Pimlach

Hello Teammates, Punch checking in. Tough test tonight but the boys are steady so far. GO SABRES !!! MUSCLE WEIGHT

I don't swear in front of mama either, never allowed the kids to either. Funny story, last week I was in my recliner reading and my wife asked me to toss her the remote. I was reluctant and against my better judgement I tossed it to her underhanded. Doink! It was as if her forehead was a backboard. Well of course it hurt her for what seemed like hours upon hours. Yesterday she asked my to toss her the remote again. I got up off the recliner and put it in her soft little hand.

Well I got a good chuckle or too. I am not on the list, but my friends and family will tell you I am a sonnofabit@h when I lose.

This is one of your funniest post yet. Just list all your friends and make up things that can never be proven, and then hope they agree with you. ? I can understand why the other poster said what he said to PA. He can come off negative at times, and dare I say contrarian to the current Sabres pop culture. Sure, @PASabreFan is a loyal long time fan. From what I can tell, he and I have a very similar disdain for the way ownership has run this club, just as we have a similar love for the early days when we all took managerial competence to be a given. I have no idea how much he hates losing relative to anyone else, and neither do you.

Is Hill playing tonight?

I don't swear, I don't smoke, I don't drink. Son of a bit@h, I left my cigarettes at the bar.

I think our big guns are ready to explode. Sabres 5 Devils 3

This is the first year in many decades that I am not going to a Bills game at home. Getting there early, tailgating, the atmosphere in the stadium lots, the game, then tail gate after - that was all great! But as you get older the total time it takes gets to be hard. Then there is the weather/elements, parking issues, the rowdiness, the time to get out of there - it gets old. I have been going every year since the Rockpile days, but not this year.

Bernard is a future star. Benford looks pretty solid, great pick at 6, but to be a star CB you need to be a shut down corner and he is not that.

Hard to say what Allen likes. All the 12 really does is replace the slot receiver with Kincaid, who could be the slot receiver or a TE or a blocker. Maybe if WR#2 had more breakaway speed and sure hands the 12 would be better? Team speed on our offense is only average at best. There are no burners.

I won’t call this an error if Kincaid turns out to be a star player. Drafting Kincaid looks like a smart move to me. We need another playmaker. You can see already he is a much better receiver and route runner than Knox. If we play 11, Kincaid should start at TE.

The “right” comes from being the HC. In that position he is ultimately accountable for everything. If he is accountable for everything on the field, then he has the final say on the play calls, unless he decides to defer that, and he accountable for deferring that too This not a counter argument, it is the actual reason and it doesn’t mean he would not be better served letting the OC or the QB call the plays. Bellichick call plays at times, he was never an offensive coach. Do you recall that Marv Levy took control of playcalls on short yardage situations? He felt he should be involved because he is ultimately accountable. The list is probably pretty long. I think McD made several questionable calls yesterday. Punting at the opponents 45 on 4th and 2 when our offense was rolling and just drove for 7. Seven more was the dagger. Additionally, his use of timeouts is always helpful to the opposition. We got lucky - Even the Hail Mary defense, three Bills in the end zone, two fall down on each other behind the play, three more Bills are near the goal line - any one of them could have been flagged for holding. Not one defender in position to knock it down. We could have lost on a Hail Mary - again. Questionable Coaching decisions and panic among players in close games have become the norm. That was easily a game were we put 38 or more on the scoreboard. It was a game we dominated and yet still almost lost.

I’ll take the win but it should have been a 38-10 win. Instead it could have been a loss on Hail Mary. (Again). At best they are wild card level.

He is the head coach.

This is Kulich's second season in Rochester and he is doing very well to start the season. He did not look like an NHL player in preseason at this time but he will be someday. Benson an Savoie have to go to Junior WHL, a big difference. The thing with Benson is he looks ready mentally from a hockey sense, its the physical side of it that is the question. Right now its best to keep them around, get them work at the NHL/AHL level as they can, and see what is in store for them in the WHL. Decisions like these sometimes get make themselves.

The record shows I was against that 4th start in a row. Short sighted move for a team with a long, long, term plan.

I am skeptical about VO on a checking line. I watched him closely and he just does not engage physically as much as he should. He has a knack for being around the play without being in the play.

