Marvin

That is what people on other boards have been saying.

On the other hand, he was the one who recruited B. Thomas Golisano when the previous ownership group fell through. The same negative characteristics always have their upside.

Where is he slotted in various publications? Do you have an evaluation of where he should land.

After floating around some Calgary boards, I will join this consensus. A swap of top forwards with them makes more sense from both teams' POV.

My wife told me that when she was 12, she rode her bike from Alden to Danny Gare's house. 35 years later, she was working on a fundraiser for Roswell Park with the Buffalo Sabres alumni and goes up to Gare asking if he remembered the incident. Gare did and called over Robert to ask if Rene remembered Danny telling him about the crazy kid riding her bike to say "hi" to him. Robert nodded, looked at my wife, and said, "he was right -- you were crazy! And what the hell did your parents have to say about it?" Gare had told everyone in the dressing room about it over the years. Rene brought others over as Gare was talking with my wife.

You remind me of this story from my youth. When I was five, after showing no interest in electronics whatsoever, I asked for a do-it-yourself radio for Christmas. A month or so later, my parents heard a noise from my bedroom well after my 8pm bedtime. They opened the door to find that I had a game against Vancouver on the radio. Probably where my insomnia began.

I feel so old. I remember Eddie "The Entertainer" Shack being traded for him.

Any updates?

I must quibble with you here a bit. The AHL is a far better place to learn as a coach than the NCAA. I got to know college coaches at Michigan State and pro coaching from the Murray brothers when I was at Maryland. The level of sophistication is vastly different.

When Girgensons was drafted, I has pegged him as a target at around 15. I liked his grit, leadership, and willingness to learn. But I also thought he needed seasoning in the AHL. He, like Ristolainen, was rushed because of The Tank. That in turn harmed his development. Then we hired Bylsma, who did his usual thing of undermining youth like Zemgus and Larry (even worse) to coddle mediocre veterans. IMHO, the Girgensons we saw in The Tank Season was no mirage, but circumstances prevented him from becoming more than he is.

I will take any positive thought over the current negativity on this board. I actually figured this was part of it. Maybe not much, but it probably informed their thinking.

China Eichel? You lost me.

Oh, boy. RIP.

I am not as paranoid as you are about TP, but you have a point that needs reinforcing: When a superior gets involved in what a subordinate is doing, s/he becomes akin to an observer of a quantum state: the mere fact that the superior is observing the process intrinsically changes the process; it does not matter if s/he tries to change the process or not. (I call it the "Heisenberg uncertainty principle of management.") When it is the owner of a hockey franchise within a flat management infrastructure, the effect is more pronounced because there is less insulation between the owner and the person affected. And he is known to radically affect things, such as the contracts with Jack Eichel and Jeff Skinner.

I thought that XHCRK really inhibited their offencive games. As you point out, even on their best days, their defencive games remind me more of Phil Housley than Bill Hajt. I personally want GMKA to find each of them a different sage defencive partner who can teach them how to improve their games. I can live with Borgen and Bryson as my 3rd pair. If we are going with two pairs of youngsters (not my preference), the pairs we should try are Dahlin-Borgen and Bryson-Jokiharu.

"I am Donald J. Trump, Billionaire. I own a mansion and a yacht."

This is where analytics really would help: who is unheralded but does a lot of good stuff on the ice. Not Frolik. Not Eakin. Other teams manage to not be embarrassingly bad at the bottom of the roster. Why can't we?

Point of fact: McCabe is not due back before December. Having said that, McCabe-Ristolainen looked like the pair we wanted them to be a few years ago early on this season -- but that was in a system which neutered Dahlin and Jokiharu.

True, but Irbe frustrated the hell out of XGMTM by making previously mediocre goaltenders look like Dominik Hasek when they got here. I still find his work to be in a class by itself.

The bolded is what scares me. He may be solved -- in fact, that is a decent indication that he has been solved. Like Eichel's neck, I would rather some other franchise figure it out. Now, if we can bring back Arturs Irbe as goaltending coach, then we can talk.

IMHO, Gibson should only be included as a cap equaliser. Goaltenders can be like Bill Ranford and just fall apart or like Jim Carey and get solved. And although they can bounce back, they are just as likely to stay broken or stay solved. You need to have either a top prospect or some clearly high-end mid-line-up guys being the main parts of an Eichel trade. If they insist on some conditionals on top of that or want Gibson as a throw-in for hedging their bets on an Eichel injury, then that is different.

I just hope none of the quarters is a slug.

Please put on flame retardant. We would hate for you to go, especially that way.

Does speaking with the younger ones when they were handing out programs count? They spoke at length about wanting the family to be a Cup-winning dynasty.

Playing with the cats and helping our newest daughter adapt to a house with cats. Her previous family are moving into the military and can't bring her, so we adopted her so that they would know she was always being taken care of by another family that love her.