Sabres Announce GM Jason Botterill has been Fired. Kevyn Adams Named GM

[LGR4GM]

Just now, Randall Flagg said:

I do think we should emphasize that Kevyn isn't talking about gutting the Amerks of vets, it just seemed that he wasn't impressed by the accomplishments of first round sweep losses when they basically had nothing to do with sabre prospects 

Maybe someone... somewhere... has finally realized our prospect pool at forward is a barren hellscape. 

[inkman]

1 minute ago, Randall Flagg said:

I do think we should emphasize that Kevyn isn't talking about gutting the Amerks of vets, it just seemed that he wasn't impressed by the accomplishments of first round sweep losses when they basically had nothing to do with sabre prospects 

Well if he's referring to the $3 mill they spent on Wilson, Nelson, Gilmore, Remy and Hammond; I agree.  Plenty of more bang for your buck available for the minors.  

[PASabreFan]

15 minutes ago, darksabre said:

It's the details that are making my ears perk up. It just doesn't fit with what we have been told his "role" was with the team prior to this. It hints that he was far more involved in pretty much everything, which may dispel some of the notion that he doesn't have the experience to do this job. He still doesn't have much experience, but he sure seems to have a lot of information.

Sorry if it has already been mentioned, but along these lines, Adams said he has gotten to know the analytics guy (Nightengale?) well the past couple of years.

[inkman]

7 minutes ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I'm not sure Taylor was exactly given a hole mess of good prospects to work with

17-18 - Their top prospects were Ullmark (now the Sabres starter), Guhle (AAAA player) and TM's failed forwards in Cornel, Bailey, Nylander, and Baptiste

18-19 - Their top prospects were VO (now in our top 6), Asplund (1st NA year), Pilut ( Jbot Int FA), Borgen, with holdovers Nylander, Guhle, Bailey and Cornel. Thompson was sent down late in the year and showed improvement.

19-20 - Their top prospects were Bryson, Mitts, Thompson, Pilut, Asplund, and maybe Brett Murray with Borgen still hanging around.  Bryson and Mitts certainly improved under Taylor and his staff.

Not exactly an overflow of great young talent.  Last year was the 1st year that Taylor was really coaching Jbot acquired prospects (Bryson, Pilut, Mitts and Thompson) with the later two being reclamation projects that were bearing fruit.

He wasn't fired because of his performance.  They didn't want to pay an AHL coach to do nothing until 2021.  They are broke. 

[GASabresIUFAN]

Just now, inkman said:

He wasn't fired because of his performance.  They didn't want to pay an AHL coach to do nothing until 2021.  They are broke. 

That is probably true.

[darksabre]

1 minute ago, PASabreFan said:

Sorry if it has already been mentioned, but along these lines, Adams said he has gotten to know the analytics guy (Nightengale?) well the past couple of years.

Yeah, that's definitely the most interesting tidbit. This whole situation seems driven by that relationship. If Adams was the "conduit" to Kim that she said he was, then it's not unreasonable to expect that Nightengale's complaints were heard, investigated, and found to be legitimate.

[LGR4GM]

1 minute ago, inkman said:

He wasn't fired because of his performance.  They didn't want to pay an AHL coach to do nothing until 2021.  They are broke. 

Idk if they are broke but I wonder if liquidity is an issue at the moment. 

[GASabresIUFAN]

Adams/Nightengale = Tom Rowe

[Pimlach]

2 hours ago, dudacek said:

Well we’ve been told he talks to Kim and Ralph and now Nightengale.

We know Kim feels that there were culture issues and she felt she didn’t know enough about who was working for her and what they were doing.

Not suggesting it was covert, exactly, but it’s easy to see how Kevyn could have become her scout inside.

The culture issues most likely stem from Kim and Terry.  This sounds like the early days of Lafontaine, Murray, Batista, Black, et al, all over again.   Who does what?  Who is on who's side? 

After firing Darcy, Murray, and JBOT  -  maybe the owners are the root cause of the communication and culture issues that keep surfacing?   

[DarthEbriate]

Too many to quote on either topic:

I still like JBot's goal of stocking Rochester with vets to keep the team stable and competitive. The drawback is how far it skewed that way because 1) we're drafting at the top of the draft and our best prospects are NHL-ready without AHL time (Reinhart, Eichel, Dahlin), and the others who needed time there weren't given it (Mittelstadt), or they're doing their development in Europe instead of in Rochester (Ruotsalainen, Davidsson, Rousek). That and the glut of D-men got to a ridiculous extreme last season once people got healthy.

