Marvin

It is also a learning year for our coach.

Clarification: he could be the missing piece they need to win the Cup as O'Reilly was to St. Louis.

If he becomes healthy, he can be their ROR.

I think that the lack of NHL players on the NHL roster for his entire tenure here has far more to do with the Sabres' problems than Eichel or anyone else did. Murray gave us a lack of depth and bad defences. Botterill gave us improving defences and awful forwards. Adams have him lousy goaltending. Not once in his entire tenure here did Eichel ever have a line-up even as good as the one which just went 1-3 on this last West Coast trip. That is a damning indictment of the GMs for Eichel's entire tenure here. Whatever his problems were, management never gave him the supporting cast he needed to succeed. In fact, almost no one could have elevated the team to a playoff spot in his stead.

I hope this is like when I saw Rochester games during The Great Lockout, where the visions and dreams I had of those players in the NHL came true.

What I think they should do is go with a shorter schedule and/or conference-only schedule in Olympic years. Have the schedule be 6x7 in division + 4x8 in conference, or something to save on wear-and-tear. Sure, it would suck to not see the other conference's stars, but it would make for better hockey.

First, welcome to the board. Second, it's $6M cap, but $1M in actual money. When the Sabres activate Tuch, they will need to send a player to Rochester, which would put them under the cap. They also need some flexibility if they trade players for picks if they are sellers at the TDL (oh, please, let us be close enough to not want to do this...).

I expect some will stay. It is really a question of what other teams will want.

Same here. I was always afraid of this when The Tank was announced, was very concerned with the scorched-earth and salted terrain policy of those years, and disliked the "acceleration" of the rebuild. All of these things plus some questionable personnel, coaching, and management decisions kept the Sabres in the hole we had dug for ourselves. Result: The Lost Decade.

To buttress your point, several people I know of said that Colorado was out as soon as they were told, "no retention, no way, no how."

Welcome back.

Thank you for this perspective. I think Tuch, Krebs, and a 1st is a solid return for a broken Eichel.

My impression was that even before the season, when the Sabres signed players to compete "now", it was in an effort to help convince Jack to say. Maybe I am wrong, but that was my inference. You can question the strategy -- whether or not it is a good idea is a genuinely open question. To be honest, a rebuild of a rebuild of a rebuild has a whiff of fishiness to it -- and I am neutral to on-board with most of GMKA's moves.

A few points -- not to criticise your point of view, but to give you a bit of perspective. 1. Eichel wanted out. (As did Reinhart and Ristolainen, for that matter.) So, as you said, we were going to lose this trade, so the best we can hope for is to mitigate the losses. 2. I am very leery of the ADR. I hope it goes well for him because the worst case scenario is that he becomes paralysed at a later date. I don't wish that on anyone no matter how I feel about them. 3. Tuch and Krebs are not "crap". They are lesser talents than Eichel, but then again, so were Michael Peca and Jay McKee relative to Alexander Mogilny. I doubt anyone would want to undo that trade. Maybe we get lucky again.

Adams can have no choice about trading Eichel (Eichel said he asked before last season), yet still be at fault for how he handled it, what the return is, and how the trade turns out long-term. Yes, he was dealt a tough hand, but I expect him to play it as best he could. So far, the word that comes to mind is "so far, passable." If it goes to pot, then it's a failure.

Maybe this will end the idiotic spiteful narratives around him and the area. The team is another story.

Is that THE Duane?

Welcome.

Elite goaltending. As Hasek and Miller proved, that one position can steal you a lot of games and cover up a lot of flaws.

The wheels would be Buffalo Sabres logos, right?

I saw Jack around town. He certainly embraced the kids and the infirm. I see nothing in his behaviour here since he signed his contract which would make me question his commitment to the community when he was here.

This sounds like Yoda and Luke in my head.

Welcome.

I have been saying for years that the Sabres' player development at the time was so bad, I assume that if the Sabres had drafted Tkachuk and the Jets got May, then NHL fans everywhere would now be wondering why we passed on May to get Tkachuk.

So it behooves the Sabres to arrange something with the Blues now if he is part of the trade.