Non Sabres Deadline Trades/Rumors

[#freejame]

21 minutes ago, darksabre said:

I know what "the room" was like because I drink and I know things. O'Reilly is toxic if you're asking him to lead a room on his own. He's fine if you can plug him in to a team with an established leadership group already in place for him to feed off of. Without it he gets crazy and puts everything on himself. We saw the evidence of that first hand. And we see now how much better things are for him on the Blues where they already had a guy like Pietrangelo wearing the C and a bunch of other vets who have been grinding it out for a long time.

Ultimately, the O'Reilly trade says more about the state of the Sabres than it does about him. We heard all the stories about the splits in the room under Gionta, various cliques, clashes of personality. O'Reilly isn't the kind of guy you ask to unite a locker room and teach young players how the game works.

We can argue that the Sabres should have been more patient and let that leadership group develop, but my personal opinion is that it was (probably) never going to happen with O'Reilly here trying to do it all himself. I think they needed to expose Jack and put that responsibility on him as the franchise #1 center.

I don't know if it would have been any better to keep O'Reilly and strip him of the C, but it's essentially what needed to happen to get the rest of these guys to take some responsibility.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

There was literally posters on here yesterday criticizing RoR for saying game seven needs to be the best game he ever played because he’s shouldering too much burden.  That alone counters much of your argument. He’s still making those statements. He’s still putting the load on himself (in his mind at least but his playoff performance says in actuality too). 

With that being said, I’m going to go with you, like everyone else on this board, doesn’t know the state of professional hockey locker rooms. Maybe the Blues like that RoR takes spotlight off of them as individuals whereas the Sabres didn’t like that. Who knows? Certainly not you. But hey, at least you can still knock out the drinking part. 

[darksabre]

4 minutes ago, #freejame said:

There was literally posters on here yesterday criticizing RoR for saying game seven needs to be the best game he ever played because he’s shouldering too much burden.  That alone counters much of your argument. He’s still making those statements. He’s still putting the load on himself (in his mind at least but his playoff performance says in actuality too). 

With that being said, I’m going to go with you, like everyone else on this board, doesn’t know the state of professional hockey locker rooms. Maybe the Blues like that RoR takes spotlight off of them as individuals whereas the Sabres didn’t like that. Who knows? Certainly not you. But hey, at least you can still knock out the drinking part. 

If anything this proves my point. On the Sabres that self-imposed pressure manifested itself negatively.

On the Blues, in a locker room where other guys can take the edge off for him following a loss and comments like that, you end up with a much better result. You end up with an O'Reilly who comes out in game 7 and looks relaxed, not wound up tight.

It's a lot easier to play the best game of your life if you're not worrying about needing to play the best game of your life because your teammates are there with you sharing that load. 

[apuszczalowski]

40 minutes ago, darksabre said:

I know what "the room" was like because I drink and I know things. O'Reilly is toxic if you're asking him to lead a room on his own. He's fine if you can plug him in to a team with an established leadership group already in place for him to feed off of. Without it he gets crazy and puts everything on himself. We saw the evidence of that first hand. And we see now how much better things are for him on the Blues where they already had a guy like Pietrangelo wearing the C and a bunch of other vets who have been grinding it out for a long time.

Ultimately, the O'Reilly trade says more about the state of the Sabres than it does about him. We heard all the stories about the splits in the room under Gionta, various cliques, clashes of personality. O'Reilly isn't the kind of guy you ask to unite a locker room and teach young players how the game works.

We can argue that the Sabres should have been more patient and let that leadership group develop, but my personal opinion is that it was (probably) never going to happen with O'Reilly here trying to do it all himself. I think they needed to expose Jack and put that responsibility on him as the franchise #1 center.

I don't know if it would have been any better to keep O'Reilly and strip him of the C, but it's essentially what needed to happen to get the rest of these guys to take some responsibility.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

We don't even know that, the only thing we do know about OReilly is that he was sock and tired of losing and the consistent losing made him lose his enjoyment of playing the game. He goes to a team that is playing to win a cup (not the draft lottery) and he is the MVP of the playoffs.

[apuszczalowski]

19 minutes ago, #freejame said:

There was literally posters on here yesterday criticizing RoR for saying game seven needs to be the best game he ever played because he’s shouldering too much burden.  That alone counters much of your argument. He’s still making those statements. He’s still putting the load on himself (in his mind at least but his playoff performance says in actuality too). 

With that being said, I’m going to go with you, like everyone else on this board, doesn’t know the state of professional hockey locker rooms. Maybe the Blues like that RoR takes spotlight off of them as individuals whereas the Sabres didn’t like that. Who knows? Certainly not you. But hey, at least you can still knock out the drinking part. 

