Thorny

Right, im good with calling a spade a spade too. We just shouldn’t pretend there’s any kind of expectations. Cause there aren’t. The strategy is the strategy and it takes how long it takes. Missing the playoffs 4 straight years doesn’t lead into a change in approach for next year, and like the post you quoted mentioned, it’ll likely be another 2 years until the roster is supposedly ready. If it’s not then, well, stay the course it is what it is at this point, it’s easier to give up the angst and choose apathy. Making it this year, taking till year 4 of your term, I would have said Adams did an ok job. Missing this year, if we do, ya..a strategy that takes 5 years to get a team in the playoffs isn’t a good one, regardless of if we made it next year. It’s not a situation where I’d think a GM particularly deserves credit. We already know it’s a lacking plan if we take until next year to make it, if we need till year 6 or whatever was implied, I mean… totally on board w/ the thinking. Bad strategy, bad GM, but if it takes 6 years it takes 6 years. Or beyond. I drew my personal line at 5. It’s the time I’ve got for this regime. I’m barely watching this year as is: hopefully they can put it together for next year, that 5th one

So it’s just a run back again, we are pretty much locked in to what we have and what happens happens We don’t need to approach the offseason any differently even though doing it that way leading into this season resulted in a disastrous year thus far just hope it goes better next time Honestly, I kinda do see it playing out that way, too.

👍

This would be awesome

I suppose, but whether it is for you or not, time is a big factor for me. It’s not merely about value in value out with no regard to ETA, for the same reason an NHL GM would value a first in 2024 more than a first in 2029. But especially with us, the 6 years we’ve been bad since is just a huge factor in my calculation. If we trade Tage today for a draft pick that’s ends up even better, it’s still not a good trade for me. Time is of the essence and has been for a good long while. But, I understand you are evaluating by different metrics and, I can respect that.

Ya like the reason I want Levi here is because he’s imo not insignificantly our second best option right now re: attempting to win hockey games I don’t think his development is harmed by keeping him here to the extent it should be prioritized over team result in the now - ie I don’t think it’s harmed very much by keeping him up tbh. Do I think he’d be better served being sent down? Probably, but that’s not what I’m prioritizing right now if we still think playoffs are in play. Like weave said, we shouldn’t even BE in that position, but we are so I’m making decisions based on what is and not what should be

A bad trade is a bad trade, just because it’s made in combination with a series of other bad decisions meaning success was theoretically never possible under said GM doesn’t therefore alleviate the badness of said trade. Why would it? again, if Adams traded Dahlin today, and Thompson tomorrow, and Power the next day, it would be like saying, “well, I guess the Dahlin trade wasn’t that bad, cause looking back, it didn’t matter cause we were never going to succeed in light of how bad Adams turned out to be.” I’m not really sure what odd, backwards mental gymnastics are going on but none of it makes any sense anymore lol

Lmao post of the day. Like in seriousness the bold made me laugh, just the wording I guess. Probably true. Poor JBot. To his credit, many of our good players are his additions - - - As for the conclusion you drew about being unable to succeed with ROR therefore the trade not being bad I completely disagree but I’ve already laid out my case above. We’ll just have to see it differently I can’t really explain my stance further

I agree completely.

You know what they say.. You smelt it, you dealt it

It’s also a really good point. The better UPL performs, doesn’t that nearly necessitate KA finally making the goaltending move he’s been reluctant to make?

Absolutely read the OP in the tone of Jimmy Fallon’s “thank you notes”

I can’t be nearly as annoyingly certain in my viewpoint on this as I usually am because….like I said I’m not actually sure what the correct course is (or, rather, what I personally suspect the correct course to be). While playoffs were reasonably possible I was much more set on keeping him up but there’s probably a mathematical line where playoffs become so unlikely it probably makes most sense to prioritize his development, even in a season where winning is/is supposed to be the priority Are we at the line? Maybe. My gut still says no cause, for a team that’s missed 12 straight years, it would be pretty hoity-toity to turn up our noses at even the slim chances presented to us right now id keep mah foot on the gas pedal

I guess for me it’s the relative comparison between “best we’ve got” and “some of the best we’ve got”

The sultan of swat Across the entire fanbase? I think it’s a few thousand at least maybe even as many as 5 or 6K

If the Bills won the Super Bowl this season, would that make you feel better about Pegula’s ownership of the hockey team?