The thing on Hutton's eyes. Typically, you don't wake up one day with bad eyes. It's something that comes about gradually and your brain adapts, and then your doc says "Maybe you should try reading glasses" and bam! Holy four-eyes, Batman, I can read it crystal clear! So I trust Hutton the least on this issue over the span of a single season. He's noticing something is off, but as a healthy young goalie, it's not registering as the cause. That's on check-ups/physicals to catch, which really might not be caught until some time elapses or until the offseason.

[inkman]

4 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

Idk if they are broke but I wonder if liquidity is an issue at the moment. 

Potayto potahto.  It would stand to make sense as what exactly are their revenue streams on June 17th, 2020.  I can't think of any.  WGR?  

[DarthEbriate]

7 minutes ago, Pimlach said:

The culture issues most likely stem from Kim and Terry.  This sounds like the early days of Lafontaine, Murray, Batista, Black, et al, all over again.   Who does what?  Who is on who's side? 

After firing Darcy, Murray, and JBOT  -  maybe the owners are the root cause of the communication and culture issues that keep surfacing?   

Along the lines of every year the porg is dry --- and you keep using a new bird and you've even replaced the old oven once --- maybe it's the grandma/grandpa tandem that's doing the baking of the porg. Obviously, the solution is: this porg needs more gravy!

Edited June 17, 2020 by DarthEbriate
Edit: I can do better Star Warsing!

[DarthEbriate]

5 minutes ago, inkman said:

Potayto potahto.  It would stand to make sense as what exactly are their revenue streams on June 17th, 2020.  I can't think of any.  WGR?  

Mmmmm... Porgtayto, porgtahto.

[Taro T]

32 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

Idk if they are broke but I wonder if liquidity is an issue at the moment. 

Saw reports earlier this year that they capped/shut in their wells when the NG market tanked.  They paid a fracking well tax of close to $2MM back in 2018 per reports available on JKLM Energy's website.  If they really did have to shut in the wells, that's a pretty big hit to cash flow.  (Couldn't find how much an individual well typically produces, so am going with the per well tax rate as being equivalent to 2-5% of typical value.  If the equivalent %age is significantly greater than that, then it isn't that big of a hit to cashflow.  If it's 2%, that's $100MM gross, at 5%, that's $40MM.)

The issue is liquidity.  They still own their teams, their lands, their drilling operations, & all the assets of the seemingly valueless vanity projects.  They are capital rich but could very well be relatively cash poor.

[shrader]

1 minute ago, Taro T said:

Saw reports earlier this year that they capped/shut in their wells when the NG market tanked.  They paid a fracking well tax of close to $2MM back in 2018 per reports available on JKLM Energy's website.  If they really did have to shut in the wells, that's a pretty big hit to cash flow.  (Couldn't find how much an individual well typically produces, so am going with the per well tax rate as being equivalent to 2-5% of typical value.  If the equivalent %age is significantly greater than that, then it isn't that big of a hit to cashflow.  If it's 2%, that's $100MM gross, at 5%, that's $40MM.)

The issue is liquidity.  They still own their teams, their lands, their drilling operations, & all the assets of the seemingly valueless vanity projects.  They are capital rich but could very well be relatively cash poor.

And only one business is able to pay for itself.  Of course, that could change too if for some reason they aren't able to start their games on schedule.

[Curt]

2 hours ago, Huckleberry said:

I feel the same way that they just sacked everyone that knew about it and didn't act on it.    But seems a stretch.  

other one might just be he was against the mass lay offs and wouldn't do it.

Bingo.  Pegulas straight up said that their vision moving forward was lean, efficient, lean, effective, lean, lean, lean.  And that Botterill’s vision did not align, and the owners felt like they were not being heard.

[Randall Flagg]

There are enough tidbits and whispered rumors that I think Adams is gonna be pretty good.

Of course I will base my firm predictions on the moves he makes in September or whatever 

[Drag0nDan]

Just now, Curt said:

Bingo.  Pegulas straight up said that their vision moving forward was lean, efficient, lean, effective, lean, lean, lean.  And that Botterill’s vision did not align, and the owners felt like they were not being heard.

I get that they aren't like in the business of making huge profits with a hockey team.  But this whole thing hurts them even more - they clearly are hearing rumblings of 2020-2021 without fans (massive hit to revenue).  They've already been losing money for a few years now it would seem (Excessive player/coach/gm buyouts, lower season ticket numbers and corresponding rate hikes).  Yes they are looking at the bottom line - because a 300 million dollar investment shouldn't be losing money YoY, while not growing in value.

Lots of leagues probably fold from this too - since many have no TV contracts.  Scouting and the league in general are going to get weird.  I wonder if they end up with more of the soccer mindset with drafted prospects being available to loan out to foreign leagues, or if college hockey will see an increase.  

