Thorny

You are a Sabres fan.

We don’t need hindsight to see what talents we have on the team now, by way of that ROR trade. Hindsight doesn’t serve the argument, because in hindsight the deal still looks terrible: the deal failed under the prism of what it was attempting to accomplish *at the time*. It was a big reason that rebuild crashed and Botterill’s time came to an end. The following GM picking up the pieces doesn’t make it a good trade, it just makes Adams a good GM. This also isn’t the same as saying I’d “reverse the trade”. I honestly don’t know- it’s impossible to see how the past changes if we didn’t maroon our offence beyond Eichel. But Thompson is critical for us now. In the end, a trade can be bad, yet over the ripples of time eventually produce a talent better than given up - both things can in fact be true If Adams dealt Cozens for a 3rd round pick, and the pick became Brayden Point, is it a good trade? We know the answer is no.

Hockey game. 12 left then we get back to working our expectations into a frenzie over a long summer. As of course is tradition. Go team, score goals. My prediction: The devil bowed his head because he knew that he'd been beat And he laid that golden fiddle on the ground at Johnny's feet Johnny said, "Devil, just come on back if you ever wanna try again I done told you once you son of a bitch, I'm the best that's ever been"

I think it’s possible, probably likely that McDavid is the best pure talent we’ve ever seen, ya. But in terms of all around ability, I think there’s an argument to be made (duh, I’m making it) that what Crosby grants to a team is more conducive to greatness within the way the national hockey league, itself, is officiated, run, managed, and coached I think McDavid’s overall stats, all around game included, marks out higher on the back of a marvel card. I think he’s better even all around. Best ever. But Crosby arguably, at slightly less overall, yes, melds better within the context of building a championship roster *in the NHL*. I think being the greatest grinder ever gives him an easier pathway, within the NHL playoffs specifically, if that makes sense, to all time greatness - - - Tl;dr In a hypothetical league that maximizes its best talents - I draft McDavid. In the real world, I honestly draft 18 year old Sid before Connor if constructing a team from scratch

I want absolutely no part in being bad enough that we technically have a claim to Bedard. Reflective of too disappointing of a season, not a good trade off - - - I will also absolutely do a complete 180 publicly should we win the pick, just totally totally betray my argument by freaking out - this is a McDavid-like prospect. No, it’s not a Sidney Crosby and all the generational winning a top 5 all around player of all time brings, but it’s generational talent to the extent it actually might allow for ever so slightly less aptitude from our GM going forward, which, yes, betrays my initial argument we aren’t winning it anyway but ya

Could be in line for a top 10 Norris finish and might outscore Dahlin. Definitely a shame it didn’t work out. Just another piece of evidence for why Botterill’s talent analysis was often reasonable but his team building was awful

Fox leaps Dahlin. Heiskanen, Makar and Montour closing in

Oh so he’s a modest upgrade on Bryson then

There’s actually a rather hilarious extended edition scene in Desolation of Smaug featuring the dwarves and Beorn that plays on all of the above lol

Not only that, but IIRC Botterill was canned not for performance but rather his unwillingness to cut staff. Adams was all too willing, but interestingly enough, as you point out, they spent under Adams that season to the max - once Taylor Hall presented himself as an opportunity. Now the wisdom of making that move remains up for debate, but the point I think is that even after apparently deciding to cut spending Pegula proved himself willing to be flexible / convinced by Adams/Krueger

During the trade deadline coverage on TSN they specifically mentioned teams needing to do the immigration thing IS actually a concern / factor for all teams - it stood out to me b/c they were saying it’s pretty hard line. Ie it’s “not open on weekends” type stuff and in many cases the player themselves has to show up to the immigration office. It’s not athlete preferential treatment type stuff I don’t think we are seeing anything unusual

Honestly always did get THAT vibe from TV

I think a vote of NHL players just named Crosby the league’s best player, too Edit - most complete At his age this is very remarkable. Top 5 all time, imo.

As crazy as the Kulich bit is, Dahlin at 18 (also turning 19 in the April of his first nhl season) did what Kulich is doing, and more, at the *NHL level*. A fact continuously undersold when Dahlin’s early years get lumped in Krueger. Pretty astounding. Dahlin had more points in the nhl as a d-man than Kulich as a F in the A, and as outlined in the OP what Kulich is doing is outstanding

13 playoff games plus 1 regular season game, true, fair enough. But he functionally made the jump from full time Junior one season to full time NHLer the very next, even including the AHL tune up the same year he was a full time junior player. I’m not sure the 14 AHL games were critical in the jump being possible, but, it’s plausible

Definitely agree the trajectory matters. This can all shift again pretty quickly. If they finish strong it still matters

Friedman on Tim and friends today making a lot of good points about how hockey is suffering internationally due to lack of best on best tournaments. Says Olympics are most important but World Cup absolutely necessary sans that tournament. This was in light of a conversation about how beneficial to WBC is for baseball internationally Says players are very in support of it, notably McDavid, and I’ll add it’s an absolute crime we haven’t seen him on that stage Mentioned Mats Sundin was talking about how much Sweden is being hurt by it

He played 1 game 84-85 QMJHL - 44gp AHL - 1gp NHL - 1gp 85-86 NHL - 47gp

👍

Patrick Roy

Evidence for the fact the board’s expectations weren’t met, contrary to the revisionist

Scorn for whom? My only issue is with the handle on twitter framing the numbers the way they did. But it’s twitter. They have no idea what they are doing.

That high level take also isn’t even accurate re: pre season expectations. It might not be FAR off, but it’s off. The consensus was higher than low 80s The language, and data, wasn’t “around .500” I’m with you on this. There are plenty trying to re-write this. No dice folks

90 point average, ya. Just did this in another thread Its gonna depend on how we finish. Just the way it is. Look at the numbers in the poll, read the thread. People aren’t saying “around .500” and low 80s. The talk is playoff bubble / high 80s low 90s

Better said than me