dudacek

What a horrible shift from Skinner. Two blown exits, and he managed to be the last one up and the last one back on every rush.

Gotta say Bryson so far is sure looking like we what hoped we were getting with Montour. Such a great skater.

It hurts listening to RJ right now. He’s a legend because of his cadence would match and amplify the flow of the game so well, but he’s a hall-of-farmer because he was so dialed in to what was happening. That’s vanished entirely. All he’s got now is the sound of his voice.

This. He’s either been completely neutered by over coaching, or he is being obstinate to prove a point, because this is easily his worst period of the year. And he is dragging Sheahan and Mittelstadt down.

Holy cow has the broadcast been awful. Staal sets up a wide-open Cozens in the slot for the Sabres best chance for the period there and neither guy even mentioned it happened. A few minutes Earlier, Eakin throws himself in front of a puck on the PK to block a shot that was headed into the open net with Hutton down and out. We get Rayzor “that was a bit of a cluster.” Bryson takes a penalty be lifting Hayes stick to save another goal and we get “Hayes missed the open net” and “Bryson clipped him with a high stick.” Call what is happening, please. They are so disengaged.

John’s had an unhealthy chip on his shoulder on here, but he seems to be a pro at his job. He seems to strike the right balance between asking the tough questions but not being an ass about it. Harrington seems to have reined himself toward that line recently after a long stretch of being a dick, although my only exposure to his work these days is recognizing his voice in a presser.

Usage and deployment colour results, they don’t dictate them. And you and I both know that Jeff Skinner was not being force fed tough defensive minutes against the other team’s best players last year. Last time I checked goals for and against is the measurement for winning hockey games. If you can produce some arcane chart that “proves” no goals, three assists and -17 over 22 games was actually good, I think you’re missing the point of hockey. Putting all your stock into theoretical measurements while dismissing actual results is the epitome of ivory tower thinking. The emperor has no clothes.

These are both spot on, IMO. Don't underestimate Krueger's clout with ownership. Also, Kevyn Adams has no allegiance to Skinner.

And I think it's obvious there is power struggle going on between Ralph and Jeff. I'm just responding to the idea the consensus around here that Ralph caused the power struggle by jerking Jeff around for no reason by providing evidence that the reason (terrible production) predated the jerking. I'm fully on board with the idea the Krueger could have and should have handled the situation better. But I am frankly shocked that I seem to be one of the few upset with Jeff's play, which has been bad for a year now.

I wouldn't argue if Okposo was sat. I would argue that Ralph is giving him the benefit of the doubt because he played well last year and he is coming back from an injury. Just like he gave Jeff the benefit of the doubt and continued to play him a lot throughout the first two months of his enormous slump last year, and kept him in the lineup even after it continued. I mean, my god, 0/3/3/-17 in 22 games? Who does that and doesn't get benched?

This is where the disconnect comes for me. The chance has become more and more negligible as time has past and Skinner's slump continues. The Jeff Skinner of the past year smells a lot like the Kyle Okposo of a few years ago, without the excuses of "injury" and "good teammate" propping him up. I'm not sure why you are giving as much weight as you are to the small sample size of Skinner's early season analytics. I have not seen Sheahan/Lazar to be less effective with Asplund or Mittelstadt than with Skinner.

I don't think Skinner scoring 4 goals in a month is bad. Disappointing by the standards he previously set, but not bad. Scoring 4 goals in 46 games, or 7 in 60, that's bad, especially for a guy who is in the league for his offence. That's a look at your other options level performance. I actually thought Jeff's work in the details of the game were as good as I've seen them in the first half-dozen or so games this year. And even as his production sucked over the past year, Jeff still did two things really well: draw penalties and generate a high number of shots in high danger areas. But (again, over the past year) I struggle to see where else he has helped the team. Generally speaking he doesn't get in hard on the forecheck and retrieve pucks. He doesn't get open for tap-ins or burying one-timers. He doesn't support his linemates well by getting open for them, finding them when they are open, or rotating to fill the holes when they attack. His passing is outright bad. He will make some really nice steals from behind at times, but he's not winning a ton of puck battles, or providing good puck support for his teammate's battles, and he is generally the last man back on the backcheck. He is non-entity on zone exits, doesn't carry the puck much through the neutral zone or shine on entries. He doesn't wear down the opposition physically, block shots or win faceoffs. He doesn't kill penalties and has not added much to the PP those times he's been on it. Is his overall play "worse" than the other guys rotating through the bottom six? Not really. Should he have been tried earlier and more sincerely with the talent more than the 5 periods he got this year? Yes. Has he been doing more than Lazar, Sheahan, Reider, Mittelstadt, Cozens, Olofsson, Hall, Reinhart, Okposo, Thompson or Asplund? Maybe Thompson and Okposo. Has he contributed more than your typical bottom-sixer? No. And sitting out a bottom-six player isn't worth losing your ***** over.

That Ullmark sequence and Sam's lacrosse goal were those moments where you stop and “say how did he do that?” It is so sad they were squandered and will vanish from our memory banks in the quicksand that is Pegula Sabres.

