Taro T

With all due respect, no, you may not. 😉

Yes, and that was the point of saying "Wadr, your point is pretty much contradicted by what you wrote above."

If he doesn't come on strong this season could see him very easily turning into Danny Paille. Hope he ends up more than that, but not real hopeful.

It's not so much that they haven't been valued. It's more of a case IMHO that successive GMs have had significantly different ideas of how a team should be built (and accordingly have typically valued different styles of players than his predecessor valued). The guys that are least likely to be kept around in that scenario are the guys at the bottom of the food chain (all of those F's, some of those D) and the ones that can't play the style the new GM wants or the guys that don't want to be there (either or both categories cover the rest of the D). Wadr, your point is pretty much contradicted by what you wrote above. It's not that the roles have never been valued. They have been valued. Heck, on the past 3 teams 2 of the 2 or 3 captains (depending upon season) came from that pool of role players. But they've changed what they're looking for in that role every 4 years at the latest and more like every 2-3 realistically. You are never going to get out of the hole you're in if you start redigging what you've just managed to fill in.

Either that or getting invited to become a politician's PR director. What, you can't get basic facts right, well, then put this out PRONTO. 😉

Good for you getting back into the game. Not sure where you're based out of but if you're in a place like WNY you'd be able to find a league for any skill level / age. And for the most part, if you're willing to drive a little ways you can pick which night you want to play at that skill level for the most part. And there are pickup/drop in leagues at all sorts of times and days too. Still play once/ week in the winter. Haven't played in the spring or summer in a couple of years; just too darn busy.

You're never going to get to a point where the world can become fully predictable because so much of the world (weather being a great example) is best described as strange attractors which are systems that in overly simplified terms essentially repeat but depending upon the starting point where you enter / start tracking the system you will wind up with wildly divergent outcomes. And, no matter how hard one tries, really doubt AI will ever be able to account for the emotion of a situation. AI will never (IMHO) be able to understand emotion as it will never be able to experience it. And if it can't understand it, it will never be able to fully account for it. And the emotion of a moment, and how humans deal with them, will make far more of a difference to an outcome than a random loss of footing might. Again, MHO.

Welcome to why Granato is no longer employed and Ellis is no longer running the PP and off the bench (and should be no longer employed either). They didn't just keep trying to do it. They kept just trying to do it for an entire nother full season. Still get ticked thinking about how awful the PP was the last 2 seasons.

Thank you. Have been saying that since the spring of '23. As soon as that magical 6-7 week run was done and teams figured out how to take away the 1 timers, it went back to being the trash it had been at the start of that season.

Nothing deeply thought out but do have a few thoughts on it. 1st. AI or any search engine / data parser / whatever tool you're working with is only going to be as good at whatever task as whomever programmed it to be is and it will necessarily have the same biases as the programming team. So, it could review data significantly quicker than a human (well, no Schlitz Sherlock) but it isn't necessarily going to see something in a different light - because it can't. 2nd. As it does get used as a tool in new fields, it will necessarily get more useful as newer iterations come along. No idea how long that would take as sports in general is a very big industry but it's also kind of a niche in that people making money off of owning professional teams are ridiculously few. Now, could gamblers start using it? The big ones almost certainly already are. But, the gamblers aren't going to be suggesting line combinations nor forechecking strategies; they're going to look for trends in the end results and act accordingly. Wouldn't even hazard a WAG as to how soon it could be affecting outcomes because of the front offices and coaching staffs making use of it. 3rd. AI doesn't actually "think" like we consider thinking so it's going to be way more useful in interpolating data and trends than extrapolating them. And again, the team that's programming it would really need to know what they're looking for to try to take what it comes up with and take it "outside the box." 4th. Expect an individual team would be better off talking to the major players in AI about how they could make use of what those companies have developed and outsourcing (with a ton of agreements protecting the propriety of what those companies come up with for the team) any AI "research" projects rather than trying to have a small team of their own developers trying to do something with it.

Argue it against who? Have never heard a single person claim otherwise. Not sure how many foreigners are playing in the KHL since that war broke out, so it COULD be better than the KHL at present. Would still expect it's a notch behind that, but could be persuaded otherwise. The only other 2 leagues in the discussion about the 2nd best league in the world are the AHL and the Czech League, neither of which would get this kid's vote ahead of either of the other mentioned tours. And Liiga IMHO would be a notch below them. EDIT: Ah, see where it appears that GA is equating them. Yeah, no, not so much. Nevermind.

Yes. Appert and Ruff are in charge of it now. So, expect Peterka opposite Thompson and Quinn to get the 1st crack at the bumper slot.

He definitely had room to improve upon when facing odd man rushes. The rest of his game was pretty decent (against AHL competition).

So Nashville acquiesced to Askarov's ask to get traded rather than sent back to the A once again. Wonder what they get back in return. Figure a 1st has to be a significant portion of that package, right?

