly closer to the goal.  

However claiming Nolan and Elie are nothing burgers.  Class 5 deals.  They don’t move the meter at all.  They were meant to add depth and nothing more. Elie is still in the organization and is doing a decent job in Roch.  Not sure that’s a fail but it is meaningless in the course of things and only really had upside since we paid nothing to acquire him.

 

Edited February 21, 2020 by GASabresIUFAN

[LGR4GM]

16 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I didn’t say bad contract.  I said cap hell.  Big difference.  TrueBlue said he only inherited 3 bad contracts which was incorrect.  I said he inherited cap hell from TM which is pretty accurate.  The sad part is we are still carrying 11 mill in TM contracts plus Risto’s.

Also Moulson had two years left.  Ennis had two or more if memory serves.

I listed the expensive contracts Jbot inherited ( I forgot Risto) not who was a good or bad contract.  However Ennis Gorges and Mouslon were bad contracts. 

Murray put us in cap hell and Botterill has done his damnedest to keep us there. 

Players Botterill specifically added to this team or extended who have been *****. 

Sheary 3mil

Frolic 4.3mil

Sobotka 3.5mil

Hunwick 2.25mil

Vesey 2.275mil

Erod 2mil

for a grand total of 17.325mil and that is also with the luck of getting out from under Berglunds 4.5mil

17.325mil for a grand total of... 52 points. Botterill didn't need to bring in Frolic, Sheary, Vesey, Hunwick, Sobotka, or even Erod. He just wasted cap on 6 players instead of finding 3 good players to fill those roles. This is another indictment of his piss poor ability to find useful NHL forwards and to draft/develop useful NHL forwards. My favorite thing about alllllll these guys I list, 5 of them are lw's, 1 is a defender (you could argue Erod is a center I suppose).  The guy is completely incompetent at analyzing his roster and targeting forwards of need. Instead he goes and find guys with 10 even strength goals and says "oh that works". Botterill is bad at evaluating NHL level forward talent. This doesn't even take into account he signed Skinner (LW) brought in Wilson (LW) and picked up Elie who is... a left wing! Wow. Now lets couple that with his drafting obsession with defenders and I got to tell you, this team is structurally screwed for probably another 2-3 years without major changes. 

In the end, GMTM is not the reason the Sabres are in cap hell. Botterill could have easily not done some of the things he did and the team would have been better off in regards to the cap. Like the alarms some of us have raised about his drafting, his NHL talent evaluation and acquisition is also highly questionable. He seems fixated on even strength goals from left wing players. 

Edited February 21, 2020 by LGR4GM

[Randall Flagg]

Helluva summary. I won't repost it, but I put a wall of text in the Ottawa GDT about Jason's team, and I think it's worth considering that, through all of these moves, his stated vision has been more quickly and more successfully implemented on the ice by the Melnyk and Dorion-led Senators, and they have used it to clobber us relentlessly this season, while still being one of the worst teams in the league. Even the "pass" acquisitions of Botterill don't play the game he says he's looking for.

[darksabre]

5 minutes ago, Randall Flagg said:

Helluva summary. I won't repost it, but I put a wall of text in the Ottawa GDT about Jason's team, and I think it's worth considering that, through all of these moves, his stated vision has been more quickly and more successfully implemented on the ice by the Melnyk and Dorion-led Senators, and they have used it to clobber us relentlessly this season, while still being one of the worst teams in the league. Even the "pass" acquisitions of Botterill don't play the game he says he's looking for.

Another note about the Sens, but if Botterill thinks the FA market is going to be a good place to get players this summer, he better take note of Ottawa. They have a TON of cap space coming as well, and I would bet they'll be in on every FA we'll be targeting.

Edited February 21, 2020 by darksabre

[bunomatic]

1 minute ago, darksabre said:

Another note about the Sens, but if Botterill thinks the FA market is going to be a good place to get players this summer, he better take note of Ottawa. They have a TON of cap space coming as well, and I would bet they'll be in on every FA we'll be targeting.

Ah the FA market. Where JBott will massively overpay to make us better.

[Randall Flagg]

Pretty sure he should be looking at them for some of THEIR UFAs too. don't they have a couple centers that could be decent stop-gap 2/3C options?

[GASabresIUFAN]

This team isn’t structurally screwed not by any stretch of the imagination.

We need 5 players and 3 are already in the organization.

We have the following 

L1 VO Jack Reinhart

L2 Skinner ??? ????

L3 MoJo  (Cozens) (Mitts or Thompson)

L4 Larsson Lazar Okposo

D Miller McCabe Montour Risto Joker and Dahlin 

G Ullmark (and either Johansson or FA)

We have also Pilut and Asplund and the loser of the position battle between Mitts and Thompson in reserve.  

This is far from a disaster or hopeless.  Admittedly a 2c and a 2 RW aren’t easy to come by but he has assets and cap space to get them.

