Taro T

You do realize that at the time he was traded to the Sabres, Dominic Hasek was Chicago's 2nd goalie, right?

A few observations in no particular order from last night's game. They seemed to not realize the league wasn't taking the Olympic break in the 1st, but woke up in the 2nd. That's one thing (among others) they need to fix before next season. After having a few days off,, they need to come ready to play. Fortunately their longest break after February is 3 days & that only happens once. At least 3 times all the players on the ice (at least those near the puck) had no idea where the puck was when it got deflected high into the air. Haven't seen that happen that often before. Early in the 3rd, shift after Tuch scored his goal, he took a heavy shot that deflected off Werenski's leg and the BJ's cleared it. Weren't was in great discomfort, so much that the ref asked if he needed a whistle. He shook the ref off, but could barely get to his feet much less propel himself towards his bench. So, the ref helped him up & then gave him a huge boost towards his bench. He eventually worked his way off the ice & was back about 6 minutes later, so no serious damage done. But honestly can't recall seeing a ref help a player off the ice during play before. It won't be on the highlights as the play was in the Sabres zone by the time e therefore gave him the boost. Weird. Speaking of Tuch & blocked shots. In the 1st, right before an icing, Tokarski made a save & the puck made an enormously loud thud as it hit Tuch's shoulder pads at chest level. He never flinched & never reacted to it at all even though he couldn't get to the bench for about a minute. Guess it sounded worse than it was. While we're discussing Tuch, as enticing as having Krebs & Tuch on the same line is, really don't want to pull Skinner off Alex's line. We've found the ONE player in the entire league that Skinner can effectively pass the puck to & don't want to mess that up. 😉 Though Skinner CAN'T hit the post w/ a wide open net off that feed from Tuch in the 1st.) Skinner might have had his best all around game last night even though he didn't score a goal. Wtf is Dahlin's goal song? They played it for about 4 minutes waiting for the video review & it epitomizes what you'd expect to hear in a Euro version of a Pokémon video game. Love the player, but he really needs to never score another goal at home. 😉 And speaking of Dahlin, maybe part of his lack of chemistry w/ Jokiharju is that Swedish Finnish thing because he was going ALL over the ice to hit Laine every chance possible. Guess he likes Finns in B&G, but he really doesn't like them wearing opposing colors. Which is good. Krebs was finding the puck like crazy, but his passing was waaaaay off. Expecting it was due to a lack of playing much w/ his linemates as he was clearly expecting them to zig, but they zapped & the puck was turned over or given back to Tokarski from the offensive zone. D'OH! Also looking forward to him bulking up a bit as he was getting ragdolled at times by BJ D-men. But it never stopped him from going after the puck nor to the front of the net. Hagg couldn't get anything to go right for him. Hopefully that was bad luck or rust because he's likely in the lineup at least until Power shows up. Merzerklins was bad. Tokarski said, "hold my beer." Not sure why he got the start over Anderson. That decision likely cost them a point. Watching OT, had just got done saying, "2 D, guess Granato wants OT to go a little longer than ..." "so much for that, it was a nice idea though." Anyone that thinks Dahlin can't fly, go back and watch him go back for the puck as the PP in the 3rd was expiring & he realized the BJ coming out of the box had the line on the puck. He found a completely different gear & won that race cleanly. Thompson continues to show he is the 2nd Sabre exception (right after Larsson) that proves the rule that all C's can play W. As long as Granato is coach, doubt we ever see him back on the wing, but NEVER want to see him at wing again. Hayden has an excuse for making poor plays - he just doesn't have NHL baseline skills. Wtf is Bjork's excuse? Really think he simply doesn't have "hockey smarts." Can't wait for him to be supplanted. Nice pass from Jankowski to Mr. Leatherman (he may not be the ideal tool for the job, but he can get just about any job done) Kyle Okposo. Will Olofsson EVER buy another goal? Bounced a shot off the far post right after Dahlin's goal that looked like it would go. Another very sparse crowd. Definitely less than 5,000. Probably less than 4,000. Would believe it if you said there were under 3,000. The intermission band was playing blues & was actually pretty good at it. No idea who they were. Bring in live bands for the intermission was a very good idea. Hope that stays for next year.

Which puts it as a standard Sabres injury timeline where the end of window is the absolute earliest the player MIGHT be back.

The last REALLY noticeable game that yours truly recalls where Dahlin kind of quit on a play & was clearly exasperated was December 4 vs Carolina. That was at the height of goalies going down pretty much daily. And well after Eichel's departure.

Not the right place for this, Dell's between the pipes rather than UPL but don't really want to start a GDT during the 3rd period. That said ... Really nice breakout leading to a tic-tac-toe play to get Ethan Prow the go ahead goal vs the Baby Pens. Ra-cha-cha up 2-1 about 1/2 way through the 3rd.

At the youth levels it's more like 60-40 right to lefty. There are definitely more righties than lefties here.

Not sure if it's "official" or not, but see way more Americans shoot the same way they write (righties shoot right handed, lefties left handed - it probably actually is about 50-50) than Canadians do. Way more Canadians shoot opposite how they write (it's probably close to 80% write right & shoot left or write left & shoot right). Shooting from your dominant side typically costs power but adds some accuracy but flipping that helps create more power at the cost of some accuracy. Most people are right handed and most Canadian players shoot left. And you golfing right is just weird for a lefty. You pull an opposite Nadal playing tennis?

