Drunkard

The stealth tank. I love it! So much winning (in Carrion lingo at least).

We still have a game in hand on those other teams though. However, I have full confidence in this organization to lose that game and look pathetic while doing so.

Hear hear. Gone are the days of having to put on a trench coat and dark glasses then drive to the local smut peddler to purchase pornography. The younger people don't know how good they have it, but they'll also never know the joys of the no eye contact shopping experience as you snag the last copy of Butt Invaders 7. Victory!

Lee Majors would destroy them all in any era using any rules. His seed produced the savior of all mankind.

I hope this is the case. Duchene is older than O'Reilly now (and much older than O'Reilly was when we actually acquired and extended him), he's worse offensively and much more defensively than O'Reilly, his contract will likely be more (several seasons have passed, the cap has gone up, etc.) than O'Reilly's, and it will run until a much later age (O'Reillys will end at age 31 where a new deal for Duchene will probably take him to age 35). I think it would be a huge mistake within just a few seasons, maybe even quicker.

No problem, man. Semper Fi.

I mean that defense spending (and more specifically defense contracting) is the biggest jobs program in the country by far. They rely on government spending to keep their industry afloat. That's why when even the Pentagon says they don't need any more of plane x, helicopter y, or tank z, Congress usually ignores them and appropriates money to keep building them anyway. Not because they are needed, but because without building those items some big factory in Ohio closes down and leaves a few thousand people unemployed. Military personnel runs the same spectrum of political opinions as any other population group. Some are conservative, some are liberal, some are independent. It doesn't change the fact that defense contractors are highly dependent on government spending, which makes it a much more socialist program than most conservatives would like to admit. Most conservative members of Congress have no issue with government spending as long as the money is spent on things that they deem to be worthy, whether it's defense contractors, tax cuts for the wealthy, or faith based initiatives.

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I agree that Trump is not a conservative in the traditional sense, but he still checks the 4 most important boxes to gain GOP support. 1. Anti-abortion (even if he himself is not, he only appoints judges from the approved list from Heritage) 2. Pro Gun 3. Military Spending (the biggest socialist and jobs program by far) 4. Tax cuts (which should probably be #1)

I hear ya. I wasn't trying to put all those justifications on you, either. It was more of a compilation of various arguments different posters have made over the time since the trade. We probably still could have gotten Skinner without moving O'Reilly but we most likely would have needed to move Kane at least. Skinner Eichel Mittelstadt Sheary O'Reilly Reinhart Smith Rodriguez Okposo Girgensons Larsson Pominville Theoretically I think that forward group would have fit under the cap for this season, plus we still could have picked up Montour using the San Jose pick for Kane. If not we could have bribed some team with something like a second round pick and a prospect to take on Pominville's last season under contract.

Gotta love the ever evolving argument to defend FXGMJB for his stupid decision to trade O'Reilly: When the trade first happened the defense was: 1. We traded him for a boat load of valuable pieces. We needed depth and we just acquired valuable depth for a single player. Hold my beer while I create awesome depth charts with Berglund looking great as our second line center until Mittelstadt is ready! Suddenly it's apparent that Berglund and Sobotka suck and Thompson should be in Rochester, so it morphs into: 2. Look at St. Louis's record! It's O'Reilly's fault, he's a team killer! Suddenly St. Louis starts to win some games and that excuse is toast so it morphs into: 3. GMJB got us a 1st round pick. Those are the most valuable commodity on the planet. This upcoming draft is loaded. The guy we get with that pick is gonna be great! Fast forward and that draft pick is possibly traded for Montour, so it morphs into: 4. We finished last with O'Reilly and the team has more wins this season so the trade was still good. Let's ignore the fact that we also added Dahlin, Skinner, Pilut, had Bogosian healthy for the first time since he first got here, McCabe being healthy for most of the season, and getting 2 new goaltenders who were playing lights out when we stacked up all those wins that are responsible for the increased point totals. So now the argument is we wouldn't have Skinner without trading O'Reilly? Awesome.

Positives: Dahlin looks great, even as an 18 year old rookie Eichel and Reinhart continuing to improve Acquisitions of Skinner and Montour Rodriguez provides a great bang for the buck Pominville and Moulson cap hits expire in just over a month Only one more season of Sobotka, Bogosian, and Hunwick

Yes, I should provide valuable insight like your Old MacDonald sold. I will strive to live up to your impeccable posting standards going forward.

I wonder if he intends to bring in more awesome depth players like Sobotka. We need more of them like Walken needs more cowbell.

Plus the socialism from all kickbacks he has to give soybean farmers due to screwing the pooch on trade with China, but it's a GOP member providing that socialism so we'll call it something else. I like to call it winning. So much winning.