The difference is that he is saying those things and putting the pressure on him to help his team win the Cup, in Buffalo he was putting the pressure on him to win a regular season game so the team won't be as embarrassing while the fans were cheering on losses for better draft positioning.

[Weave]

If the problem was he couldn’t lead a bunch of kids, why wouldn’t the correct response be to obtain the people who can lead the kids and keep the best 2C in the game on your roster?

[SwampD]

1 minute ago, Weave said:

If the problem was he couldn’t lead a bunch of kids, why wouldn’t the correct response be to obtain the people who can lead the kids and keep the best 2C in the game on your roster?

Abso-freakin-lutely!

 

[darksabre]

1 minute ago, Weave said:

If the problem was he couldn’t lead a bunch of kids, why wouldn’t the correct response be to obtain the people who can lead the kids and keep the best 2C in the game on your roster?

I think the trick here is that the veteran leadership thing had run its course. With Jack signing his long term deal and becoming the defacto captain of the team I don't think there was room for him and O'Reilly to share leadership duties, especially with guys like Bogo and Okposo very much in Jack's corner on things.

I get the feeling Jack wanted to lead the team his way and O'Reilly wasn't on the same page with him a lot of the time. We know there was conflict between them, although the extent of it was probably overblown.

But I don't know if stripping the C off of O'Reilly and giving it to Jack would have made things any better.

FWIW, I don't think this is an indictment of either Jack or Ryan. I just think these are two guys who don't "fit" together. And as @dudacek has said, we tend to undervalue things like fit around here.

[TrueBlueGED]

20 minutes ago, darksabre said:

I think the trick here is that the veteran leadership thing had run its course. With Jack signing his long term deal and becoming the defacto captain of the team I don't think there was room for him and O'Reilly to share leadership duties, especially with guys like Bogo and Okposo very much in Jack's corner on things.

I get the feeling Jack wanted to lead the team his way and O'Reilly wasn't on the same page with him a lot of the time. We know there was conflict between them, although the extent of it was probably overblown.

But I don't know if stripping the C off of O'Reilly and giving it to Jack would have made things any better.

FWIW, I don't think this is an indictment of either Jack or Ryan. I just think these are two guys who don't "fit" together. And as @dudacek has said, we tend to undervalue things like fit around here.

O'Reilly never had the C. 

[inkman]

3 hours ago, apuszczalowski said:

The difference is that he is saying those things and putting the pressure on him to help his team win the Cup, in Buffalo he was putting the pressure on him to win a regular season game so the team won't be as embarrassing while the fans were cheering on losses for better draft positioning.

Is that true for any team ROR was on?  I thought that ended the season prior to him showing up.  

[LGR4GM]

2 minutes ago, inkman said:

Is that true for any team ROR was on?  I thought that ended the season prior to him showing up.  

It did. ROR came to the Sabres in the summer of 2015 just before we draft Eichel. No one has been cheering for losses since we picked up Eichel. 

[inkman]

1 minute ago, LGR4GM said:

It did. ROR came to the Sabres in the summer of 2015 just before we draft Eichel. No one has been cheering for losses since we picked up Eichel. 

But yet I've read it here and heard it on the radio. It's amazing how people adjust the facts to meet their narrative. 

[darksabre]

3 minutes ago, TrueBlueGED said:

O'Reilly never had the C. 

Good catch, you're right. Everyone was wearing A's after Gionta left.

It doesn't change my core argument though.

[LGR4GM]

3 minutes ago, inkman said:

But yet I've read it here and heard it on the radio. It's amazing how people adjust the facts to meet their narrative. 

Yup and it is a load of bullhockey

[apuszczalowski]

Maybe not vocally cheering losses at games, but supporting losing for better draft positioning was done while ROR was here.

[LGR4GM]

3 minutes ago, apuszczalowski said:

Maybe not vocally cheering losses at games, but supporting losing for better draft positioning was done while ROR was here.

When? After the team was trash and got eliminated from the playoffs? Maybe if he didn't like that he should have stayed in contention for the playoffs. 

[Trettioåtta]

6 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

When? After the team was trash and got eliminated from the playoffs? Maybe if he didn't like that he should have stayed in contention for the playoffs. 

Hockey is a team game. What more did you want him to give?

[apuszczalowski]

4 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

When? After the team was trash and got eliminated from the playoffs? Maybe if he didn't like that he should have stayed in contention for the playoffs. 