Doesn’t say anything from a Sabres perspective but, as a noted Jets disliker the only saving grace for me here is that the trade amounted to a whole lot of nothing for them, too. Especially after their entire building chanted, “best trade ever” for a solid year And actually watching live in person here as Kane silenced the crowd on “track suit night” by setting Reinhart up for his hat trick was a nice silver lining too considering it was the first time I saw Buffalo win live. Sticking it to a crowd emboldened by arguably racist undertones was enjoyable

I think where we see it manifest most often is that people forget that everything a team does, every roster move they make, purely exists as a means to achieving an end: achieving a result. We look to evaluate trades and transactions by anything and everything we possibly can, before measuring them based on wins and losses. The only thing that actually matters. We fear that expectation

Apologies, I was mistakenly under the impression that Eichel winning the cup proved he could be part of a winner, ROR the same. No? Lol The book is written: obviously the Sabres COULD have built around them. I thought that was generally accepted around here tbh. For the life of me I don’t see how it could be argued otherwise at this point. They PROVED they could be key components of championship teams! That proved them not winning in Buffalo was a Buffalo issue. It was a team building issue.

I’ve already illustrated factually why your argument misses the mark “They were a bad team with him here, they were a bad team after he was traded. I didn't see them getting better with him on the roster. End the story all I need.” Substitute Tage in for a hypothetical comparable: if we dealt him now for a couple prospects. What are the potential resulting scenarios? Let’s lay them out, using the logic of your argument to define how we feel about it we trade him and we remain bad: “bad team while Tage was here, bad team while he was traded”. Inconsequential deal. we trade and we get good: “I guess Tage was the problem.” Can you see that you’ve backed yourself into a position where, if your team is really bad, you seemingly can’t make a bad trade? respectfully, it doesn’t make any sense. Coming up with an analysis for why dealing anyone from a bad team just doesn’t matter and convincing yourself of it is probably the type of thinking that keeps a team bad

The gall to suggest a guy who led the playoffs in scoring, and a guy who won the Smythe, wouldn’t have made the team better had we built around them is a little much, no? What do we think is more likely? That two players who proved themselves capable of being the very best in the world at the most important stretch of hockey in the universe, combined, WOULD have provided a solid base to winning, or WOULDN’T? The same people who preach patience are ready to write off the combo because we saw them together on a disfunctional roster under disfunctional coaching and management, immediately after burning the roster to the ground and salting the earth, during Jack’s 18-20, *elc* seasons when he hadn’t even learned to play 2 way yet what do we feel is more representative of their abilities to be built around? The fact they won cups? Or what the worst franchise in hockey history did with them? Seriously, answer the question, what’s the better marker? What the Sabres did with them? Or what competent franchises did with them? A shred of Occam’s razor reveals the answer blindingly

Looking back, trading ROR away was absolutely disastrous for the team. It led to that core collapsing, Botterill being fired, and an additional 6 years (and counting) in the wilderness since. How one could look at that trade and not call it terrible is beyond me. You are just guessing with no real logical backing that keeping a good player wouldn’t have mattered. Whereas, we KNOW we’ve been terrible since and we KNOW the lack of forward depth led to the collapse of that roster, Eichel and Reinhart and Ullmark leaving, and the lack of depth we still see today: because we are still in the process of rebuilding Your argument respectfully isn’t a very good one. “They didn’t do anything here so it doesn’t matter that we dealt them.” By the same logic we can trade Tage today because we haven’t amounted to a single playoff berth with him. This is what you are actually arguing: worst case scenario is that we are bad once we move him, right? Which, as you laid out in your argument makes the trade inconsequential, as we merely maintain the status quo. No harm no foul. You can see once broken down like this it doesn’t make any sense. When will people learn and except it’s the *collection* of talent and about building depth, and a team? “We never won anything with Eichel and ROR”. You mean, when Eichel was 18-20 years old and we were literally recovering from a scorched earth tank? Be serious for a minute

It’s probably why Levi is still here. Which I’ll credit Adams for I suppose in the sense that I’m choosing to believe that’s a reflection of the GM’s commitment to winning this season and not some random agreement. Keeping Levi here because he’s a bit better than Comrie would imo be evidence towards what the priority is