MattPie

Or that was the first year Montreal didn't have dibs any more. :) I took a look at Montreal's seasons since 1970: - I didn't realize the run they were on from 67-80. Am I reading that right, they had 8 cups in 13 years? Yikes! - If you take the "we get dibs" effect out (they presumably got good FC kids in 67-69 and those kids played well for the Habs through the 70s) and start with 1980, they have only two cups.

How many Montreal cups came when they had dibs on any French Canadian players? I'm wondering how that worked, did Montreal just get to submit a list of players they wanted and got? Or did they sit in the call and any time a FC player came up with another team's pick they just yelled, "dibs, you EEnglish pig-dogs" into the phone?

Are you really trying to equate the 96-97 Sabres (who lost to Philly 1-4 in the 2nd round) with Pittsburgh? That's a stretch.

If you're up for a ride, there's a place near me called "The Whip" that normally has decent wings and beef on weck on the menu. It's an "English" pub in horse country, but the manager is/was from Orchard Park NY. For awhile, Victory Brewing in Downingtown had beef on weck on the menu; the chef liked experimenting with local foods. It wasn't bad, but the roll was a little foo-foo compared to a traditional sandwich. http://www.thewhiptavern.com/

I don't understand why it's so pervasive, but it's been a long time since Buffalo has had a decent rep as a city nation-wide. I think it's because the only time Buffalo makes the national news is when we're snowed in. I'm furiously trying to enjoy the 4 weeks of nice weather here before it gets miserably hot and humid here near Philadelphia. These four weeks here is the same weather are what Buffalo gets from June until September. But that doesn't make the news. It's all about air conditioning. Once AC became prevalent, it wasn't as miserable to live in the south so lots of people moved there to get away from the snow. As for the teams, that one baffles me. As you mention, Buffalo fans support their teams through thick and thin (and there's been lots of thin) when many cities would have left them to die. That being said, based on population Buffalo would never be awarded a team now. While Buffalo used to be in the top-10 in population 100 years ago and still respectable 50 years ago, we're near #50 in the US now.

This does seem like a pretty big sell, I'm not sure I'm buying yet. :) Drane, you're making a big deal about the fastest coach to 200/250 wins. Anyone want to look to see how many first-time NHL coaches get handed the keys to the previous year's SCF finalist?

Matt Ellis.

No kidding. I wonder if there's a good place in Lancaster (PA); I'll meet you half way.

Fixed that for you. Crumbles have their uses. :)

I'm sure they do, but I can't imagine ordering anything other than traditional wings if I'm at Bar Bill. Honey BBQ is for when I'm at Buffalo Wild Wings or something (not in Buffalo).

Frankly, I was worried I'd be banned for taking a stand against blue cheese. I stand by my statement: the only reason to put blue cheese on wings is if you don't like how wings taste alone. I can't fathom why someone wouldn't like wings alone though. Many years ago I worked with a guy that went to college in Buffalo and he was giving me about not eating BC on wings. I had to pull the "I've been eating wings since I was 5 years old" line on him. :) Also, I don't put horseradish on beef for the same reason. The beef and roll are so damn good on their own, why would I add something that completely overwhelms that? Celery is for wiping up the bits of sauce in the bottom of the basket. Can't let it go to waste.

It just makes it more like real life. NYI and EDM having been picking (and making trades) by a different set of rules for years!

F that, blue cheese is for people who don't enjoy what wings taste like.

I think California mandates a week of paid leave for fathers. That's something at least.

That would be nice. In theory, I have 3 months of FLMA leave for the birth of my child up until 1 year after the birth. Unpaid leave, that is. I'm not sure how many people can afford to take 1/4 year off without pay, but it ain't me with a wife that isn't working and a new baby (well, at the time, she's 9 mo. now). To make it worse, if I were to take the time, I'm technically not an employee so all my accesses and accounts get turned off and it takes forever to get everything reinstated once I get back to work.

Yeah, the oven step is awesome It's unfortunate more places don't do it. Or the celery. Or carrots. Or fingers. Or the napkins. Sunnabich, I need to get to Buffalo, like now.

Java is fine, there's a whole host of JVMs for Linux (and Windows) to choose from. If I were doing it, I'd probably be writing it as Java webapp for Tomcat (that seems to be popular around here). That's speaking as an IT guy that's only do some very simple web work.

I've had wings on a grill before which were pretty good. I was sceptical but my friend dumped a bag of (I think frozen) wings on the grill on high, closed the lid, and left them other than stirring and turning occasionally. Plastic bowl of sauce like usual and they were pretty solid.

You beat me to it!

The fewer wings per batch the better. If you dump a ton in they'll drop the oil temperature down too far and they'll just be soaking in grease until it comes back up. (Disclaimer: I don't fry much of anything due to the mess, this is academic knowledge)

I didn't watch, so I can't comment on his play. With 36 points in the regular season, he's something like 38th for RW, so 2nd line material (basic stats). He'll probably get $4-5M, and that's probably too much for a 3rd liner.

If you guys want to set this up and SDS doesn't want to bother, I'd be interested in setting up Amazon hosting (or something) for it if Wildcard is writing it in a Linux-friendly format. If there's not much traffic there might be very small hosting costs which I'll cover. If it gets expensive I'd take a cut from the pot or something.

He's better than 3rd-line in basic stats, and gets paid far too much to "only" be there. Maybe on the second line with Samson and Moulson.

To expand a little: generally, NFL arenas are only really used for football and concerts. The NHL plays in more mixed-use environment. Also, it's easy to say: don't book on these weekend dates in January. The NHL needs: don't book too much in the latter half of April, all of May, and most of June. The NHL might need to squeeze 3-4 games every two weeks that you won't know the schedule until a day or two before it starts. I'm now wondering if the arena is required to leave days open no matter what. Does the F'N Center have a bunch of dates empty in June in case the Sabres went to the SCF this year? (OK, maybe Buffalo is a bad example since I'd guess the center isn't that busy, but somewhere like MSG...)

It's e. e. cummings, damn it! But then they won't get to crow about how bad they made the other one look (while we just roll our eyes). The only thing that bothered me about the exchange is that someone things GoDD has a bully pulpit and not a sandwich board on the street corner. We had cups with strings. :)