Completely spitballing here. Wondering, does anybody know which, if any, of those guys shoot with the same handedness of their dominant hand? Because, it would seem a guy that holds the stick with the lower hand his dominant hand ("American" style with the dominant hand lower on the stick losing some power but gaining accuracy when shooting but also having his likely dominant eye closer to the boards when playing his typical side) might have an easier time playing D on his offhand w/ the dominant hand up higher on the stick providing more power ("Canadian' style w/ the dominant hand providing more power as the fulcrum of the lever & his presumably dominant eye facing the center of the ice on his typical side) both because he should have a bit more agility w/ his stick so it should be easier to control a puck along the boards on his off-hand & also because when playing on his off-hand side, his dominant eye will be towards the center of the ice and it should be easier to diagnose the situation on the ice. Maybe that logic is precisely backwards, or maybe it doesn't matter. But would be interested in knowing if it is a factor in that. It seems that it might.

Possibly. Would expect that any pro athletes having unexpected success tend to believe it's more on them than the opponent or circumstance, but the SC Playoffs are full of teams that outdid expectations & then just got #### stomped in the Finals. Goes all the way back to the Blues in the 60's (though those teams actually did what was expected at all stages of the playoffs; the West was really bad & everybody knew the East finals were the real battle for the SC), the Rags in '79, Minny & Vancouver getting stomped by the Aisles, Minny again vs the Pens, the Caps vs Detroit, Swamp Cats vs Avs; just to name a few. If Price & the ST could've stayed magical they had a shot, but they couldn't & TB, especially w/ reinforcements, was a beast.

No doubt. But he can wait until the off-season to get him.

But, they were in the Finals last season. It was nothing like the fluke of FLA getting there to hand the Avs their 1st SC victory. This Habs team strode confidently into the playoffs in the best division in hockey, defeated a playoff juggernaut in TO, pounded arguably the best team in the entire NHL that clearly isn't a product of its goaltending in the Jets, and then won another round after Price was in the groove. They NEARLY beat the Bolts too; missed it by THAT much. 😒

Were the answers Hasek, Drury, or Sauve? (If not, got nothing. 😉 )

Makes sense. It's HIS fault Price & Weber have been injured and that Kokateniemi & Danault are gone. 😕

Durn it. Was really hoping this kid could sprout up. 😉

How big is their postman? 😉

Without delving deeply, would expect a fair amount of the results can be attributed to 2 things: 1. Granato, for the most part rolls his lines far more than other teams do & has said repeatedly that he's more interested in working on the offensive aspects of the game which necessarily comes at the expense, to a degree, of the defense. And we've seen that bite them for a few huge goals against late in games when a certain small forward has been out at the end of games when leading or when tied. Those aren't the only time it's happened, just the most glaring. They've not adjusted their play as much due to the score as their opponents have - and presumably when they actually care whether they win or not, we'll see some of the effects due to that philosophy lessen as there is a reason teams adjust their play in game as situations dictate - it improves their chances of winning and the Sabres will rejoin the league in that regard. And 2. Other teams DO adjust their game & intensity based upon the score of the game & most all of the teams the Sabres are playing this season have more talent than they have. When a better team focuses on accomplishing a task, they tend to be more successful at that task than the lesser talented team. And being down a goal or up by one causes most teams to focus on rectifying or continuing that situation. And the better teams are more effective at doing that. Expecting this will remain an issue until the kids have actually grown into their roles. Expecting that the Sabres goalies have been giving up more than the analytics say they should give up too, which wouldn't help either. But haven't seen those stats, so that guess could be way off. (Guesses oftentimes are. 😉 )

Yep.

Anybody know what triggered the little rat faced git to go postal? Not that it matters, just curious. Will be very interested in finding out how long his suspension is.

Don't play it. Apparently there's a #'s based equivalent called Nerdle. Not planning on playing that either, but if you like Wordle you'll likely like the other one as well.

EVERYBODY reports tickets sold (or even tickets distributed) rather than turnstile.

Awesome, now we know who'll replace Jeanneret when looking back and narrating the Sabres version of the Wonder Years. (Maybe the Blunder Years?")

Either that or also flipping Thompson & Mittelstadt from there. But expecting it'd be what you suggest.

We're IN 2022 and the time frame in the post you quoted that you think you disagree with stated that it was from the perspective LITERALLY of today. Obviously, the picture changes next season (& the following seasons as well). You are also, obviously, free to agree or disagree w/ whatever you'd like, but it seems like a really strange statement to say (paraphrasing) "no, can't agree that 9 or so F's on the roster today wouldn't be good enough to have substantial roles on a contender because next season there will be better players on the roster." 🤔

Maybe they do, maybe they don't. They won't publicly acknowledge any deficiencies. But they had some very poor games & not sure that "bend don't break" D that gets gashed badly by good running teams is the best complement to a high octane offense. Would really like to see a more aggressive scheme that wins more often than not but either way hands the keys back to Allen in a more timely manner. And have that 3 man rush w/ man coverage + 2 deep to use against KC that other teams used so effectively against them. A couple of changes to personnel would absolutely allow them to get more of a Carolina D working than the Minnesota D we see every week.

Completely depends on the timeline. If the Q is: how many players away are they TODAY. The answer may very well be 15+. 2 goalies, at least 4 D, & ~9 forwards all aren't good enough to be given solid roles on a contender. But those kids can grow & most of them will. If the Q is: how many players are the Sabres away from being a legit contender in '25 (or, more pessimistically '26) the answer very well might be 2-3. (Our luck, that's not the case, but it could be.) They absolutely have gaps at RD. But most all the rest of the spots might be filled well enough if 1 of the goalies is a true stud AND they have 3 (or even 4) high end 2C's on the roster.