Thorny

Hughes, Hamilton leap Dahlin in D scoring race. Dahlin currently tied for 5th with Fox. With Makar charging and closing in, 2 points back in 10 less games played, mostly at this point I guess I just hope Dahlin stays ahead of Heiskanen, for 7th? Haha, tracking it at that point has probably lost it’s luster

So here we go, wanted to follow up on this. Our goal differential seemed to go and reconcile itself, as I was alluding to: it now sits 20th league wide while our points % sits 20th, as well. So it’s more less reflective of the overall group’s play, at both ends. With obvious allowances for G being the biggest negative factor, but one factor among several nonetheless

Whoops, thought you’d know I was kidding

Good one. Agree with all this - I like the point about face offs. They don’t really matter that much, that’s exactly what I’d say if someone asked me, cause that’s what the data reveals in large sizes. But as it seems to happen so frequently, in a non hyperbolic sense- the Sabres love to sit around the historical outliers and exceed them. Playoff drought? Face offs we are DEAD LAST. Ok, UNCLE! you got me, they matter for Buffalo! sabres the truthful, frequent embodiment of paradise lost Better to reign in hell, indeed

The correlation between Dahlin scoring and the team winning is equally prevalent, over a larger sample size, and more compelling due to Samuelsson’s case having much more correlation v causation wiggle room. The Sabres played their best game, and their best defensive game, without Samuelsson, for the record. To me the data and (especially?) eye test supports the idea it’s difficult to lose ANY good player right now considering our lack of impact player depth, and that Samuelsson is a good player. He’s good. He’s not *particularly* good - he’s, arguably, particularly valuable, due to our lack of depth on D. But he’s not even the best defensive D on the team. By the numbers and (especially?) the eye test, that’s easily Dahlin (least until last few weeks). Is Samuelsson our second best in that area? Power? One of the two

You didn’t vote till NOW? way to go out on a limb, dude..

There’s some good merit here now that I think about it, KA has a good track record for additions, but I feel like the good ones looked good pretty quickly - it’s not unreasonable to be disappointed in what we’ve seen from Greenway in that KA set his own high precedent with Jost

I agree with you. We tend to live and die by the moment, but years later we just look back at the point total to more less assess how a season went- there’s a reason we do that. The most accurate reading is almost always in the larger pool of data People will say it doesn’t matter, maybe it’s semantics, it almost seems too simple, but sometimes I think we / I do over complicate. Win more games to end, and prove yourself a team *less in NEED* of that higher pick. I want to be a Sabres team that finishes with 89 points, not a Sabres team that fails to break Bylsma’s mark from my first season posting here. maybe it doesn’t matter but on balance, in the macro, I’ll take the season w/more points as far as what it means for the future. Nothing wrong with the future seeming a little more in reach

*this has been a paid advertisement by thorny

twitches

^ Hobbits, to the Elves:

West road def easier Vegas will need to be reckoned with though. They look great. Eichel hatty yesterday Ya Makar was down. He’s back and closing in on Norris conversation, now

Every asset we have is available for the right price, full stop - - - Other than goalie: I did a breakdown recently of the fact the Sabres don’t win games when Dahlin doesn’t contribute on the scoresheet. Biggest need after G is competent reinforcements on D, as good as we can get, so as to ensure we can get Norris Dahlin for a full 82, let alone playoffs. The fact they hit a wall is exactly why I put stock in it The fact they hit a wall, the fact our point total ends up at whatever it ends up at, is simply revelatory of what the 2022-23 sabres actually are Guy who busts it out of the gate in a marathon and gassed himself to run the first half in a good time, collapses down the stretch can’t logically write off the end and extrapolate the earlier bit forward. No logic in it. The Sabres are what they finish with.

If the playoffs are truly the expectation, ie falling short is viewed as a detriment to the rebuild we cannot afford, a starting goaltender is a must. Otherwise, playoffs CAN ONLY be a hope. Playoffs being “the hope”, but not the expectation next season, is not something I can get on board with

We don’t need Hasek, we would see a lot of improvement merely by striving for “not absolutely terrible” The goaltending is simply awful, *relative to what our poor (in need of improvement, but not awful) defence gives up*. That means, accounting for how many chances we give up, and the quality, the goalies STILL save significantly less than others in the same position what this means is that, SHOULD we improve the D, and the amount of chances and quality chances we give up, our goalies will STILL give up more than the other goalies league wide facing those chances ie any way you dice it we need to improve in net

Very true..

I am going to read it in that voice now

I don’t think he was ever going to win. Karlsson will get it but what is disappointing is he’s playing, and has likely already played himself out of a nomination altogether.

I’m totally willing to leave a blank space on that, “how will he perform in crunch time games”. Absolutely. Presuming you are willing to grant that he played very well in the games, early in the year, that you were arguing were some of the important games, last year during the hot stretch to end? So, no, not the MOST important yet, but he has 75% of it covered. That’s a reasonable amount to go on, for Kevyn Adams and his team building supplementation, one would think

Jack’s fault

This isn’t to be negative, it’s just a reality- whether by his play, fatigue, injury, or pairing partner, Dahlin has absolutely played himself out of the race with this putrid stretch. He hasn’t been very good since the all star game, but particularly of late, after another -3 today: he’s got 0 points in his last 8 games and is a *minus -13*. Whereas he was among the D leaders in this category (which can matter for Norris), a minus season is actually possible after all that which was simply unfathomable a few weeks ago. it adds a certain sting cause as a fan you can sometimes fall back on individual careers years / progress in light of team failure, as a silver lining, but that too is drying up across the board

We have a big advanced stats team now, right? Explains why Granato refuses to pull him, he’s expecting the numbers to improve

Bruins were on a back to back and didn’t try very hard

This is the correct term