Samson's Flow

I am getting a little nervous that my strategy to wait to buy the SabreSpace meetup tickets through the secondary market is going to blow up in my face given the recent success. I will probably get them regardless, but I was thinking I could get them easily like the previous tank years, and that strategy seems to be rapidly evolving.

Yeah I think this current team is way more top heavy than the 06'-07' team. That team was great because they had three lines that were all equally dangerous, so the other team couldn't match up with their depth scoring. The current team is really led by the Eichel/Skinner line and scoring from the defense. I really think the only comparison between the two is that they were/are unexpectedly successful. But they are doing it in completely different ways.

Beating Boston is always an enjoyable experience. ☺️

It's fun to speculate, but I too think we will sit tight with what we have as well. There are lots of reinforcements coming in the next few years just from Rochester given the success they are having.

Also, good to see the recent success brings out some new voices. I know you joined well over a year ago, but have been far more active in the last week. A belated welcome!!

Jumping into this conversation to say that I think for the Sabres purposes Skinner's skill set is more what we need than Duchene would be. A lot depends on team context.

Don't we already have that in spades with Thompson and/or Nylander?

What goaltending is out there that can fix it mid-season? Not a challenge I honestly don't have a pulse on the FA/trade goaltender market.

I think the difference between Lehner and Hutton has less to do with their actual goaltender skill and more to do with the team believing in their goaltender and wanting to respond after hanging them out to dry. Last year I had the sense that a lot of the team had a "#### that guy" mindset towards Lehner, and everyone was kind of in it for themselves. This better articulates what I was trying to get at. Back breaking goals where the team thinks "are you kidding me?!?"

The way I see the team is I am good with the roles of most of the players in the current lineup. If we can economically improve any of the bolded players in the current lineup I would be all for it, but not at the expense of hurting a lot of the futures (1st round picks, Nylander, Pilut, etc.) Skinner - Eichel - Pommers Sheary - Mittelstadt - Okposo Thompson - Sobotka - Reinhart <-- ERod should be centering this line IMO which replaces Sobotka Girgensons - Larsson - Berglund Finding a 1st line RW will be tough without paying a lot, but finding a cheaper scoring wing to add to Reinhart/ERod line would make a big difference IMO. If we did find a wing for the top line, Pommers could fill that void as well.

Yes, let me restate - the coaching change will probably only move them from current bottom 10 team to 11-15th draft pick. Still bad, but not as bad.

I think it is interesting that when we first brought in Phil Housley, he talked about Jake McCabe's ability and how he played well for him when he coached the US National Team (U-18). I suspect that PH knew all along what Jake could bring and it wasn't represented by the ***** play during the tank years. Now we are finally starting to see all of our defensemen take a step forward this year, and McCabe has been one of the more pleasant surprises. That said, I don't think you give anyone but star players 7-8 year contract terms, but 4 or 5 years at $3MM a year seems fair and is commensurate with other team's 2nd pairing defensemen. ***5,000th Post*** ???

Thanks gents. Also - I didn't want my 5,000 post to be about Phil Kessel & hot dogs ?

Well they tossed Yeo, but they (StL) still resemble the Sabres teams of the past couple years in that they appear to be a collection of seemingly talented players that just don't fit well together. I don't think they are suddenly going to improve just from a coaching change. Yep - I think more likely than not they will be shifting the StL pick to 2020. Which may be beneficial if their downward spiral continues into 2019/2020.

I'm at work. That's a terrifying search string.

I think we will see far more of this once he gets a few more years to work on that teenage body. Right now it's mostly speed and finesse, but there are hints of the punishing power game as well.

I thought the joke was that Phat Phil like donuts. Did he shift to hot dogs without telling us?

I think it's part of the maturation process of the team as a whole. At the beginning of the year we all talked about how young this roster was going to be. As they get more consistent, they will (hopefully) start playing a full 60 minute game but for now the slow starts or mental mistakes have not crippled them because the goaltending has generally bailed the team out. That is huge for the confidence of the young players to be able to play this aggressive, high risk brand of hockey. If every time they tried something that didn't work ended up in a goal against, the players would shift back to conservative play which would kill our offensive development. Hutton and Ullmark have been huge in allowing the team as a whole to push the pace and attack as a five man unit.

I don't disagree with anything you are saying here. In the back of my mind I am terrified that KO will turn back into a pumpkin and we end up kicking ourselves for not capitalizing on the opportunity to get value and get out of that contract. I want to believe but the last few years are hard to forget.

I'm in the keep Skinner crowd as well, but every cap dollar we save with the core players makes it easier to compete for rentals/secondary pieces to put us over the top. I'm optimistically hoping that we can cash in some of the goodwill built from this team's unexpected success to try to keep this group together long term at a reasonable discount. That said, Skinner deserves a good contract based on his play and chemistry with JE.

Agreed. Skinner has elevated and transformed Jacks game just as much as Jack has helped Skinner.

We are talking about him the the Trade Rumors thread though... FWIW

I haven't liked his game much either, but I think as a GM you can point to a higher point total and better looking play and say he's back to previous level of play. It's an easier sell than in past years where he looked like a shell of his Islander days.

As a counterpoint, this is probably a bigger factor than we think in our success this year so far.

This is an interesting idea, especially since KO finally looks like the player we thought we were getting. If you (GMJB) believe this "new" Okposo isn't sustainable, this would be your opportunity to trade him for close to 100% value given his recent play. That's how to play the sell high/buy low game.