JoeSchmoe

They can expand and move teams at the same time. All it takes is the will of an owner to want to make more $ and lose less (though arguably he's still making money on franchise appreciation). Getting a 9-figure bill on an arena for a declining fan base might be the straw that breaks the camel's back. Also keep in mind... When the Sabres season ticket wait list was a mile long, they were dirt cheap... Bottom of the league. And the price could largely be made back by selling your Leafs and Habs games. If prices went up to league average to cover the massive cap increases AND you couldn't sell your "Gold" games to Canadians, I question how well the seats would sell in an average year. Yes, they might do okay if the team is in cup contention like they were in the mid-00's... But say if we were Minnesota Wild level average over an extended period, I don't think people would want to keeping paying.

Impoverished or not, the Buffalo market is small compared to most other NHL markets. It's not about charity to appeal to Canadians, but it's about growing a fan base, selling corporate seats, etc. Stuff a franchise could do by moving to a bigger market like Houston. Hockey is the #1 sport here in Canada, as opposed to being the #2 sport in Buffalo, and done right, there's a lot of potential. Prior to tanking, the number of Sabres fans here in Niagara were getting close to outnumbering Leaf fans. The tank (and the futility since) killed that.

Don't you mean UPL "regression to the mean". He's been bad for almost his entire pro career.

Classic case of telling me you're not watching the games without telling me you're not watching the games!

I always thought goal scoring came so easily early in his career that Gretzky took a much higher interest in setting up teammates. Of course we don't know if that was truly the case, we can all agree he was a pass first player. And while Gretzky was pass first, Ovie is and always has been a shoot first, shoot second, and shoot third type player.

The answer is that you take an AHL guy add in one of our log jam NHL guys, and you package them to a team that's either rebuilding or a team that's in cap trouble and needs to shed a proven top 6 player to get under the cap.

Thanks for all the replies everyone. As an update, a very generous Sabrespace poster has donated some tickets to me so I can spend time with my daughter, while keeping the boycott alive! This place is the best dysfunctional family on the internet! I appreciate the comments about spending time with my daughter. Thankfully, I think I'll always have a close relationship with my her. We're pretty tight. Maybe it'll change in the next year or so... I hope not!!!

I'm not too worried about this. Pretty much every day I'm driving her to hockey (she plays 25min out of town), or to the gym, or over to her friends'... We went on a ski trip to Quebec last month, etc... I have taken a picture of her beside shark girl every year since she was little (the pic in my avatar is cropped from this). Google Photos' AI system recognized this and did a cool collage of her over the years. I should probably keep that going for at least another year.

I like it!

I've had a boycott in place where I won't buy any tickets until the team is in the playoffs. I did go to the Colorado game at the start of the losing streak, but I think they were in a playoff spot (or close) when my friend bought the tix. My 15yo daughter's been asking about going to a game before the end of the season. I think I'll break down and go Tuesday's game... They're practically giving the tickets away anyways. Am I doing the right thing? 😁

UPL isn't streaky- unless you're talking about streaks in your underpants.

You're probably right, but UPL's metrics are so far off league median that if Reimer gives you anywhere close to that, we get enough extra wins to be in the playoff race. Edit: Stated otherwise, of goalies that have played 40 games or more, the median goals saved above expected is 13.4 (Dustin Wolf). UPL is -9.4. if we had 22 less goals against we're in positive goal differential at plus 3.

Too bad he's got 4 years left on his contract. He's going to get all the chances in the world to "succeed" for at least another 2 years.

Why does old man Reimer keep dropping his cane?

There's no saving UPL's season. The book is written. He sucks. But, by seeing how well 37yo Reimer does in the remaining games, we can get a true sense of how badly UPL sucked. With enough sample size, we can see how much a JAG goalie might improve this team.

Lafferty sucks!

Lennye

The point is, if we trade/package him for a proven player this summer, we can end the cycle of being the youngest team in the league whose veterans eventually lose their love of the game and leave.

Before we get ahead of ourselves, remember that Quinn dominated in the AHL... Like really dominated. Where is he now? We don't need to keep being the youngest team in the league. He's so far from being able to contribute... If he ever does. It's way easier said than done, but let's use him as part of a package to get a legit top 6 F or top 4 D. Let's see who can't afford to sign all their vets this summer and make a deal.

Sounds like a real good trade piece!

So you're saying running multipage threads on players wanting out due to their reactions after they score might be a waste of time? That said, I remember UPL doing a Finnish interview where he seemed unhappy and didn't like being called UPL. Do you think we can lay into the UPL thing a little harder? I figure we can upgrade from him with a 37yo journeyman, and keep the $5 million a season for a new paint job in the arena.

I would still trade him in a McLeod - Savoie style deal. Hopefully his value keeps rising to get us a guy even better than McLeod.

Don't give Byram a contract.

I don't like UPL. I don't want him on my team anymore.