MattPie

More points, and based on the chart above, he's solidly in the middle of #2 picks in the last couple decades, even taking into account some of those guys may have started playing pro at an older age and some (I'm looking at you, Malkin) played in a much more wide-open era (and on more wide open teams). Without doing the exact math, it's Eichel, ROR, Okposo, Kane, Samson, and Risto, the last three being in the same neighborhood of points (mid-40s). After that, there's a noticeable drop to Gionta and Moulson, and another to McCabe and Foligno.

I keep wanting to bring Audette into this conversation, but I don't really think he belongs.

I'm not sure I see that much difference between the Hawks willfully bad management (coming from the top, the owner not wanting to spend money) for a decade and a team ruthlessly setting up their future by sacrificing results in the short term.

Unless I'm misreading the above, NJ has nothing to lose and everything to gain, right? If some other team wants him, have NJ sign him then trade to that team for whatever.

Take a Wild---- guess!

What's that saying about sandwiching a lie between two pieces of truth? :)

The idea was Darcy was competent but limited by budget. That turned out to be wrong, but it's not unreasonable to say that a guy that did OK given limited budgets could be pretty good with more financial resources.

Re: tanks I don't remember all the teams listed, but I know it included: Hawks: Kane and Toews (#1 and #3 picks) Boston: Seguin in their cup run was a #2 pick (gotten from the Leafs for Kessel, Kessel was the Bruins #5 overall pick in 2006) Kings: coming out of the 2004-05 lockout, they had a run of bad seasons where they were tied for last one year (with Tampa) and top 10 picks for a few more. They picked 11, 4, 2, and 5 coming out of the lockout before returning to the playoffs. (that #4 was Thomas Hickey, whom they lost to NYI on waivers, so these quality hockey mega-brains in LA messed up a #4 pick) Habs: I don't really consider them a force. They've ridden one the best goalies in the league but I can't recall thinking, "MTL really has a shot this year". So perennial playoffs yes, contender, not really.

I'm not worried about the Sabres cash flow. The front office will spend to the cap and I'd guess above the cap if Okposo is on LITR. This is a non-issue to me as a fan because it doesn't limit what players the Sabres can bring in in terms of the cap.

He left the NHL with term on his contract right? Would that contract resume if he came back?

Those are the only people I can think of; it doesn't even come close to 2007.

It's entirely possible that Eichel said something in a moment of frustration to a teammate, much like if I'm having a ###### day at work I'll come home and say, screw it, I'm done with this. Then I get up the next day and go back to work. EDIT: remove profanity; I expected the filter to catch it.

Sorry Millbank, we all know how it feels to see their team eliminated. I'm really annoyed at how good the Leafs are. Hey, there's a bright side to the Sabres playoff drought: there are young Sabres fans who've never seen the Sabres lose a playoff series! There are college age Bills fans that can say the same!

This is a good place to start: http://forums.sabrespace.com/topic/24444-the-system/page-3?do=findComment&comment=920157 Post 100 starts Flagg's incredible string of posts comparing Byslma's System (the Byslmatic) to Carolina which plays a puck support scheme. There's are some cool heat-map posts on the second page of that thread showing where Buffalo's shots were happening.

I feel like it's 1956 in here.

They're playing on the Island now too; Brooklyn (and Queens) are the west end of the island.

I like Foligno, but he's overpaid to be a 4th line wing. If $NEWGM can get something for him, do it and replace with someone making $1 - 1.5M per year. You may say it's not that much, but do it a few times on the roster and suddenly you're at the cap and that $4M/yr D FA that'd put your team in a great spot is not affordable.

A lot of those aren't terrible. I wouldn't mind seeing the Bills in those, preferably in royal. I'm not sure it'd go that way though; based on the fan support if they were going to unify things, it'll probably be more red for the Sabres. Red, white, and blue are boring because it's over done.

That's encouraging; unless it's because they'll end up with 5 year salary for 2 years of work.

TP: Good morning, I'm sure you have questions. Mike (Harrington), you first. MH: You weren't present at the end of season press conference. Do you hate the media, or do you just feel that it's not worth your time to discuss the worst season of hockey ever played? TP: That's all for now. Thank you.

Sorry man. I know how despairing it was for me when it looked like HHDCRGDDB was going to stay, so I know how this probably hit you.

Why would they wait until the NHL draft to fire Whaley?

I'm not entirely disagreeing with you, but if you have two D that apparently don't have high Hockey IQ, why force them into a system that requires reading the entire ice and making pinpoint passes to drive the offense? Falk and Fedun looked promising, but it's tough to call them career years. Falk had more points in less games in 2011. Fedun has played 39 NHL games, 20 some this year. It's good that McCabe and Risto can play Dan's system, now we only need 4 more solid guys. Or a new system where the guys we have might be solid. It boils down to: I don't think the Sabres can come up with 6 guys that can be hugely successful in Dan's offense plan (long passes). And something is going on with D coverage where everyone (other than McCabe and Risto look completely lost out there). This really feels like one of those things where the guys that leave are going to look a lot better wherever they end up.

Well, the system doesn't have a lot a spice, so yeah.