[WildCard]

9 minutes ago, Randall Flagg said:

There are enough tidbits and whispered rumors that I think Adams is gonna be pretty good.

Of course I will base my firm predictions on the moves he makes in September or whatever 

Those tidbits/rumors being the stuff discussed on here, or something else?

[Radar]

1 minute ago, Curt said:

Bingo.  Pegulas straight up said that their vision moving forward was lean, efficient, lean, effective, lean, lean, lean.  And that Botterill’s vision did not align, and the owners felt like they were not being heard.

Let's face it Pegulas have to look at results. You can be very lean and get the same results they ha e been getting. I'm not disturbed by the purge at all because it was throwing money at continued bad results. Improvement wasn't happening. What does disturb me is the owners seem to be dart throwers hoping to hit a bulls eye. Too much change with same negative results. Purge a bad system? Great. But I expected more experienced people to be handing the reigns to. Answer ? Reigns still in the hands of the Pegulas. That worries me as I see them the one constant in this futile decade of hockey.

 

 

[Drag0nDan]

24 minutes ago, shrader said:

And only one business is able to pay for itself.  Of course, that could change too if for some reason they aren't able to start their games on schedule.

Businesses should all run independently of one another.  If the Bills make money, and the Sabres lose money - it doesn't make sense to rob peter to pay paul.  You figure out how to stop losing so much money with the Sabres. 

If this was 2 sales business units - say A vs. B.  Would you move A people/profits over to the B group to help prop it up?  Or would you re-invest in those people/profits to try and grow A.  Typically A is the answer here.  B would be where you are doing layoffs - bring in new people and ideas, as well as some cost cutting.  

I'd say the same thing about his oil business - it's a long game there, don't sell stuff to pay for the sabres misfortunes. 

Edited June 17, 2020 by Drag0nDan

[shrader]

10 minutes ago, Randall Flagg said:

There are enough tidbits and whispered rumors that I think Adams is gonna be pretty good.

Of course I will base my firm predictions on the moves he makes in September or whatever 

That last part is what really gets me.  We still don't have the slightest clue when any of that will be.  A couple bad bounces and the whole restart gets delayed or canceled.  At one point I would have shot down this thought as ridiculous, but at this stage I think it's fairly reasonable.

[shrader]

1 minute ago, Drag0nDan said:

Businesses should all run independently of one another.  If the Bills make money, and the Sabres lose money - it doesn't make sense to rob peter to pay paul.  You figure out how to stop losing so much money with the Sabres. 

If this was 2 sales business units - say A vs. B.  Would you move A people/profits over to the B group to help prop it up?  Or would you re-invest in those people/profits to try and grow A.  Typically A is the answer here.  B would be where you are doing layoffs - bring in new people and ideas, as well as some cost cutting.  

I'd say the same thing about his oil business - it's a long game there, don't sell stuff to pay for the sabres misfortunes. 

That's all well and good when if you're talking about 2 businesses.  If things are in the shape that (I'm pretty sure it was him) Taro laid out, it's a lot more complicated one you have 7 businesses and 6 are struggling.  Sure, you'd love to keep everything separate, but that's not always practical.  But yes, I'm completely on board with the thought that the oil is a long term game.  The others are as well.

[Curt]

4 minutes ago, Radar said:

Let's face it Pegulas have to look at results. You can be very lean and get the same results they ha e been getting. I'm not disturbed by the purge at all because it was throwing money at continued bad results. Improvement wasn't happening. What does disturb me is the owners seem to be dart throwers hoping to hit a bulls eye. Too much change with same negative results. Purge a bad system? Great. But I expected more experienced people to be handing the reigns to. Answer ? Reigns still in the hands of the Pegulas. That worries me as I see them the one constant in this futile decade of hockey.

True, I don’t think results were at the heart of GM change though.  Pegulas gave an opening statement and answered 4-5 questions before even mentioning team performance.

This was all about undergoing a complete restructuring of the organization and Botterill not being on board for that.  Pegulas were very clear that they see the organizations top management team as a 3 pillared structure of themselves, Adams, and Krueger.  They want lots of communication between those 3.  So yes, their hands are very much on the wheel, probably more so than ever.

[Radar]

11 minutes ago, Randall Flagg said:

There are enough tidbits and whispered rumors that I think Adams is gonna be pretty good.

Of course I will base my firm predictions on the moves he makes in September or whatever 

I have hopes but I've had hopes crushed too many times to get at all excited. Hey, I was so excited when Pegula bought the team. Finally an owner with deep pockets!!!  Turns out he may be the worst owner we've had as far as competence is concerned.  I hope Adams is up to the job. I think he's a smart guy. Krueger I think in a greater role hopefully to help a inexperienced GM.