Thorner

Only enough to include him in a hedged bet with an un-ready Levi and un-fit to be an NHLer Comrie to the tune of literally half our games this season having been started by the latter 2, and poor goaltending results overall until ~ half way through the season, thereby significantly contributing to a slow start we were measuring by way of results this season, remember. If UPL is good next year, and the backup looks reasonable, and we make the playoffs, I’ll give Adams credit for sticking with UPL. And I mean that literally: he will in fact be due credit for sticking with him. It’s just not appropriate rn imo

Besides being intentionally hyperbolic, so as to really give this franchise a challenge in trying to live up to it, im not really saying they won’t/aren’t spending. My point was that the performance of their cap setup on paper is more important than its performance on the ice. It doesn’t need to be cheap, it just needs to look like value. That’s a big difference. It’s also how KA makes trades I merely present the real-time reaction to those deals as evidence. The reaction to those big contracts, in large majority, wasn’t about the contracts being expensive, and that the players had a lot to live up to. Nope. They were praised for their value. They were heralded upon signing.

Been forever since he’s seen the ice

I saw that and actually meant to “react” to it, your post is what gave me the idea It’s not going to be that way though, so I’m in the process of contradicting myself. Dollars to donuts a GM gets a “second coaching hire”, if we don’t fire Granato this offseason, I think it’s almost certain Adams is back for year 6 but we also know the goal is to be economic and efficient: so my suggestion is to alter the parameters for what we look for as fans. We should be rooting for economic efficiency. This is why we play online GM simulator mode, right? Cap is looking good for the next several years. I’m not sure it matters if we win, so long as we have a cap situation and prospect set up wherein it cannot be ruled out Up-thread hit on it brilliantly. A universal reality, that Many a truth are uttered in jest: “Oh, you need to have proof for your predictions, now?” such a Freudian, salient slip. We don’t need evidence of anything. Actual performance does not matter. If we can’t rule out that KA is building a dynasty, the process is going according to plan. And if timeline continues to be a non-existent factor, this can be the case in perpetuity We can *always* be the youngest team in the league, if we want to. We can *always* draft high and have a top prospect pool, if we want to. These things are available for free, at ease, ie literally *anyone* could be GM (Adams LITERALLY IS “anyone”. He has no merit as a GM), so long as these are the factors by which you measure success People can see the Hack, here, right? You can see the man behind the curtain?

Find me the GM who wouldn’t have signed Dahlin long term. Find me the poster who wouldn’t have signed Dahlin long term at the time we signed him. ”genius” Displaced helmet

Season…regime…owner… ya

They will *absolutely* tout “getting used to the new assistants” if we get off to a slow start next season. That’s not a joke: anything and everything can and does get framed by this regime in that way because, in their back pocket, they always have the “not about building a playoff team, it’s about building a perennial contender” card there isn’t a single thing they can’t spin by way of “short term pain for long term gain” it’s smart messaging on their part, as long as there’s buy in from the fanbase

Probably shouldn’t be, tbh. I guess it’s just not the hill I’ll die on, because the GM being held to a standard means so, so more more, i’d say. If Granato is back, Adams can go ahead and live and die by it, just like his roster if we lose literally because of the coach, and could have made it otherwise, that poor decision making would have bit us in the arse down the line, anyways. I’m good with Adams continuing to implement HIS plan and I’m good with documenting why it’s terrible, as long as it still is

On another note, if Adams and Granato are indeed tied at the hip, I’m fine with Granato being back next year if it’s do or die for both of them. There’s no keeping him hired just to fire him, and in so doing granting a further mulligan

Who said it wasn’t?

Do the injuries provide Adams with an excuse to more less run it back, a legitimate reason to run it back, or neither?

In hindsight, it was never been about them knowing more *about* what they are doing that the fans, it was about the fact *what* they were doing doesn’t align with what the fans want To them, the fans are indeed wrong about the lack of success, if they are defining success differently

Honestly, I feel such a connection to the fanbase that, once it got SO bad here that people generally stopped thinking/hoping/pretending that Adams and his regime had any idea solitary idea what they are doing, it was somewhat of a pressure valve release. Almost no one wants to carry water for the complete, unacceptable ineptitude the organization has shown, and that honestly somehow makes it easier to except, as a fan. In sports you can be loveable losers if you are, in fact, considered to be losers. Lions-Esque. one day it’ll turn around and it’ll be pure. In a sense that purity is born from the fact the fanbase became united, over the course of this drought.

And we’ve upped the scouting since: which I think represents the “regression to the mean” from Covid: but much of the spending practices appear to have remained the same

Someone like Brawndo can correct me if I am wrong, but I think it’s an actual established fact that Botterill would have kept his job had he been willing to cut staff. It’s basically saying the quiet part out loud: it struck me at the time and I said as much. Botterill wasn’t being fired for performance. Performance wasn’t a sticking point to Terry. The money was. This is pretty compelling to me. People will refer to context, to the Covid situation perhaps, but it doesn’t appear the mode of operation has changed, since. Until otherwise, it would be tough to form a cohesive argument, imo, for why winning is as important to this is franchise as its performance in a business sense, up to and including cost of payroll I could be wrong; I just don’t think so. I think that’s what we are seeing

That’s what I mean he sounds totally lost. That’s sort of my defining factor for why I’m saying he should go now after being reluctant to say it definitively until now: even HE doesn’t think he has any answers Many franchises would have already* changed GMs (*im speaking from the perspective/under the assumption that we miss the playoffs this year - many GMs wouldn’t get a 5th year with this sort of poor league-relative performance

Honestly, if you gave me 6 years to make the playoffs, I could be GM. That’s too long of a timeline for Adams There’s no argument to bring him back if you miss the playoffs your first 5 years

I don’t think Harrington actually knows. My reading was that he’s assuming the assistants would be gone, under the situation where Granato was back. Then again, he’s been firm on the idea Terry won’t pay another coach. I think it’s pretty clear objectively that Granato needs to be replaced going in to next season, just looking at the results with an unbiased eye and the way this team consistently struggles to get off to good starts Maybe it works out fine, maybe we win the cup next year, but I think it’s pretty quickly becoming apparent that the “Economic, efficient” Terry-doesn’t-wanna-spend-money-here things represents a solid Occam’s razor should Granato be back next year. Adams is the guy who said he could do it for less, when Botterill wouldn’t trim down, right? We should probably just listen to what they say. Winning would be nice, but the focus is being economic - that’s the primary quest of the team I keep saying that as fans our kin is other fans, the current employees that wear the colors are just that: our aims don’t even truly align

It’s not spin: I don’t think you understand what spin is It was merely a fact lol. The value went up. My point wasn’t that it went up because of Pegula: where did I say that? What exactly did I spin? My point was that, because of league values as a whole, it looks like a pretty safe investment

Gotta be honest, I stopped at “95%”. Kidding. You make a fair point.

I don’t buy it. Doesn’t make any business sense. Correct me if I am wrong, as my argument hinges on this, but hasn’t the value of the Sabres gone UP, considerably, since its last sale? I’d imagine a business-y businessman might look at that sort of business, undergone *even while a team stank to high heaven* and see a whole wack of..what’s the word? Oh ya: business potential. That the sabres couldn’t get a buyer to keep them in Buffalo is, I’d wager, a boogeyman

Could be.

A lot of people were arguing on twitter a couple days ago that the Wings were last year’s Sabres, that we shouldn’t be jealous of them. doesn’t really seem that way. They’ve been consistently in a playoff spot all year. Some were even saying they went “all in” to do it. Which seems wrong on several levels.