Pimlach

I like that Slavin. A lot. Sanderson scores. Nice

I don’t talk politics here, but I can’t believe he said it again. I saw coverage on tv and quickly said this to my wife, “I really hope he doesn’t say uhhhggnn, never mind …”.

Sad to hear about McAvoy. My respect for him as a player went way up because of this series. He was a big key in the win against Canada

Great shot McKinnon, and through a very tight space.

Put this game in a time warp, it’s 1976, and The Knox Bros lure this game into the Aud. Terry, do better. Buffalo should be hosting this.

The Canadian fans did a better job with the anthem than the singer. Ooooffff

McAvoy out is big. Maker in is big. Eichel playing at home.

Especially Eichel. He will get some Hart Trophy votes.

All this talk about the Rochester GM and coach brings up a few things. 1. Karmanos was more qualified to be a GM than Adams. Dig into their experience prior to taking their jobs at Buffalo. It is not even close. 2. Adams was hired to save money (EEE) and to rebuild with a home grown approach. He probably masterminded the plan along with Terry. Trade the best players away, stockpile picks and prospects, develop picks/prospects, have no blockers, no big vet contracts, just play the kids, extend the kids, and assume they are good enough. Do all this with a rookie NHL coach and staff, and stay under the cap to enable signing your home grown players. Of course this has not worked and it has made it even harder to get good players and good coaches to come to Buffalo. The EEE plan just added 5 more long years of losing to the string - but at least Rochester is good! 😞 Of course adding Lindy, a guy we know and like, was supposed to take the team to another level too. Unfortunately, I think this EEE master plan has another year to go with Lindy still on contract. 3. Putting Karmanos' work in perspective - Good job, but lets not forget it is easier to GM in the AHL, you don't have to deal with the parent club culture issues and NTCs. Still, Karmanos could not be any worse than Adams. It's hard to be worse than last place in the conference and 0 playoff appearances after 5 years.

Anyone know who decided to give him an A? Adams or Ruff? I suspect Adams.

I don't see it that way Stoner. The analytics say we have ONE very good defenseman (Dahlin) who carries whoever he plays with. If a team has only one good defenseman they will lose a lot of games, which the Sabres do. I did some quick research, Dahlin was out injured for a large part of the 13 game season killing losing streak. He was gone for all the games between Dec 3 and Dec 20, and he was playing hurt prior to that. When he came back he had 4 assists and we finally won a game. Take away that miserable 13 game streak, just play .500 in that space, and the team is playing at a wildcard spot right now. The analytics say they if you trade Dahlin and don't replace him with a better defenseman, your team will get worse. Chances of a real NHL team trading away a defenseman better than Dahlin is ZERO. The analytics and the losing streak tell me that Power and Byram did not step up. Should one of them be traded? Yes, but only if the GM can make the NHL Team better right now. No more trading for futures, get better NHL players using one or more of them in trade. Which takes us to the real problem, a problem created by Pegula and his band of bad GMs. Which is, who will come here?

True, but not to teams like the Blues, Knights, Panthers, Lightning and others. The hiring of three consecutive unqualified GMs is a bigger problem than how good the players have been. There are good players on the team right now and there were good players before them. None of the GMs could build a roster and hire a coach staff.

Power will be the next Sabre to go somewhere else and then become a very good player while playing in a better environment. He could fetch a lot in a trade. Teams need (and covet) puck moving offensive defensemen and he was leading all defenseman in points while playing 5v5 for parts of this season. He was playing good hockey prior to the big losing streak. The Sabres just do not have a solid partner for him. Dahlin, Power, Byram all have a similar game. Dahlin is clearly the one you keep. A good GM could improve the overall team by trading either one of Byram or Power. Power is the one I would keep for another season, but if the return for him is right and it fills major holes with immediate help then move him and keep Byram - but don’t offer him a long term big contract, he is still a prove it guy The bolded is Kevyn Adams kind of thinking and it’s exactly why he fails as a GM. It’s not about winning trades, it about building a balanced NHL roster.