I get what you mean but i cannot agree that Bellichick is an average coach. all the data, the longevity, the rings - they all spell one of the greatest. He kept it together in the free agency and salary cap era and he did it longer then Lombardi, Shula, Landry, Knoll, Walsh, - guys that did not have free agency or salary cap for most of their careers. We are taking about 20 years. His ability to draft and develop was key, even drafting at the end of the rounds. He had periods of great defense and below average defense and he won. He had periods of great offense and just average offense and he won. Lets see how many teams match his accomplishments before we call him average. Look what he just did to the Bills. He shut them down for a half, and took a team averaging 12 points per game and put 29 on us. When I look at game day coaching, he has no peer.

Name a QB that plays just as good injured as he does healthy? There is no data out there to support he is any worse than any other QB when playing with an injury. They guy is tough as nails and plays injured all the time. Bolded sentence is unfair to Allen. What is a "very very large way"? Lots of other factors to consider in those set of numbers including the health of his teammates, competition, weather, etc. His numbers while inured last year are still very good and better than most QBs in the league - so the "very very large way" is not supported. Certainly the elbow injury affected his play, he is the one guy that touches the ball every play, and the guy throwing it. I think he is hampered by an injury right now but there are so many things wrong with the Bills right now that he has almost no help keeping things going. The Bills are sleepwalking right now. The Bills locker room has not been good since the end of last season and the coaching staff is not getting them ready to go. They were completely unprepared for Jax in London, and since that game they were outplayed by two of the worst teams in the league. There are problems - the team lacks playmakers on offense, the OL is average at best, and they are very thin on defense with key injuries at every position. Josh's shoulder is a problem, but not the only problem.

What has Dorsey done to earn Cart Blanche control of the offense?

The reality in the NFL is that no coach is gonna win much without a top QB. The myth here is Bellichick was a below average coach. He never was. He was a product of Bills Parcells and was the defensive genius that beat us in SB XXV (wide right). Buffalo has a far superior roster that year and was the best team in the league and they were peaking at the right time. Bellichick's defensive game plan was brilliant. Bellichick earned the head coached job at Cleveland and was just below .500 with a below average team, he did get one 11-5 season with them in 5 years. He then went to the Jets as a DC and was still so highly regarded that the Pats* traded to get him as their head coach to replace Parcells. When does that happen? From there he won championships at NE like no other coach has, maybe ever. Sure with Brady. Brady was a big part of it, but Bellichick won lots of different ways with lots of players and for a long time. Keeping the team together and losing coordinators and still maintianing a very high level for 20 years - not easy to do. The Bills are yet to digest the Daboll for Dorsey switch. How can a below average coach do all that? Doug Marone was below average, so has Chan Gaily, not Bill Bellichick.

This is it. They inevitably do this no matter how the players are align and who plays where. The points are the key and the opponents pressure the points and all the other perimeter guys. We need to operate down low, it is easier to get a slot guy uncovered that way - then the slot guy has position to move in for a real screen at any time once the puck moves to the walls or the point. When that happens we need a shot, not more perimeter passes, unless there is an open passing lane of course and we can get the goalie moving.

Indeed. I just criticized the PP, but the PK is really looking good. E Johnson is a huge upgrade over Looby on the PK and in 5v5. Clifton is a huge upgrade over Bryson/Clague. Greenway is probably the biggest revelation. You don't have to score a lot to add value and his defensive play alone is really helping. I like seeing Tage and Tuch out there with their reach and being gritty on the PK - this will build their 5v5 skills too. Also, it takes some load off of Girgs and Kyle. Can't forget the goaltending which has been decent so far and could get better if the commitment to Team Defense sticks.

They are mixing up who plays were, sure, they did that. But the still do essentially the same thing, perimeter passing, in the new alignment. They pass around the perimeter until someone thinks they have a clear shot, usually with no screen or no one in the slot. We have great shooters so it works sometimes, but not enough. The opponent PK is putting pressure on whoever has the puck, they don't wait in a defensive posture for us to set up a play. Our guy with the puck is under pressure, hence the fast perimeter passing - our extra man joins them on the outside so that we can maintain possession but 5 on the outside is what the opponents want. Then they keep sticks down and in the passing lanes. They get their goalies a view clear. We get a shot, they recover the rebound and they try to breakout or clear. When they clear they put pressure on the us deep in our zone, quite often with 2 guys. Our goalies have face high danger changes with us on the PP way to much. The PP went sour at the end of last season after being dominant for awhile. Perhaps teams figured it out? It still seems like it to me.