I'm sure that's what he was trying to do, but he is only one player. One of the only ones who wasn't happy just collecting a paycheck to lose

[TrueBlueGED]

8 minutes ago, darksabre said:

Good catch, you're right. Everyone was wearing A's after Gionta left.

It doesn't change my core argument though.

It moves it some, I think. Correct me if I'm wrong, but part of your argument is Eichel and O'Reilly couldn't co-exist in the leadership group because making it Eichel's team would inherently mean a demotion of sorts for O'Reilly. But it was never O'Reilly's team in any formal sense. Maybe O'Reilly wanted the C, knew he wasn't getting it, and that caused friction. Maybe other players did get tired of O'Reilly being negative. But man, aren't those things relatively minor in the grand scheme? Is any of that so big that building up the room and icing a better roster (thus, winning) wouldn't have been able to work it out? I just find it all really hard to believe. 

There are some situations where yes, you simply have to get a guy out. The whole thing a year ago with Hoffman and Karlsson strikes me as such a situation. I don't think the O'Reilly situation comes within a country mile of that severity from what we know.

[LGR4GM]

2 minutes ago, Trettioåtta said:

Hockey is a team game. What more did you want him to give?

He clearly gave St Louis more so, more. I wanted him to give more. 

[TrueBlueGED]

Just now, LGR4GM said:

He clearly gave St Louis more so, more. I wanted him to give more. 

Based on what?

[LGR4GM]

5 minutes ago, apuszczalowski said:

I'm sure that's what he was trying to do, but he is only one player. One of the only ones who wasn't happy just collecting a paycheck to lose

I don't actually believe this myth. The guys who stayed like Eichel and Reinhart clearly have worked hard in the off-season to try and turn this around. ROR just pulled the emergency eject and got out. He's very good player and the trade was garbage. At this point I just don't care about rehashing ROR. 

No one was cheering for a tank and if ROR thinks that was the case, who cares. He's not part of the team or the community so he can ***** right off. 

2 minutes ago, TrueBlueGED said:

Based on what?

... point totals? 77 versus 61. 

Edited June 13, 2019 by LGR4GM

[TrueBlueGED]

1 minute ago, LGR4GM said:

I don't actually believe this myth. The guys who stayed like Eichel and Reinhart clearly have worked hard in the off-season to try and turn this around. ROR just pulled the emergency eject and got out. He's very good player and the trade was garbage. At this point I just don't care about rehashing ROR. 

No one was cheering for a tank and if ROR thinks that was the case, who cares. He's not part of the team or the community so he can ***** right off. 

... point totals? 

Do you honestly think it's that simple? He had more points, therefore tried harder?

[LGR4GM]

You know what, I won't respond to anything ROR related anymore. He left and then trashed his old team. His brother was a pile of trash. Congrats to him for winning the cup, he has always been talented. I don't care anymore why he left. He's gone, he sounds like a prick, we completely lost the trade. Story over. 

1 minute ago, TrueBlueGED said:

Do you honestly think it's that simple? He had more points, therefore tried harder?

See above. I just don't care what ROR thinks anymore. 

[TrueBlueGED]

Just now, LGR4GM said:

You know what, I won't respond to anything ROR related anymore. He left and then trashed his old team. His brother was a pile of trash. Congrats to him for winning the cup, he has always been talented. I don't care anymore why he left. He's gone, he sounds like a prick, we completely lost the trade. Story over. 

See above. I just don't care what ROR thinks anymore. 

I graciously accept your surrender.

[darksabre]

1 minute ago, TrueBlueGED said:

It moves it some, I think. Correct me if I'm wrong, but part of your argument is Eichel and O'Reilly couldn't co-exist in the leadership group because making it Eichel's team would inherently mean a demotion of sorts for O'Reilly. But it was never O'Reilly's team in any formal sense. Maybe O'Reilly wanted the C, knew he wasn't getting it, and that caused friction. Maybe other players did get tired of O'Reilly being negative. But man, aren't those things relatively minor in the grand scheme? Is any of that so big that building up the room and icing a better roster (thus, winning) wouldn't have been able to work it out? I just find it all really hard to believe. 

There are some situations where yes, you simply have to get a guy out. The whole thing a year ago with Hoffman and Karlsson strikes me as such a situation. I don't think the O'Reilly situation comes within a country mile of that severity from what we know.

I only have so much info to base my conjecture on, but I think it mostly boils down to the simple question of: who's team is it?

The Sabres were, for all intents and purposes, O'Reilly's team before they became Jack's team. Who's team was the Avalanche when he was there?

I think what we have is that a line needed to be drawn about who's team this is, and it's obviously Jack's.

An unpredictable future will allow us to evaluate with hindsight whether that is a good thing or not.