Taro T

The Muppet Show theme! Now, THERE's something we can work with!

Again, fully expect the Sabres would love to have all 314 people that want to watch the game be able to watch it, but MSG isn't selling any ads because advertisers don't want to pay for 314 sets of eyeballs and MSG has the exclusive rights to the Sabres games that don't end up on ABC, ESPN, nor TNT, so they aren't exercising their rights and they also aren't subletting the rights to any other carriers. One more way the Sabres deal w/ MSG stinks for the fans.

Am guessing it's more on the NHL's & the individual teams' "broadcast partners." They likely aren't going to get enough viewers to be able to sell advertising at any reasonable rate and they have "exclusive" rights to games in the team's barn. Since the BJ's were showing last night's game on TV, the Sabres were allowed to do so as well. And because the game was on the regional networks that ESPN+ has rights to broadcast, they showed it as well. MSG wanted nothing to do with tonight's game, so the Sabres are showing it to all 36 of us in the area that want to watch but not attend and the BJ's website is showing it as well. Expecting you have to be in the greater C-Bus area to watch their feed; just know it isn't available here in WNY.

And it's on.

Expecting it has to do either with the way their contract with MSG is written or the league's contracts with Disney and TNT are written. This has been SOP for a while now. Which stinks for the OoTers.

Just for clarification, he meant that as in at this moment in time Benson doesn't belong on the 1st line with Thompson THIS year, right? Not that he's implying he doesn't see Benson ever belonging there.

Presuming the league and PA don't implement the BF-LTIR revisions on an expedited schedule. Guess we'll have to wait to see which teams might still try to use that loophole this year to figure out whether that change comes in this year or next.

Thought they had pills to cure that issue. 😉

Actually, figured out what they SHOULD be using: Rush's 2112 - The Temples of Syrinx. Can start at either "... and the meek shall inherit the earth" (which technically is the end of the 2112 Overture) OR when Geddy Lee is screeching "oh what a night ...." Bonus points for ticking off Loaf fans by stealing a song from their local boys. All the gifts of life are held within our walls.

Do they make hockey sticks that double as walkers? 😉 But seriously, do expect that his kid will make the team out of the gate.

And freely admit that it very well could be backwards. The Bills have trouble with the Crows in the regular season but win close ones in the playoffs and they regularly beat the Chefs in the RS but lose close ones in the playoffs. So, maybe stick with what works and if you have to run into 1 of them in the playoffs, hope it's the Crows; but at least on paper (and do realize they don't play them on paper) they should have an easier time w/ the Chef than the Crows. And just can't get past that portion of it. Though am hoping that somehow both of them miss the playoffs this year. Who'd it be better to avoid, the Chefs of the Crows; like the little presumably Mexican girl asks "why not both."

So, it should be a WWJC? (What would Jeff choose?) Might be able to get behind that.

Realize this is likely backwards because the Bills have beaten the Crows in the playoffs twice and haven't beaten the Chefs in the playoffs since Montana was in the league; but the Bills are built to matchup against KC and KC isn't what it was the past 7 or so years this year. The Ravens play a style that the Bills have to play their absolute A game to beat because they aren't particularly good at stopping heaving running teams. So, would rather see KC win this one and hope that somehow the Stillers manage to be the only team coming out of the North. Both the Bolts and the Donkeys could finish ahead of the Chefs in that division this year. Which could make this the magical year that both the Crows and the Chefs miss the playoffs. Totally get that Jackson has not been regular season Lamar in the playoffs to date and that they have a tendency to shoot themselves in the foot during big games; and also that until the Bills have beaten Mahomes Chefs in the playoffs they have not done so. BUT with all that said, would rather face the Chefs in Buffalo in January than the Crows in Buffalo in January. Go Walrus, coo-coo-a-chew. Then go back to losing the following week. 😉

Geertsen and Kozak doing double duty, along with Levi who we already knew was going to get the 3rd tonight. No Tuch. A little surprised at that. Wonder if he'll play when Detroit is in town or if they'll hold him out until the Pens or possibly even the Rags? EDIT: Missed Helenius doing double duty too filling in for Tuch.

