Can the Mittelstadt Line Continue as a 2nd Scoring Line Moving Forward?

[Marvin]

3 minutes ago, Weave said:

4 lines with 2 guys that can’t skate, 1 guy that can’t score, and without a Hasek level goalie?  Yeah, that would be a train wreck.

The idea is that you will be on the positive side of the possession ledger even against Marchand-Bergeron-Pasternak for the entire game.

2 guys that can't skate?  Unless Okposo counts twice, I don't  see it.

We don't have an option: we need to build a team which looks likes the 1995-2001 team without Hasek.  We need better defence because we won't have Hasek.  We are not getting players like Eichel and Reinhart back.  So you go the Las Vegas route.

[Weave]

11 minutes ago, Marvin, Sabres Fan said:

The idea is that you will be on the positive side of the possession ledger even against Marchand-Bergeron-Pasternak for the entire game.

2 guys that can't skate?  Unless Okposo counts twice, I don't  see it.

We don't have an option: we need to build a team which looks likes the 1995-2001 team without Hasek.  We need better defence because we won't have Hasek.  We are not getting players like Eichel and Reinhart back.  So you go the Las Vegas route.

Nah.  05-06 Sabres will be the model. Four 2nd lines.  Not four 4th lines.  Noone wins with four 4th lines.  Most of the last 7 years have looked like that.

[Marvin]

4 minutes ago, Weave said:

Nah.  05-06 Sabres will be the model. Four 2nd lines.  Not four 4th lines.  Noone wins with four 4th lines.  Most of the last 7 years have looked like that.

3 2nds and a 3rd, but yeah.  This is the proper model.

[Thorny]

5 minutes ago, Weave said:

Nah.  05-06 Sabres will be the model. Four 2nd lines.  Not four 4th lines.  Noone wins with four 4th lines.  Most of the last 7 years have looked like that.

Briere had a better points per game in 05-06 than Jack has had in his career, to date. 

We had a first line

[Marvin]

8 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Briere had a better points per game in 05-06 than Jack has had in his career, to date. 

We had a first line

They weren't expected to be.  The plan was 3 2nd lines.  Briere broke out, Connolly fulfilled his promise, and Drury elevated his game all in 1 season.

[Thorny]

1 minute ago, Marvin, Sabres Fan said:

They weren't expected to be.  The plan was 3 2nd lines.  Briere broke out, Connolly fulfilled his promise, and Drury elevated his game all in 1 season.

So they had a bad plan and got lucky?

[Marvin]

2 minutes ago, Thorny said:

So they had a bad plan and got lucky?

No - they had a good plan and got lucky that they turned from a decent playoff team into the best team in hockey -- barring injuries.  I think they planned 2005-6 as a year to find what they needed -- and found that they didn't need anything but ordinary luck.

[Thorny]

6 minutes ago, Marvin, Sabres Fan said:

No - they had a good plan and got lucky that they turned from a decent playoff team into the best team in hockey -- barring injuries.  I think they planned 2005-6 as a year to find what they needed -- and found that they didn't need anything but ordinary luck.

The point is the strategy needs to be replicable. They didn't succeed because they had the idea to put out 3 second lines. If that was thinking, they succeeded because their actual roster outperformed their evaluation of the roster. 

We can't say they were "decent playoff team" without knowing how it would have been if we didn't actually have a first line. Which we did. We didn't have 4 second lines, we just "rolled 4 lines". 

Is the answer to fixing goalie a trade with the blackhawks for a 10th round goalie pick because that's what Hasek evolved from? Doesn't matter what they thought it was, what matters is what the roster actually was. 

Edited May 10, 2021 by Thorny

[Taro T]

19 minutes ago, Marvin, Sabres Fan said:

3 2nds and a 3rd, but yeah.  This is the proper model.

Yeah, but it's truly rare for your 2nd scoring line to be a true shutdown line as well.

That team was sooooo special, and Golisano was soooooo tight.  There should've been 3 teams ahead of the rest of the league at the end of the Aughts.  Not just the Pens & the Wings.  

[Marvin]

3 minutes ago, Thorny said:

The point is the strategy needs to be replicable. They didn't succeed because they had the idea to put out 3 second lines. If that was thinking, they succeeded because their actual roster outperformed their evaluation of the roster. 

We can't say they were "decent playoff team" without knowing how it would have been if we didn't actually have a first line. Which we did. We didn't have 4 second lines, we just "rolled 4 lines". 

Is the answer to fixing goalie a trade with the blackhawks for a 10th round goalie pick because that's what Hasek evolved from? Doesn't matter what they thought it was, what matters is what the roster actually was. 

I remember Darcy and Lindy saying at the beginning of the year, very specifically, that if the league really enforced the rules as they promised, then they expected to make the playoffs "comfortably".  In response, people around the hockey world derided them by saying they expected "to draw blood from a stone," as one pundit said.  So their clear expectation was that the Sabres were good enough to land about 6th in the conference.  There was no reason to expect to have anything other than 4 middle lines based on the team before The Great Lockout.

BTW, you can construct a Stanley Cup Finalist without having a top line per se -- ask the Las Vegas Golden Knights, so the theory is replicable.  How often and how well is another matter.

[Thorny]

9 minutes ago, Marvin, Sabres Fan said:

I remember Darcy and Lindy saying at the beginning of the year, very specifically, that if the league really enforced the rules as they promised, then they expected to make the playoffs "comfortably".  In response, people around the hockey world derided them by saying they expected "to draw blood from a stone," as one pundit said.  So their clear expectation was that the Sabres were good enough to land about 6th in the conference.  There was no reason to expect to have anything other than 4 middle lines based on the team before The Great Lockout.

BTW, you can construct a Stanley Cup Finalist without having a top line per se -- ask the Las Vegas Golden Knights, so the theory is replicable.  How often and how well is another matter.

It's very uncommon, and, perhaps more to the point - Stone is a first line player. He might be a top 10 player in the league. They had/have a first line. 

You are mixing up have 4 good lines with "no lines being a 1st line"

Briere was 11th in the NHL in points per game in 05-06. He was a 1C. 

Also, what management "thought" they'd be with 4 second lines or whatever is literally irrelevant - Adams and Pegula thought the Hall signing made us "Cup Contenders". 

The only thing that matters is the result. Building the team that way only panned out because they didn't actually put together a team of all second lines. 

Edited May 10, 2021 by Thorny