This. But, realistically, somebody will miss significant time due to injury and Kulich (especially without another top 6F being brought in before the season starts) is the most likely recipient of the newly opened ice time. Would have Johnson next up on the list, but expect the real big guy they brought in will likely slide in as the 6 (if he isn't already rotating into there depending upon opponent) should 1 D-man go down.

Said this back at the end of June and am sticking by it. Am expecting them to score between 260 & 270. (264 as the EV) Peterka - Thompson - Tuch - 85 (28-35-22) Benson-Cozens-Quinn - 75 (18-22-35) Zucker-McLeod-Greenway -40 (16-12-12) Malinstyn(sp?)-Fogarty-Lafferty-Aubel-Kube - 24 (8-8-8) Defense - 40 (Dahlin 18. The other 5 - 22) Yes, some won't get there & some will be injured. But that doesn't include ANY goals from those not in the top 18. They should pot another 10-20 which'll offset some overly optimistic predictions. And with reasonable health, Tuch & Cozens at a minimum could pot quite a few more. So, yeah, they have enough offense. AND they still might bring in a W that drops Benson out of the top 6. If they do that, it makes it all that much more likely that this is realistic. Plus a healthy Thompson could easily score 10 more than predicted more than a month and a half ago.

Amazing how effective the threat of litigation is if a potential hazard can go kaca. Significantly unrelated, but had a fairly new car that's speedometer starting going wild. It would randomly peg itself or drop down to below 0 or go ANYWHERE inbetween. There was 0 correlation between what it displayed and how fast the car was going. So, the only way to figure out if you were close to the right speed was to keep with traffic. Called the dealer to get them to fix that under warranty. Their initial response was that yours truly should stop speeding. 🤬 Explained to them that even when going well below the posted speed limit this was occurring, so they said they could get me an appointment but since that was a specialty part it would take about 1-1/2 months to get it in for service. Said, that's fine. Just realize that if yours truly gets any speeding tickets or into any accidents that the dealership will be expected to pay those and any associated increases in the cost of the insurance as they know about the problem, it is a safety hazard, and they don't seem to care about remedying it. Their tune changed pretty quickly after that. Car was in the dealership the next AM and it was back running properly about 4 days after that. And all w/ a courtesy loaner.

Haven't looked closely at the PS schedule, but somebody had pointed out that the Sabres play at least 1 preseaon game (maybe 2) after the squad will have played a PS game in Germany. That indicates that the team will have bifurcated into a Sabres plus a handful and Amerks by the midpoint of the preseason at the latest. Which is a much better way of working things than still seeing if guys like Rousek or Kulich can be 1st liners in a pinch in the last tune up game. Them not being desperate for their usual quick start to the season while their opponents didn't fully have their game legs and were overlooking the Sabres pretty well doomed the season. They'll be desperate this year; but unfortunately their 1st 2 games are with another desperate team that will be trying to kick the snot out of their old head coach's new team. Absolutely HATE that they're starting the year in Europe. The disruption to the start of the season could seriously gum up the whole works. Yeah, it could help them bond and have a solid October which starts the whole thing off on the right foot; but expect with the new coach and the renewed sense of desperation, they were going to get that with a normal start to the year. More likely the disruption gets them off to a 1-4-1 start than the bonding gets them off to an 8-1-1 start.

You could always TS Garp the kid. (And end up with a similar result too unfortunately.)

The shingles vaccine sucks. Worst "flu" in at least 7 years and that includes having had Covid. (Though that lasted 3-1/2 days rather than just 2-1/2.) Am SOOOOO looking forward to round 2.

We talkin' about Vancouver last year? 😉 Somebody is going to get into the playoffs in the east that isn't expected to do so. It could be the Sabres. They need a couple of things to break their way, but it's possible. (And no, am not happy that it's merely possible rather than probable. Still am hoping for 1 more piece to get brought in some time in September to move it a little closer to probable.)

Wasn't talking about the 6th rounder that actually made the show that the Loafs took. Was referring to the 7th rounder that ended up washing out that the Sabres took after they literally couldn't give the pick away.

And at least per Duff and Biron, that "material breach of contract" is likely that Johansen is pursuing a treatment plan that the Phlyers aren't on board with. (Consider how the Sabres would've treated it if Eichel had scheduled the neck surgery that they didn't approve for him.) It's going to be interesting to see how this plays out because according to the CBA the team chooses the course of treatment for injuries but the player chooses the specialist (surgeon, therapist, etc.) to perform it. Expecting that to be the major item the players want modified when they negotiate a new CBA in a couple of years.

It was the incident/item that was the most representative of the Sabres of that era. It summed them up perfectly.

That's actually plausible. But that has to be a kick in the nuts to be the guy taken simply because the team couldn't GIVE the pick away and (presumably) according to the CBA had to use the pick or face fines/sanctions. Hey, an NHL team wants ME!!!!!! No, no, they really don't.