If they make the playoffs this year; and it is a real possibility, AND that song ends up the B&G goal song you realize that he will be campaigning for it to stay the goal song (heck, if it ends up the goal song, he'll be campaigning for it to remain even if they're '75 Caps bad or anywhere inbetween) for as long as he's still gainfully employed at WGR, right? Like Thatcher famously said, "don't go all wobbly on us now, George." 😉

Did he really say that about that play? Does he not realize the Rams have been blowing big leads in nationally televised games (Fox's game of the week) going back to at least the days that Frank Reich was a Bill. There was a pretty great Monday Nighter back in the day. Not much miraculous in getting by them; more like a parlor trick than a miracle. 😉

Still expect "This Beat Goes On" by the Kings would've been a good choice. Not impressed with the choices they're down to. Would go w/ the Motley Crew tune if absolutely had to pick one of them. Expecting Jeremy White finally gets his way but am not thrilled about it.

Ruff implied last season that Samuelsson came into the year out of shape and explicitly said so this year. That he didn't strip a letter from him implies that he considers him in shape this year. His '23-'24 season ended in January, so yes, he was recovering from an injury once again. Agreed, that it will be interesting to see if he's back to his early NHL form with a full healthy off-season this year.

Plus the Bungles will be without Joe Rodent Home for about 3 months.

What's not to like in a 4-0 road win. Georgiev looked like the Georgiev that backed up in NY and played that 1st year in Colorado. Hopefully that keeps up. Thought Levi was a little nervous and overplaying the puck early but he got the stops and then settled down. Will be interesting to see how he builds on that in the 3rd of tomorrow's game. Didn't think much of Quinn's play the 1st 2 periods, but he was driving to the net in the 3rd which is something he used to do but stopped doing last year. He could be a big bounce back candidate if he can keep that up. Mrtka is definitely young, but the skill is there and he does have a bit of mean in him. Am liking that draft selection much more after the prospects tourney and tonight. Knew Kesselring was young, didn't realize how young he looks. But liked his game; he was solid in his own end and not afraid to hit people and he was quick to jump up into the rush. Power even threw a light hit or 2; maybe there's still hope. Liked the 2 Russian kids too. They still need more seasoning but they both look like they'll be NHLers, especially Novikov. Still despise the entries on the PP. Östlund got a couple of more really good chances and once again was unable to finish. Love that he gets really solid chances; hate that nothing ever seems to come of them. Do expect Helenius to be an NHLer in a year or 2. Both of the checking lines seemed to acquit themselves well or well enough at a minimum. The BJs crew was very impressed with the Sabres work along the boards. Personally was impressed with their work in front of both nets. It was significantly better than at least the past 2 seasons and likely much longer than that. Both Krebs and Kozak seemed to play pretty well in front of our net. Wasn't paying much attention to faceoffs (was bouncing back and forth between the Crows choking again in the 4th and the Sabres) but a graphic late in the 2nd had C-Bus winning about 2/3's of them. If that was accurate, there's something besides the PP entries they can improve on. Will be interesting to see how the Sabres top 2 lines fare against the BJs lower lines and how the battles for spots 5-8 on the D play out. Will also be interesting to see if the top PP unit can do anything. Not expecting much; but maybe adding Norris makes a difference.

Before the leg injuries, Quinn was like a young version of Reinhart regarding contact. He'd get knocked down a lot but wouldn't necessarily lose the puck and he was pretty good at forechecking to get it back (and then get knocked down again without losing it, and so on and so forth). But he was way easier to get away from the puck last season and he wasn't nearly as effective at getting it back. Will be interesting to see which version shows up this season and we get our 1st glimpse of it tonight.

Now if they could just help with getting the shot counter at the rink to be accurate, that'd be great. Expecting that's an issue to be resolved another day.

We have DTv and the streaming package is included with it. Have used it fairly often when away from home to watch games and haven't had any issues with it. There doesn't seem to be an ability to watch DVR'd stuff, but have never looked for that capability when using the DTv+. So, it might be there with the regular DTv when streaming and would be mildly surprised if it isn't available for the pure streaming service.

So, preseason squad 1 has all of the borderline F's (lines 3 - 5 and likely 6 but possibly 7 by ice time) and preseason squad 2 has all of the borderline D (pairings 3-5). Interesting. Also interesting that Rosen was the odd man out from the AHL scoring line with the other unit.

The only real change that they'd need to do to work that is bump Krebs off PP2 (PP3?) and put Wahlberg there. Follow up with either the Krebs line or the Kozak line and the Russians and no issues with lines getting juggled. And it's not like Krebs is going to get a legit look at the PP early in the season anyhow unless they have a lot of injuries.