Eleven

Buffalo News is reporting that Hutton will be the starter going forward. This is stupid.

Filly also got the best player in the deal. Forsberg > Lindros all day long. Again, if the value is there, fine, but I don't have confidence that Botterill can evaluate well. If--as you mention earlier--another GM is doing the trading on Buffalo's behalf, I'd be more confident.

This is interesting. A lot of emotion on one side (with a good argument here and there); a lot of good arguments on the other (with some emotion here and there). It all depends on the return. It always does. I'm with the posters who don't trust Botterill to bring back the right return.

Especially in Bowling Green. Imagine surviving the Bowling Green Massacre.

This freaking team.

Not according to these... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Jones_(footballer) -- shows 0 academy games https://www.soccerbase.com/players/player.sd?player_id=111601 -- only one academy preseason game https://www.espn.com/soccer/player/matches/_/id/190257/team/16728 -- 0 academy games (click the dropdown for U21) https://fbref.com/en/players/4fb9c88f/Curtis-Jones -- 0 academy games First, let's not sidetrack this any further. There's a soccer thread in the Clubs section and I'm happy to discuss there. For the purpose of discussion that actually is relevant to this thread, it remains that there is no traditional NA-style farm system in soccer, as far as I'm concerned. Second, it's time for you to show where you're getting your info from. Again, in the soccer thread, please.

Because... Yep

His name is John. His nickname is Jack. It's already done.

Anyway. The main topic. Relegation. It's interesting--wouldn't a Buffalonian love to see the Bisons in the majors? But NA sports aren't set up that way.

Here's my favorite team. I'm not seeing it: https://fbref.com/en/squads/1c781004/Norwich-City Here's Liverpool. Not seeing it here, either: https://fbref.com/en/squads/822bd0ba/Liverpool There is an 18 year old who played, but nothing on his player page indicates that he is an academy player. His wiki page indicates that he is with the senior team. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curtis_Jones_(footballer) And here's Palace, which I randomly picked from mid-table. Not there: https://fbref.com/en/squads/47c64c55/Crystal-Palace I don't know what else I'm supposed to look at. I'm certainly not going through every roster in English soccer.

They believe they want him to do that?

I don't think this is correct. They might loan out younger players. Call ups are infrequent in my experience, but I really only follow one league (England).

Not really. They're not calling up 16 year olds to play for the big club and then sending them down to the academy team for more training. I'm sure it's happened, but it probably happens once or twice a decade.

Those are the academy teams I referenced. They don't have farm systems as we understand that term in North America.

They sign the players as children to what they call "academy" teams and no, there is no farm system.

It would require a complete overhaul. Those European soccer leagues don't have drafts, for example.

Eichel works for the team. Do you want Kerry and Tim to fire Eichel? Seriously, though, the game day experience needs to change, big time.

It won't be easy, but they will.

Yes. A Pizza Hut pan pizza, to be specific.

Well, they just announced it during the Pro Bowl and then immediately cut to an image of a pizza. How ceremonious.

Everything about this all-star weekend was disappointing. The skills competition wasn't interesting, the 3-on-3 games sucked, the presentation on TV was horrible (hat-tip to @spndnchz), and there were too many stars missing.

Because they had to pick someone from Filly. Damn, I wish there was an "ignore thread" feature. I don't know why I keep clicking on this.

They are tremendous.

It's probably in or close to my top 10, but why is this comment here?