We're never going to know everything, especially the behind the scenes stuff, so if we're only supposed to discuss things we know everything about then 90% of the posts on this board wouldn't get made. I doubt that's what Scott/SDS had in mind when he started this board. To make statements like I'll never know if Berglund would have earned his money or not is akin to saying not to share opinions on it because the jury is still out or some type of excuse. He produced poorly while he was here and couldn't contribute anything better than 4th line duties. He was 30 years old and already in decline. Botterill is fortunate that the team doesn't have to pay for that mistake for 3 more seasons. A crystal ball and all the behind the scenes information isn't needed to believe that's the likely outcome. The odds he was suddenly going to start producing at 31 or 32 when he sucked at 30 isn't very high. If they trade Ristolainen and the D flourishes, so be it. I'd rather not see FXGMJB try to fix his #2 center mistake by shipping him off, especially now that we finally have a solid stable of defenseman on the right hand side with him, Montour, and Bogosian, plus Nelson as depth and Borgen developing in the minors. It's Botterill's job to make that call and all his decisions will ultimately add up to whether he keeps his job long term or not. If he trades Ristolainen and the defense gets better, he'll probably keep his job. If the defense gets worse, I hope they toss him in the street before he can make any more stupid trades that hurt the team. You can fence sit all you want, but if everyone did that debate on this board would grind to a halt. I don't see the point in that. If everyone waited for the verdict to be in on everything, this place would suck and we'd only be able to talk about stuff from 10 years ago without discussing our speculating on the present or future of the team.

Quite the opposite.

1. You're full of it. Trading O'Reilly actually cost us cap space for this season so if we had enough space to acquire Skinner and Sheary after the trade, we certainly would have had the space to do it if we hadn't traded him. Sure some spots may have had to go to some guys on cheap contracts like Wilson, Smith, O'Regan, or Nylander, but it definitely could have been done. I'd rather spend $1 million in cap space watching Wilson and Smith play on the bottom 6 than spend $3.85 million to see Berglund play on the 4th line and paying Sobotka $3.5 million to ride the bench or play bottom 6 duties. Anyone playing for league minimum would have been preferable than overpaying for those bums, especially if it means we keep our second best forward. Skinner Eichel Mittelstadt Sheary O'Reilly Reinhart Wilson Rodriguez Okposo Girgensons Larsson Pominville Smith I'm pretty sure that forward lineup fits under the cap, if not you give some team a second round pick and maybe a prospect if you have to for them to take Pominville and replace him with a cheap guy from Rochester, some veteran who makes the league minimum, or a waiver pick up. 2. Plenty of posters here (myself included) thought it was a bad trade as soon as it was announced, so it's not a hindsight is 20/20 type situation. Sure we got repeatedly shouted down when the Blues started losing early in the season thanks in part to crappy goaltending and Tarasenko starting the season off in a scoring slump, but there were many of us who didn't like the trade from the get go. I've been saying it would be a mistake to trade Ristolainen for over a year (people wanted to trade him for Klefbom before we even had Montour and all we had on the right side was him, the always injured Bogosian, and Nelson). If they do end up trading Ristolainen, I think it will be a colossal mistake. If it comes to pass and the defense suffers, it won't be hindsight. I fear that FXGMJB is going to trade him to try to fix his #2 center mistake and the guy we get won't be nearly as good a O'Reily was, which means we'll end up downgrading at 2 critical positions (#2 C and RHD). 3. I don't care that we save a few million in cap long term. I care that players produce to justify their cap hit. O'Reilly earns his money, Berglund and Sobotka clearly don't/didn't. We were fortunate Berglund quit and ran home and saved us the future cap hits. That doesn't suddenly make it some shrewd cap saving move by FXGMJB. 4. There's a search function on the boards. Every post is archived. I don't believe in revisionist history. I like some trades and hate others. Sometimes I'm right sometimes I'm wrong but I never try to pretend I was right when I wasn't because it's relatively easy to go back and check. Trades I've liked: Skinner, Sheary (even though it hasn't exactly paid off), Montour, Scandella and Pominville Trades I've hated: Kane, O'Reilly, and if they trade Ristolainen it will be a huge mistake Furthermore I like Murray and still don't ***** on him even though most do. I absolutely detested his coach (Bylsma) though because I can't stand dump and chase style hockey and I hated his system. Transversely I hate Botterill and his approach of trading prime pieces for scraps, but I like Housley's system and I'm glad he's the coach even though the Sabres are struggling and sometimes he looks like he's in over his head.

No need to at this point. He's still cheap and under team control (RFA status). This isn't an Okposo or Bogosian situation where the guy is locked up long term for big money. If anything it may mean that we can lock him up at a lower cap hit, or we can sign him to a short term deal for an even lower rate to minimize risk.

Pretty much the same as if we had kept him. That's the biggest blunder of the trade Botterill made. He moved out O'Reilly's $7.5 million cap hit and downgraded the talent all while bringing in $8.275 million in cap hits ($3.85 million for Berglund, $3.5 million for Sobotka, and $925,000 for Thompson) so that's a poor argument. Sure he lucked out after the fact with Berglund walking away, but to suggest we moved O'Reilly for cap space so we could upgrade other areas is completely misleading. O'Reilly actually produced enough to justify his cap hit, unlike the proceeds of what we received by trading him.

I'd rather keep our good players and acquire more of them then do the FXGMJB special and trade a quarter for a nickel, 2 slugs, and a penny.

Using that logic we should trade Eichel.

Sounds like they want to raise praises but are afraid to do so after the waiting list for season tickets vanished like a fart in the wind so they are testing the waters with surveys.

I'd rather do that than see GMJB trade away Ristolainen is a failed attempt to fix his #2 Center mistake and just compound the talent issue further.

Botterill probably thought Berglund and Sobotka provided value, which should make us all question his ability to evaluate talent.