Eleven

So do you give Terry credit for the Nylander trade?

Yes, especially in a sign-and-trade. I don't want him gone without a very nice return, though.

Yes, but Rip will call him "Hensie" or "Joksie" instead.

Either Ristolainen or McCabe will still be here to bring the mean.

Wow it's been a long time since I thought of that. It's like the first meme in Internet history to me.

/r/hockey has plenty of them melting down.

GIVE ME ALL OF THE DEFENSEMEN.

I didn't know about it until now. I'll try it for a bit.

This story has been corrected to delete a reference to Pegula being a Manitoba native. He is from Pennsylvania.

Do it and I'll come see you play. So far, I've seen a sled game and two regular games this year, two regular games last year, and I went to the mega game two years ago about four or five times. Hockey, friends, and cancer research are three very important things in my life!

I was there yesterday evening and Friday night. It's fun.

I love this metaphor.

It's only about a week or two old.

Here is Tim Graham's mailbag Q&A on the subject of meddling: There is a feeling that Terry Pegula did not want an experienced GM and did not hire a hockey president because he wants to have the last word in all the player matters (trades, salary, etc). With a first-time GM and no president, Pegula is the guy who takes the last decision, and I think the abrupt and unfortunate Ryan O’Reilly trade it is on Pegula, not on Botts. What is your insight? — Sergiu S. People I trust tell me this is inaccurate. In fact, Terry Pegula has been increasingly hands-off over the years with both the Sabres and Bills. He hires executives to do those jobs and lets them work without meddling. Pegula has final say over every personnel move; that is any owner’s prerogative. But insight from those who know insist Pegula provides Sabres GM Jason Botterill and Bills GM Brandon Beane all the latitude and resources they wish. Many folks are upset the Pegulas haven’t installed a hockey or football czar above Botterill or Beane, or haven’t hired another president since Russ Brandon’s firing. I don’t understand why this is a controversial issue. The term “president” isn’t consistently applied throughout sports. A president with one club might be what another team calls its general manager or its vice president of hockey operations. Some presidents handle only the business and carry zero sway on sports decisions. Botterill and Beane are in charge, so there’s no need for a president, no purpose for another layer in between either GM and the Pegulas.

Working on it.

Pretty convenient to leave out the "without meddling" part of the quote. Same Tim Graham piece mentioned that not all teams have someone in operations over the GM.

Tim Graham in The Athletic gave a detailed response to a question about their involvement with the actual teams' sporting operations. It's about three or four paragraphs from a longer article. The short of it is: They're not involved. If the mods think I can post just that portion of the article, I'm happy to.

Not on the marketing side.

They're already hands off.

Isles, I am getting bored over here...let’s go do something regrettable already!

Hoss. You’re way off on this one. Like ***** miles away. It wasn’t even a race-based comment (the NBA has non-black players and gangs have non-black members) until YOU colored it that way. And you’re talking about a guy who visits Africa in his free time to provide medical care. Please resist the temptation to double- or triple-down on your accusation and consider apologizing to the guy.

4

Yeah, I don’t know why he posted that, but he can ***** right off.

No, @North Buffalo, you're supposed to do it WITHOUT the thumb.

This is exactly why it needs to happen: so we can watch two teams get screwed.