Trade Risto or Montour to help get the 2c and pay a FA RW and you have a playoff team.  

[dudacek]

2 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

@dudacek

interesting wall post and mostly fair although I disagree with some of your conclusions but I agree with you overall conclusion that this team isn’t that far away.

Where I quibble is that you talk about the move bringing us closer or farther from his vision for the team.  I might rate the moves by class.  Dumping ROR is a class one move because it involved a core piece and it moved us further away from the goal because it failed.  By the same token re-signing Jack and trading for Skinner were class one moves because they moved us significantly closer to the goal.  

However claiming Nolan and Elie are nothing burgers.  Class 5 deals.  They don’t move the meter at all.  They were meant to add depth and nothing more. Elie is still in the organization and is doing a decent job in Roch.  Not sure that’s a fail but it is meaningless in the course of things and only really had upside since we paid nothing to acquire him.

 

That’s sort of my point, though, far too many of these moves don’t move the needle at all.

Elie, Vesey, Frolik, Beaulieu, Pouliot, Josefsson, Sheary, Sobotka,  Berglund, O’Regan - all guys brought in to make the team better, who didn’t and aren’t good.

Miller, Mittelstadt, Thompson, Johansson, Hutton, all guys brought in to play important roles that they haven’t shown themselves capable of playing.

O’Reilly and Lehner and Kane, good hockey players jettisoned without good players coming back.

What evidence have we seen that Jason knows how to go out and get good hockey players to fill the holes in his team?

Skinner and Montour? The scales don’t look very balanced in Jason’s favour.

Edited February 21, 2020 by dudacek

[Randall Flagg]

3 minutes ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

This team isn’t structurally screwed not by any stretch of the imagination.

We need 5 players and 3 are already in the organization.

We have the following 

L1 VO Jack Reinhart

L2 Skinner ??? ????

L3 MoJo  (Cozens) (Mitts or Thompson)

L4 Larsson Lazar Okposo

D Miller McCabe Montour Risto Joker and Dahlin 

G Ullmark (and either Johansson or FA)

We have also Pilut and Asplund and the loser of the position battle between Mitts and Thompson in reserve.  

This is far from a disaster or hopeless.  Admittedly a 2c and a 2 RW aren’t easy to come by but he has assets and cap space to get them.

Trade Risto or Montour to help get the 2c and pay a FA RW and you have a playoff team.  

Nobody thinks we aren't pretty close to being where we need to be, we know that one good offseason by one competent GM can get us there. 

The point is that three straight offseasons Jason has shown himself incapable of identifying forwards that play the type of hockey we need them to play to get to that point, and we're worried about giving him a fourth one that has the potential to screw us up for years should players like all of those he has acquired to date get substantial contracts to fill these positions.

Edited February 21, 2020 by Randall Flagg

[DarthEbriate]

8 hours ago, dudacek said:

(Mammoth wall of text incoming, but I’ll break it into multiple posts)

Neatly done, thank you.

Or rather --- We need a statement, not a manifesto. Prepare a single reactor ignition at a time.

[dudacek]

The core of this team remains players that Murray collected, plus Dahlin who fell into Jason’s lap.

[Curt]

9 minutes ago, Randall Flagg said:

Nobody thinks we aren't pretty close to being where we need to be, we know that one good offseason by one competent GM can get us there. 

Not true.  There are people here who think that 80% of the players need to be changed out, that it needs to be blown up, that the team is nowhere close to a playoff team and a couple good additions is not nearly enough to get there.

At least I’ve seen it said multiple times.

[GASabresIUFAN]

@dudacek

Besides Lazar, Montour, Joker and Skinner? 

Bringing up Lehner as this great talent he let go is BS.  He was terrible his final year here and had real medical issues.  You seem to forget he couldn’t stop a shot in a shootout.  Jbot had zero way of knowing he would get healthy much less play good hockey.  Paying him $4 mill to stick around would have been foolish. Honestly Ullmark is giving us just as much as Lehner did for much less.

Kane was replaced by Skinner who is a better player despite this season. 

The only good player he got rid of and didn’t replace is ROR.

I don’t see anyone complaining about him getting rid of or not retaining TM stalwarts Gorges, Bogo, Moulson, Ennis, Kulikov, Franson, or Gionta.  

People also keep bringing up Vesey as some big fail.  We paid a 3rd for a bottom 6 winger. He hasn’t put the goals ( no center)  but he has played good defensively and added more assists then expected.  He is on pace to hit his usual points total.  This may not be a great success but it is far from a fail.  

Edited February 21, 2020 by GASabresIUFAN

[dudacek]

6 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

Can you elaborate on this cause I'm seeing this as just some wishful thinking.

I’m talking about the $35 million in projected cap space, the relative lack of bad contracts (please don’t look at Skinner) and the under-25 talent on the roster and the system.

Dahlin, Eichel and $35 million in cap space is a great canvas for a good GM to work with.