What has to happen is not magic. The “young core” has to stop believing that they are too young to win and start winning. Things like 13 losses in a row can’t happen. Players like Dahlin and Thompson have to put the team on their backs. Leadership and hating to loose has to emerge. Start winning and players will think differently about coming here.

Just tuned into the US v SWE. What happened to Brady Tkachuk?

In his prime he sang beautifully and in multiple registers and could really hit high notes. I thought he did great for an 82 year old man.

What kills me is in the big picture, Pegula only needs to put in a few more resources (like proven NHL Execs in the FO), to get a lot better performance from his hockey organization. You would think he would want playoff revenue? His team is far down the curve to excellence but the gains that take you to the middle of the pack and a wildcard team level should be easy to get, which is why no other teams are even close to 14 year droughts. It's the last 10 percent that is hard. (Example: Florida won President Trophy and then died in the playoffs, so they retooled with a major trade for Tkachuk and won a cup). I think the right hockey guy could get this team to respectable levels quickly. Instead we have Adams and a bunch of excuses. His the end of season presser it will be interesting to me.

I’m pushing 67. My experience is yes, and yes. 👍 More than ever.

I’ve waited a few days to answer the question here. None of the option fit exactly how I feel about them, it’s probably a little of each I was an AHL Bison fan, then I anxiously awaited the Sabres. I was a kid that roamed the Aud, I was hooked from the first game. Since day one I have followed them closely and attended most of the home games for the first 12 years, until I moved away. I still followed them religiously, using cable TV, cheater boxes, Satellite dishes, streaming, and internet news/forums. I am tired of them right now. Since the unnecessary dismantling of a Presidents Trophy team, to Pegula’s empty phony promises, the Tank, the broken culture, and everything thereafter. I’m so tired of them. Other than the alumni, and much of the first 40 years, there is nothing. RJ is gone, and the last of the alumni that I care about are pretty much honored and gone. There are memories, but none are good in the past 15 years. None. I am disappointed with the organization that they are today. I actually feel bad for the players, but much more so for the fans.

The NHL regular season was definitely better when there were less teams. I think the season needs to be shorter and the playoffs need to end by the end of April. Of course this means less money to distribute, so it won't happen. In the US most cities/regions stop watching hockey when their team is eliminated, then they switch to baseball and golf and the outdooors. Canada probably has a higher percentage of diehards watching the entire playoff but a Canadian team has not won a cup since 1993 and there have been only 6 that even played in the finals since then. This trend cannot be good for the game in the long run. Less teams means more familiarity and more rivalries, it all helps to generate more intensity and better games. Too much expansion ruined the NBA and it is ruining the NHL too. Yeah, I guess I am getting old, but that is how I see it. Less is more.

I was thinking about having Eichel, Reinhart and Hagel right now on this team. Sure, lots of teams passed on Hagel but we drafted him, had his rights, and should have known more about him and maybe at least given him a look. Do you remember when we had Perreault, Martin, and Robert all going to All Star games and Team Canada series? There was no free agency. The GM knew what a good hockey player looked like and how to construct a roster.

Most NHL games, even among the top teams and rivals, are not played at the level of the USA v Canada games. Playoffs can get to that level as the stakes go up. No one player saves a team. Gretzky, Lemuiex (sp), Crosby, Ovechkin, Kane - they all had help, and lots of help. It is sad that they wasted Reinhart and Eichel. They never brought in the right veteran leadership or developed the glue players. None of the GMs and coaches under Pegula were qualified to take on a tear down/ tank and rebuild. None of the coaches were good enough. The players know it, and that is the only reason we cannot get the right players, the Sabres are not a serious franchise. Look at Hagel. A guy we drafted and never even looked it, never had an ELC to play a game in Rochester. Isn’t he exactly what this team needs? Who from Canada’s team offered to take on Matt Tkachuck? Hagel. Yeah, we need a guy like that. He more than held his own too. I guess he fell through the crack of Boterill and Adams? So many good players come and go and the Sabres continue to be irrelevant.

Homer pick. The 3rd star should have been Hellebuyck or McAvoy.

Especially given the limited time they played together.