jad1

18 Sabres out there sitting around, waiting for Eichel to do something

Dahlin played great today. From a grit standpoint, it was his best game of the year.

There were a lot of good players, but for whatever reason, there are several players on the roster who aren't scoring. The effort is there, but without Eichel's streak, this team is probably 2-8 over the last 10. This is where Botterill needs to make a move. The team is playing hard, but needs more offensive production. A legit 2C snaps a lot of players on the roster into the right place. Ultimately, Cozens will be that guy, but he's a season or two away. Botterill owes it to this current roster to make a deal.

I'm not going to blame a loss on the refs, but there's a longer term concern here. Dahlin has taken an elbow to the head in two of his last three games. Reinhart took a cross check face first into the boards. Eichel was taken down from behind in the corner. The Islanders play to the edge because the odds of the refs calling a penalty on a dirty play is 50/50, and probably less at the end of the game. Is it the goal of this garage league to have its stars knocked out of games by cheap shots? At some time player safety has to be a priority, right?

Shoot the f'n puck.

Sabres playing in the dirty areas right now.

Eichel is the best player in the league right now.

He's pressing to hard. This is way the team needs another couple of contributors on the forward lines, even though the team is playing better.

Johansson needs to simplify his game.

Eichel with a captain's interview.

Jokiharju with with a grown-a##-man play there at the blue line

B.Y.E. Baby Yoda Energy

Ha! Poweplay! (This game is over.)

I get it. Still think Botterill could have done better than the Krueger though.

Maybe I exaggerated Nolan's coaching acumen in comparison to Krueger's, as we watched Lucic carve up the Sabres defense....

So Vesey steals the puck at the point, can't beat the turned-around defenseman down the ice, and ends up holding the guy for a penalty. 50 years of Sabres hockey and this is what we've ended up with.

EPL strategy.

Fundamentally, the Sabres are a horror show. They had better zone coverage under Nolan, and that's not saying much. Being gritty and constantly out of position doesn't fix their problems, albeit the games would be more entertaining (like under Nolan).

If Vesey could finish, the Rangers wouldn't have traded him for a bag of pucks.

It's almost like hiring a coach with no hockey coaching experience the last 5 years was a bad idea.?

I'm beginning to hate that f###ing lottery.

This team won't crack 75 points this season.

He realized that as bad as he is at his job, he's still smarter than his boss. That's the sweet spot right there.

Let's not be hasty here. The big question is 'how is this handled in the English Premier League?'

I don't know. This seems like a situation where you're wrong until you're right. If you pick five bad GMs in a row, but the sixth one wins the cup, who cares about the five losers. There are only 31 (soon 32) of these jobs. If a candidate is afraid to take the job because he might get fired if he makes a mistake, who wants him? At some point, the odds dictate that an owner will pick a good GM. I'd rather the owner play those odds that sit around concerned about his reputation as another season goes down the drain.