Thorner

If the Sabres win out, they’ll finish with 107 points: good for 8th overall last year

You aren’t a Cozens fan? first I’ve heard of it

It’s youth and experience based Young players are the most prone to mental lapses and inconsistent play We are the youngest team in the league: I honestly do struggle to see how that’s not the issue. they are all young, and just happen to randomly all have heart issues, too? It’s simpler. It’s the environment - we continually field rosters exceptionally unbalanced in this fashion

I was speaking in terms of age balance, which is our main issue. In that vein, those players won’t improve us next year. We won’t be improved by injecting youth. Ymmv: but that’s the conclusion I’ve drawn based on the considerable pool of results keeping the team young is a conduit to keeping it cheap. Sure, yes, the player is nice: but the way we are acquiring said player is part of a pattern of operation ensuring we never make the playoffs

It would reflect well on Adams I’d say, don’t get me wrong. It’s the type of aggressiveness we need(-ed, a long time ago). And that’s the point: I can’t flip my whole mantra of results being the focus (and 5 years no playoffs) in the name of a single swap when train had already gone off the rails. is there a universe in which we see an EP swap and Adams is still canned at season’s end? - - - ironically, trading for EP in the midst of year 5 of straight misses under Adams, when “trades are impossible” was so often used in his defence, is arguably more damning than not

Exactly what I was thinking. If Adams makes the deal, does that mean he’s back? If that’s the case, I agree: I’d rather not see the trade. Too detrimental in the macro IMHO

Ohh that’s a good point. If we really do need another high draft pick to “save” us we are screwed anyways: and the idea a critical mass of youth will eventually just put us over doesn’t work either, we’ve had an abundant system with graduations and it’s not working without a better vet component To your point, we weren’t *counting* on a high pick, based on our analysis of the system and roster: better to look at the reasons what we have isn’t coming to fruition and add to it in a way we haven’t in the name of balance Rather than continuing to supplement in the same way we have over and over

Simply said the sabres are among teams that have shown interest

Marino is misquoting him, though. Friedman never said that And a bunch of people have, of course, run with it. Some even stating is as sabres being THE favourite

“Can’t even be mad at that one” lol f*cking sad

It’s not input on roster decisions. It’s a self-imposed salary cap. This is a recording it doesn’t change the fact that ultimately the buck stops at the owner: but he’s absentee, he doesn’t care. The idea he’s overbearingly present is at strict odds with the actual root of the problem

I think what people underestimate most is that no one isn’t willing to consider the context and grant Adams and co certain caveats. I think people actually understand that, similar to Winnipeg, building a great team here isn’t the easiest thing to do. We aren’t talking about that, though. We are talking about making the playoffs once. We are talking about not failing to make it for 5 straight years. We are talking about how we’ve averaged 70 something points for 5 years. The caveats excuse some failure, not complete ineptitude. Maybe we can’t be the Jets. Maybe we can’t make the playoffs 8 times since they came back. The rub is that everyone is simply asking to make it once

Actually? I legit feel like they play every day. Must be in a busy stretch

Soon, Terry will have himself a new apprentice….one younger, and with an eye to the future far more powerful

When only unqualified candidates are willing to take the job because the opening requirement is firing a bunch of staff and operating within a self imposed budget, (and shining the shoes of the owner) - the mystery of why said GM can’t produce good results explains itself. An unqualified hire operating under restrictions that demonstrably prevent teams from making the playoffs The restrictions need to change regardless of GM

A lot of owners want eveything run by them. Most, I’d say. That’s not what makes Terry stand out from the majority. That’s not a variable that on it’s own comes close to distinguishing us from the rest of the league and thus explaining our inability to make the playoffs Youngest. Young teams are cheap. Cheap teams don’t win. Teams that don’t SPEND don’t make the playoffs. 2 of the last 160 spent bottom 10 and made it. A lot of meddling owners made it within that time frame. We have the data: Pegula is failing because of self-imposed restrictions. He’s not forcing Adams to assemble a team of young players because he thinks that’s the best way to win, that doesn’t make any sense. The mandate is to keep costs down - and when that’s the mandate teams don’t make the playoffs. And when the GM is inept you get what we are seeing: 5 years of averaging like 70 points

RIGHT!

It seems like a variation of how I keep saying Pegula framed this to Adams: “if you are going to be bad, you can do it while spending less.” Terry spent and the team didn’t win and it appears for whatever reason he’s locked into the idea he’s ok with losing money (and games) as long as we aren’t spending what we were. Ensure one “W” by controlling what we can (spending), sell the future, hope for the best. Maybe some sort of cost calculation reflective of both his obscene wealth and overall reputation hits both positive (bills - much larger fan base) and negative (sabres - smaller fan base)

It’s been missing since Lucic

If Raimi does Spider-Man 4 he’s gotta be the villain I’m as pleased w/Byram’s recent play as much as anyone but it’s disappointing he apparently needs to be stapled to a franchise defender to make it happen

People always say “how didn’t they win when they had all 3” but they never had all 3 when Jack and Sam weren’t fledgling players on their ELCs it wasn’t nhl playoffs leading scorer and 2-way menace JACK EICHEL and 50 goal man SAMSON playing with ROR it was “on some nights he’s a negative overall impact” Yeichel, and on some nights “is he even an NHLer?” Reinhartdtt lining up with him. (Remember, have to think back to circa 2017-18: Reino was sitting at a cool 11 points headed into the January 1 winter classic; his third nhl season and 4th post draft) 11 points. At a crucial stage, those 2 coming off their ELCs and poised for the development we saw, Botterill traded ROR At an even more crucial stage, Adams just gave up and traded the 2 of them none of the sabres failures are shrouded in mystery. They are all a poorly written open book to be perused and dissected by us fans and willingly ignored by management

We traded Eichel and Reinhart JUST as they were entering their primes so a lot of the improvement in another environment we saw was going to happen here anyways. People have gotten so into the habit of downplaying Eichel’s defensive improvement from 19-20 in the name of accrediting his improvement to leaving buffalo/new coach but 19-20 happened, Jack was 23, and he finished 8th in mvp voting largely because his D improved by leaps and bounds that year. We develop players and trade them and a big part is that young players are cheaper

I don’t like to toot my own horn when I can avoid it (ok, who am I kidding), but, I was screaming this at the board 3 full years ago: I told everyone exactly what was going to happen. Adams rode in on a purported (bogus - told you) mandate to fix the culture and in so doing cemented the sabres culture as “team that doesn’t care about winning”

Exactly. It’s youth. We are too young - and we are young by choice. We are bad on purpose. - - - It’s not insane we are in last. It’s insane we have at least SEVEN POINTS LESS than *every* other team in the conference but 1. truly the worst season I can remember the sabres putting to record. The fact the GM is still employed is mind boggling when you consider the owner isn’t going to fire himself. These are absurd, absurd results. You have to give someone else a try.