nfreeman

It wasn’t a bunch of random people. The 3 authors of the GBD are epidemiologists and scientists from Oxford, Harvard and Stanford — ie substantially better credentialed than the authors of the Jon Snow article. I think an important starting point in a discussion like this is to accept that there are reasonable, intelligent and well-intentioned people on both sides, and very limited and often-conflicting data.

To be clear — discussion of lockdowns vs reopening is fine in this thread, but not random shots at political leaders of any affiliation.

Especially because Mitts is 50/50 to wash out and it’s likely that one of Samuelsson or Johnson does the same.

I'm glad you posted this. I think a reasonable discussion about lockdowns vs reopening, and the scientific support for each side, is a good conversation to have. Especially when the Prince who was Promised is involved!

Holy straw man, batman! Good players can have bad games. I don't understand the point of insisting that someone didn't have a bad game when it is manifestly obvious that it happened.

Holding firm on the "JA was fine" position, eh?

Well, I think it was more a matter of him departing from his mechanics and simply missing on a bunch of open throws. It seems like in this year's NFL, you need to score at least 27 to beat the good teams. If you have open receivers on 3rd down and just miss them by 8 feet, you're not going to win.

I don't think the Sabres would, or should, unload 2 good players in order to bring in Kuemper (or any other goalie), and you're right that in my example, it would be tricky for them to figure out how to clear that last $2MM - $3Mm in cap space. I suppose I was thinking of buying out Hutton or giving someone a pick or prospect to take him. BTW, it sure would be nice right now to have that last $1MM of cap space that JB rolled over from last year, innit? (To be fair, we could say the same for the $700K or so that they are overpaying Zemgus.)

Maybe I'm missing something, but what about a simple Montour-for-Kuemper trade, with the Sabres retaining half ($1.9MM) of Montour's cap hit? AZ gets a good player and $2.6MM in savings. The Sabres deal from a position of strength and fill a major need. The Sabres would still need to figure out a way to save $2MM to $3MM in cap somewhere, but this would be a major upgrade on the ice. I suppose it might not be appealing enough from AZ's perspective -- but they seem pretty clearly intent on shedding salary, and there aren't many takers at this point.

The good news is that we know Allen can play better, because he did it in the first 4 games. The bad news is that they cannot win a playoff game if he plays like he has the past 2 games, which is how he played in the playoffs last year.

All of the broader hockey B nominees are excellent.

I like this and would just add that goodwill would be created if the Sabres added Kuemper, who had a big year and helped the Sabres have an exciting year that got them to the playoffs. With Kuemper under contract for another year, plus Jack, Dahlin, RK, Terry’s checkbook and Hall’s family not far away, that would be hard for Hall to walk away from. If KA does this they will go to arbitration and Sam will likely get more. I think the more logical move for both sides is a 2-year or possibly 3-year deal that gets Sam financial security and takes him to UFA. Both sides would have some security and plenty of flexibility.

Yes indeed. This is very real and adds quite a bit of pressure to the situation.

This loss is on Allen -- specifically his poor accuracy.

It all comes down to the cost to keep Reino, who is a good player, vs the available alternatives. It will probably cost somewhere in the $6MM - $6.75MM range per year to keep Reino on a long-term deal. He's not going to accept $5MM and the Sabres aren't going to give him $8MM (and no team would do so). If Hall is healthy and back to his pre-injury form, he's a substantially better player than Reino. If that version of Hall is willing to sign with the Sabres for, say, $9MM per year, the Sabres will almost certainly say yes (as every other NHL team would), even though it probably means not keeping Reino. If Hall doesn't return to that level, or if he and the Sabres can't agree on terms, then the likelihood of bringing in a better forward than Reino between now and the start of the 2021-2022 season decrease significantly. The 2 sides are reportedly in talks on an extension. I would love to know what the Sabres are offering.

What a play by Diggs. And a nice throw too.

Let the record reflect that those dastardly refs just gave the Bills a 1st down when Allen had clearly stepped out of bounds on a 3rd down scramble, which led to a Bills FG. Also, JA has thrown about 5 really bad passes so far.

I was not a fan of Doc's, although I certainly didn't hate him. He is quite knowledgeable and he loves the game. I just have always felt that he talked too much (a habit he shared with a number of other sportscasters, like Mike Patrick and Mike Tirico). If the sheer number of words had been reduced by 30% I would've been quite happy with him. In any case, I hope he has a long, healthy and happy retirement.

Welcome @chloewoj!

As I've said previously, I think there is a good chance that Hall has a big year on Eichel's wing, and that he likes it here enough to sign an extension -- and that the Sabres will be very interested in doing so. If that's the case, their decision on Reino will be informed by a desire to maintain sufficient payroll flexibility to allow them to sign Hall. It doesn't seem likely that Reino would sign a long-term deal that is cheap enough (i.e. $5MM per year or less) for the Sabres to feel like they would still have enough room for what it will take to keep Hall (which, if Hall is happy here, I think will be about what Skinner got). The Sabres might be OK with going through arbitration with Reino, since it would only be a 1-year deal and he would still be RFA at the end of it. It's a very interesting situation.

I think your top unit looks right, although I think the substitution of Staal for VO that dudacek proposed is quite possible. On the 2nd unit, I'd expect Risto to have the only D spot over Joker if they play 4 forwards. I also think TT will be in the mix if he can fire the weapon reliably on the one-timer. This would also no doubt improve Staal's happiness level. I can definitely see this happening.

What is the bolded based on? Totally agree on Grzelcyk.

Fleury.

I just re-watched “ The Guard” with Brendan Gleeson, Don Cheadle and Liam Cunningham (Ser Davos from GoT). Excellent, funny cop movie set in a small town in Ireland. Solid A-minus and perhaps an A. I also recently saw Terminator: Dark Fate. Not great but reasonably enjoyable if you liked the first 2 Terminator movies. I’ll give it a B.

Well, I think KA and RK identified secondary scoring as a major issue in the roster and tried to address it with Staal and Eakin, and of course Hall was a huge addition that will help secondary scoring by pushing a top-liner down in the rotation. I think they also think they will get additional secondary scoring from at least one of Cozens or TT, and that whoever takes Larsson's minutes will contribute more scoring than Larsson did. I agree that they've emphasized grit and character, and that Staal and goaltending are major question marks that will be impactful however they turn out. I think they are planning for Eakin to be the 3rd-line center, for his line to contribute a decent amount of offense between him and one or both of Cozens and TT and for that line to play a bigger role than Zemgus-Lazar-KO, which I think will be the 4th line.