Thorny

Live look at Kevyn Adams as fans watch on from a helicopter Or is THIS a live look? We’ll have to wait until next season to find out

Absolutely. One mulligan is fair its all about playoffs in ‘25 now

It’s pretty much like in that Big Bang Theory episode (or, see also: real life) where they are sitting around making fun of phantom menace and Penny chimes in and Raj says “we can make fun of it. You can’t”. WE aren’t really part of this. WE don’t really know what we’re talking about. It was just another sad indicator of the disconnect between this regime/its players and the fan base (and probably why hiring Lindy was so important) They have no interest in claiming actual Sabres identity. Maybe we don’t have one. But if we don’t, our identity is definitely failure to make the playoffs for 13 years: which is the exact identity Adams goes out of his way to distance himself from, like with Seravali recently Even the long form plan they took was with full knowledge of and I’d argue disregard for the position the fans are in, of no playoffs: there was zero urgency to claim that and fix that: they are doing their own thing it’s been hard for me. I see the crest, but since Adams took over the team has been unfamiliar. And they’ve done it by choice for the record, I get WHY. It is difficult though. Ideally you’d think there’d be a middle ground - we haven’t seen it but Ruff is a sign it might be now here

I don’t even think it’s some nefarious thing, liger is right they take on the mindset of the organization, but they more less imbibe it: the top-down refusal to measure results in the now becomes part of a fabric of their developing identity Some recognize it and ask out Don’t forget that Jack specifically said on record he asked to be dealt *because* Adams wanted to rebuild. We didn’t have to rebuild because Jack wanted out

Such an odd vibe. Not what I expected from the group at all honestly, and I’ve had my beefs obviously. So much we are hearing is just so weird. Tuch’s comments *during the season*/playoff push on a podcast that “we are young, we’ll eventually get there.” Why? Why throw the towel in verbally when you are still in it EDIT - just realized there’s a thread for this specific discussion already, my mistake

Big part of the reason season was so disappointing is again alluded to here by KO. The bit specifically about how they “knew” in *OCTOBER* things weren’t right. So if they knew so soon things weren’t right, and they knew the locker room was feeling entitled (KA’s press conference), how did it get to a situation it went south so fast? If it was imminently obvious that quickly, presumably it was discoverable or even obvious before the season started? Why did the GM allow the situation to exist, and the fester for so long? At this point the discussion on the failure of this season is sort of getting redundant, what matters now is the coming season: it’s just disheartening we keep getting forced to come back to the analysis cause we keep getting more hard-line confirmation they really were lost right out of the gate

Chara or Logan Stanley

It’s annoying when literally any of the teams left win

It’s because everything is happening according to a clear plan. Sounds funny, but if you think about it. People are weary of his plans so in an odd way a longer process for these things with less certainty would psychology reflect better Adams is deliberate, it’s been to a fault, we’ll see which way the cookie crumbles next year

There’s not much sense looking beyond this year anyways tbh. We are either in the playoffs and we wanna keep everyone, or we miss and Adams likely gets fired and we have no idea what happens with anyone

But we’ve got the succession plan all mapped out. We are a well run franchise.

Why would they have this already mapped out? They are assuming failure? Are they assuming success? If Ruff is good, wouldn’t you keep him? Did Ruff say he only wanted 2 years?

Bruins on the ropes

He’s hit the 2 coaches mark and he’s hitting 5 years this year. Especially cause you’d expect to fall on the below average side of things considering the severely below average performance, nonetheless we reach his likely endpoint if we miss this coming season

you know what they say about responsibility

I’m not arguing against you I’m arguing with you

Than the next closest ALL TIME

I’m of the opinion we undersell this stuff due to the nature of the news cycle and our media and the scroll culture and just an overload of content. We see a tweet that shows where the sabres sit in the record books and we “ha ha” but forget about the specifics cause “ya I know we suck I’ve heard it a million times.” they have the longest playoff drought of *all time*. Just think about it for a bit. No one has been that bad, ever. In centuries. Multitudes of teams. It’s us: we are it. Hyperbole cannot and need not apply, ever we are extraordinary Our longest all time drought is THIRTY PERCENT longer than the next closest

Is this post from 2019? What page are you on? Spoiler, the drought is still going. We left colossal shite show in the rear view several hundred miles ago

I just disagree, as I’ve stated. Pegula being a terrible owner is an admittedly crappy handcuff but that’s the job: Adams took it willingly, did he not? Winning with an owner who won’t spend is still possible when winning is defined as being top 16. It’s not a hard thing to do with competence

Ya it definitely works both ways. You can’t just time travel McDavid backwards and you’d need to give Gretzky the advantages of today. You can only measure true greatness relatively - still Wayne for me easily. But like, if you DID time travel McDavid backwards as is, he would annihilate everyone, every night. Some people don’t get that. And no, he wouldn’t get “clocked”. If he can avoid collisions at the speed of today, he can dodge pylons in 1970. Regardless of if said pylon personally doesn’t like it and wants to dish out damage Jim Brown would be an average sized back today. Olympic records are reset every 4 years. Athletes are bigger strong faster it’s just true

We are and have been sold the idea that Adams told us, and is to this day proud of it (watch the seravalli interview) that this process needed to take 5 years. It was a lie. If we make the playoffs next year, it wasn’t less of a lie. It has already taken too long. It shows that Pegula isn’t trying

Everything. They illustrate that you can suck and make the playoffs