I think Asplund has been pretty good too, in a 4th-line kinda way. Really, all of Sheahan, Lazar, Eakin, Rieder and Asplund have been solid in the kill-penalties, win face-offs and don’t ***** things up kinda way coaches like from their fourth liners. But a good team only wants two or three of those guys in the lineup at any given game, rather than four or five. We have a lot of guys that can play centre, but it’s still our weakest position. The majority was right, in that Eakin hasn’t got the 20- to 30-point upside we had hoped, and the majority was wrong that Staal could fix our 2C issues. The brain is still there, but the body is not. There is an opportunity for Casey, should he grab it.

Of course it adds up. The whole hockey world saw Jack’s leg bend awkwardly and him favouring it afterward. He missed the morning skate to rest it, tried it in warm-up and decided not to go. Krueger lied about it to the media because hockey culture says admitting your injury in this kind of instance gives up some kind of competitive advantage. Nothing to see here except the normal eye-rolling NHL coach speak

If Casey continues playing like he has his first five games he should stay in the lineup. It’s certainly been the best stretch we’ve seen from him. He looks like he has a better understanding of how the game works at this level - where to go and what he can and cannot do.

@IKnowPhysics I don’t expect everyone to read all my rants, especially when they are as unpopular as my opinions on Skinner. But your stat breakdown fails to properly address Skinner’s first Krueger season by looking at it in linear fashion, the way a new coach would. October: Skinner scores 7 goals in 13 games while getting 18 minutes a game November: Skinner slumps to 3 goals in 14 games, but Krueger keeps playing him 17 minutes a game December: Skinner’s slump continues. He scores once in 12 games putting him on a two-month streak of 4 goals in 26 games, and 11 in a row without scoring before he gets injured in a Dec. 27 game against Boston. Krueger starts cutting his ice time more as the streak continues and he ends up averaging a shade under 16 minutes - still top six minutes - for the month. January: Skinner averages 19 minutes in his two-game return, but is -3 without a point. February: Skinner’s goalless streak grows to 22 games where his stat line reaches 0/3/3/-17 before he finally scores. Skinner’s stat line for the month ends up 3/1/4 at a little over 14 minutes a game. March: Krueger, perhaps encouraged by a brief spark of recent offence, gives him more ice time - 18 minutes a game over 4 games. Jeff responds by going -5 and pointless. To me it looks like a textbook case of a player who played himself out of his coach’s good graces and then failed to play his way back in. What am I missing? https://www.espn.com/nhl/player/gamelog/_/id/5540/year/2020/jeff-skinner

Just because people keep saying this doesn't make it true. Skinner continued to play close to 18 minutes a night in November and December last season despite the fact he only scored 4 goals in that period and started what eventually became a 22-game goalless drought. Skinner stopped scoring well before Krueger started "jerking him around"

Ralph Krueger should have given Jeff two weeks straight with Jack at some point over the past 50 games in order to see what would happen. Jeff Skinner sucks, I never wanted him on my team, and his first three months in Buffalo were a mirage. Framing this as "one of them has to go" as the reason why this team is good or bad is a false argument

Skinner got 7 of his 14 goals in the first month of the season, playing with Sobotka and Johansson. He got 12 goals in Housley's final 41 games playing mostly with Jack and Sam. Krueger has not done everything he could to restart Skinner's game, but Skinner stopped scoring long before Krueger got here. And you don't think the numbers I posted have anything to do with it (the benching, I mean)?

My question was about how much more leeway does he get? He's had one good month out of the past 10. When does his current performance start outweighing his past performance?

Okposo was recovering from injury and Skinner's stretch of bad play stretches back way further than Kyle's

How much more? Jeff Skinner's monthly goal totals since the second half of his last season in Carolina (the bolded marks his first three seasons in Buffalo: Jan. 2018 3 Feb. 2018 5 Mar. 2018 4 Apr. 2018 0 Oct. 2018: 6 Nov. 2018: 14 Dec. 2018: 6 Jan. 2019: 5 Feb. 2019: 5 Mar. 2019 1 Apr. 2019: 3 Oct 2019: 7 Nov. 2019: 3 Dec. 2019: 1 Jan. 2020: 0 Feb. 2020: 3 Mar. 2020: 0 Jan. 2021: 0 Jan. 2021: 0 Think a graph might show and interesting trend? He's had one good month out of the past 10, four out of the past 19. Kyle Okposo has a good history of scoring goals prior to turning 27 and signing a big contract. EDIT: Also, interesting to note that his second-best month came playing under Ralph (italics)with Sobotka and Johansson on his line.

Maybe I'm off here, but could it have something to do with the 4 goals and 7 points in 46 games? I mean 4 goals and 9 point in 31 games got Casey Mittelstadt sent to the minors...?

Thompson was dropped from the Eichel line partway through the second game of the season and got another two periods with Jack a few weeks later. Skinner played five periods with Jack before he was dropped back down and then sent to the press box. The production of Thompson and Skinner this year has been identical with similar ice time and similar usage, except Thompson was benched a half-dozen times before Skinner was benched even once.