How would you line them up?

[dudacek]

Norris is not a playmaker, full stop.

Never has been. 

He has topped 20 assists in a season just once, including AHL and college.

He has just 67 assists in 239 NHL games.

[dudacek]

There is such a thing as a player not being talented enough to play with your most talented players.

Never stopped Jochen Hecht from playing with Brière, or Mike Grier from playing with Drury. Or Evan Rodrigues from skating with the top guys in Florida.

People shouldnt be basing their line choices entirely on offence. Line chemistry and matchup success is what matters.

In theory I have no problem with Greenway playing with more talented players if he supplies what the line needs.

Edited 17 hours ago by dudacek

[Taro T]

1 hour ago, dudacek said:

There is such a thing as a player not being talented enough to play with your most talented players.

Never stopped Jochen Hecht from playing with Brière, or Mike Grier from playing with Drury. Or Evan Rodrigues from skating with the top guys in Florida.

People shouldnt be basing their line choices entirely on offence. Line chemistry and matchup success is what matters.

In theory I have no problem with Greenway playing with more talented players if he supplies what the line needs.

Yup.  "Classic" lines have a scorer, a playmaker, and a forechecker on them.  And on good teams, at least two of the top line's players can typically take on more than one of those roles.

[PerreaultForever]

4 hours ago, dudacek said:

Norris is not a playmaker, full stop.

Never has been. 

He has topped 20 assists in a season just once, including AHL and college.

He has just 67 assists in 239 NHL games.

Tage isn't a playmaker either regardless of stats. I don't really know what Norris will bring them but I believe he can motor (if healthy) and will do better with more open ice. I am simply reluctant to have youngsters in key offensive roles. It hasn't worked yet and it won't work now. 

[SabreFinn]

9 hours ago, dudacek said:

There is such a thing as a player not being talented enough to play with your most talented players.

Never stopped Jochen Hecht from playing with Brière, or Mike Grier from playing with Drury. Or Evan Rodrigues from skating with the top guys in Florida.

People shouldnt be basing their line choices entirely on offence. Line chemistry and matchup success is what matters.

In theory I have no problem with Greenway playing with more talented players if he supplies what the line needs.

How they compose lines to match opponents top6-lines bothers me. They didn't get the job done last season and I think they still are too unexperinced this season. Do they have lines that can shut down other teams top lines? My answer would be No.

[dudacek]

8 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

Tage isn't a playmaker either regardless of stats. I don't really know what Norris will bring them but I believe he can motor (if healthy) and will do better with more open ice. I am simply reluctant to have youngsters in key offensive roles. It hasn't worked yet and it won't work now. 

I think Norris is smart enough and fast enough to take advantage of the holes Tage creates offensively and help the line in its own end. He reads the play at a high level.

Hes just not a creative puck handler and a distributor in the Mittelstadt or Connolly mould.

Thing is Tage doesn’t need that type of centre. He wants to be the guy on his line carrying the puck. He’s a bit of a unicorn in the way he creates offence for himself.

There’s a reason JJ Peterka went from 22 assists to 41 last year. Jeff Skinner had never topped 30 assists in his career. Put him with Tage and he suddenly had 47.

Norris can have a career high in assists without changing a thing about his game simply chipping pucks in Tages direction.

3 hours ago, SabreFinn said:

[dudacek]

4 hours ago, SabreFinn said:

How they compose lines to match opponents top6-lines bothers me. They didn't get the job done last season and I think they still are too unexperinced this season. Do they have lines that can shut down other teams top lines? My answer would be No.

That’s the Peterka deal and the debate about Benson replacing him in a nutshell isn’t it? 

I know people hate +/- but it shows Tuch +16 and McLeod +13 won their battles, Cozens -13 Quinn -18 did not while Tage -2 and Peterka -1 were a draw

Switching to xGoals %, The Sabres had 4 lines that were “good” 2 of them had Tage and 3 had Benson. Maybe these are the forwards who create winning matchups and the ones who should be seeing the toughest ice time?

Not sure exactly what you are envisioning here, but agree coaches and fans need to take a harder look at lines in terms of how they match up.

I also think some of the moves they’ve made are based on Lindy wanting players who better fit what he wants to do.

[Taro T]

1 hour ago, dudacek said:

I think Norris is smart enough and fast enough to take advantage of the holes Tage creates offensively and help the line in its own end. He reads the play at a high level.

Hes just not a creative puck handler and a distributor in the Mittelstadt or Connolly mould.

Thing is Tage doesn’t need that type of centre. He wants to be the guy on his line carrying the puck. He’s a bit of a unicorn in the way he creates offence for himself.

There’s a reason JJ Peterka went from 22 assists to 41 last year. Jeff Skinner had never topped 30 assists in his career. Put him with Tage and he suddenly had 47.

Norris can have a career high in assists without changing a thing about his game simply chipping pucks in Tages direction.

Am slowiy coming around to being optimistic about Norris and Thompson being paired together.  Still not sure about how having the 2 shoot first players together will gel, but they will likely predominantly have Dahlin on the ice with them, and that is one very good playmaker that could be feeding the puck to either.

[JohnC]

45 minutes ago, Taro T said:

Am slowiy coming around to being optimistic about Norris and Thompson being paired together.  Still not sure about how having the 2 shoot first players together will gel, but they will likely predominantly have Dahlin on the ice with them, and that is one very good playmaker that could be feeding the puck to either.

The takeaway in reading this thread is that there are many combinations that make sense. My preference would be for Tage to be 1C, Norris the 2C and McLeod the 3C. It’s also going to be interesting to see how our forwards get slotted for the top three lines.  
 

Currently, my first line preference is Zucker/Tage/Tuch. Needless to say, this is subject to change. This is going to be an interesting camp. 

[dudacek]

10 minutes ago, JohnC said:

 

Currently, my first line preference is Zucker/Tage/Tuch. Needless to say, this is subject to change. This is going to be an interesting camp. 

The beauty about this staring at a piece of paper is that you can comfortably say each player is a good, probably above average option in their slot.

[LGR4GM]

Unless Lindy Ruff gets fired, Tage isn't going back to center. 

[Taro T]

7 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

Unless Lindy Ruff gets fired, Tage isn't going back to center. 

Maybe.

He played Briere at C for years even though he was better suited as a W in his own end.  Expect the preference is to keep Thompson at W, but could see him move back in a pinch.  If he does move back to C would expect to see him teamed up with someone like Tuch that is defensively responsible and oftentimes is the 1st F back into the zone.  Similarly to how Briere played with Hecht and then as a Phlyer with the one we try not to speak about here.