Archie Lee

This is more a reflection of overall roster construction than it is of the shortcomings of individual players. No team has 14 forwards and 8 d-man who eagerly go to the opposition crease or enthusiastically clear their own. We have too few such players.

I agree. But getting better means having better players. If we are comfortable waiting on Quinn and Peterka and Benson and Kulich to become players who collectively (not individually) are good enough to help us win, then we are in the same boat as Anaheim or San Jose or Chicago, and our expectations should be adjusted accordingly. You can’t have 4 developing or struggling forwards 23 and under in your top 9 and expect to win in the NHL. Well, you can I guess, but you would be unrealistic in your expectations.

Agreed. It’s starting to feel hopeless. On the one hand, what went wrong with the current iteration of the team is not that hard to diagnose. Since April 2023, management has failed to support their young core with a commitment to winning, solid veterans, superior coaching, and bold decision making (also known as the mainstream approach to winning in the NHL). The core is still young. With the right person in charge and the right coach, this should still be salvageable. On the other hand you have 14 years of Ville Leino, “there will be some suffering”, Pat Lafontaine, Ted Nolan, pee-pee slaps, “I’ve lost my love for the game”, Ralph Krueger, EEE, flat management, artificial disc replacement, “sustainable success”, palm trees, and “the solution is in the room”, and it’s enough to make you wonder why you invest any $$$, time, or emotion, in this vain and doomed project.

I would bet on Drury fixing the Rangers or on him getting another job and getting his new team high in the standings and deep in the playoffs, before I would bet on Adams. The Kakko trade is a warning about falling in love with young players. There were some who thought trading Quinn in the off-season in a package for a legit top 6 forward was crazy (more than crazy actually; some fans thought that trading Quinn straight-up for an actual good established NHL player would have been GM malpractice). No doubt Adams shared that view. Today, Quinn’s value has surely sunk below what Kakko just returned.

It is hard not to conclude that Adams has no authority to spend beyond a certain level. While the Sabres could use a top tier talent, I think the current swoon could have been avoided with 2-3 additional vets in the Zucker, Greenway, Clifton category. Such players are available, I think. They mostly don’t have trade protection. I’m not letting Adams off the hook. He could spend the money he has more effectively. But I think we are in a $ in / $ out situation. Sad.

He might be able to tell Pegula that. I don’t think he could tell Ken Holland that.

It might be wrong and this time Pegula is just going to dig in and let things spiral further and further out of control. But I don’t think he is on an island. There are likely people around him other than Adams who will tell him that things are beyond repair as is. His kids perhaps? Guelli maybe? Ruff? Maybe Adams asks for mercy at some point. This reminds me of when Krueger was fired. Things seemed hopeless and as though nothing would be done. But the negativity became overwhelming and something had to give. Once the national media start mocking you, it is tough to ignore. Maybe it’s different this time and Pegula is weighing what makes him a bigger laughing stock: firing Adams and hiring his 5th GM or not firing Adams and hoping that somehow against all odds things don’t degenerate even further. It is just depressing all around.

Agreed. The context of the situation that has developed is unique. The players of course are responsible for their own performances, but in the big picture I believe they have been hung out to dry by bad mgmt. The Sabres are 13 years out of the playoffs and their GM made no truly meaningful off-season acquisition to address the top 6 forwards or top 4 D. Then, before they even got home from Prague there are stories floated about how the GM is looking to do something big, meaning he doesn’t believe in the team. Now that he has failed to do anything and has blamed it on geography and has let things slip to the point of no return, he tells them it’s all good and not to expect him to do anything to make the team better. At this point, it would be an act of mercy to trade any of our players.

We just might be approaching that point where a 1st o/a pick pulls an Elway, Lemieux, Lindros, Manning, and says “don’t draft me”. I don’t think a Power or Slavkovsky-level pick would have the nerve. But a Bedard-level 1st o/a might just say “for the sake of my career, I will not sign with the Sabres”.

First of all, I agree with your post about how the players may have took the message. Indeed, I’ve been saying for some time now that the team culture, that had shifted to positive by the end of 22-23, has slid very badly and that the reason for this is that the owner and GM have not committed to winning. It’s been said by many an insider that there are times at the trade deadline that a team will slip if management doesn’t make a meaningful acquisition. The culture in the room can change to: “If this doesn’t matter to the GM, why should it matter to us?”. I think we may have seen that last night. I do not blame the players for any of this. That said, everyone is making up what was said when Pegula met the team. None of us were there. I just don’t think he said we are not making any changes the rest of the year. I’m sure Pegula didn’t want to fire Krueger, but things got so bad he had no choice. We are more than 1/2 way there after last night. Also, if we are going to take the literal approach, they only said not to expect a “big” trade. What is a big trade? Does that mean lots of players? Or big name players? Or lots of big name players? And how long does this trade moratorium last. Until Christmas? The trade deadline? The draft? Forever? What was said exactly?

On a recent After The Whistle, Rivet made a great point. He spoke about the various times in the later portion of his career that he was teamed with a young or rookie defensive partner. He said his role was to show the kids how to play and be assertive and physical at the NHL level and to let them know that everything will be ok, cause he would be right there. If anything got out of hand, he would be at their side. Adams has not given anything that even remotely approaches that level of veteran support to Power or Cozens or Dahlin or Peterka or Quinn or any of our young players.

Ruff isn’t at fault for this in the big picture, obviously. He was a terrible choice to coach this team though. The charade of a coaching search that preceded his hiring was perhaps the ultimate and obvious sign that this was headed in the wrong direction and fast.

Yeah, I think the reported accounts of the meeting are open to interpretation. I doubt Pegula said there will be no trades. More likely, in my view, the message was to not be looking over your shoulder or waiting on a big move. At some point something has to give.

Again, not pounding the drum here, but Karmanos has 25 years of NHL front office experience. He’s a Harvard Grad. He was AGM for 3 Stanley Cup winners. His name has come up for GM openings around the league in the last few off-seasons. It would be foolish to dismiss him as an option, I think.

Neither of us know whether the next guy will be successful, regardless of who it is. We know the current guy has failed. Adams had a plan and stuck to it. Credit to him, I suppose, for holding firm to his vision. But since April 15, 2023, the Kevyn Adams tenure has been an absolute failure.

Ok. I’m certainly not trying to lead the Jason Karmanos fan club or anything. I’m fine with bringing someone from outside in. But if you would rather continue with Adams than give Karmanos a shot, that’s cool.

I’m not saying there are strong disagreements, but they aren’t showing you the video of the assistant GM saying he would do something differently. It’s just never the case that a group of people in such an environment are entirely monolithic in their thinking. Further, such a change could be done on an interim basis. As for the Pegula factor, that’s a big concern to be sure. It could be that it won’t be any better with any GM. But we are about to lose our 11th in a row. In Adams 5th year as GM we are last in the Conference 32 games into the season. It could not be more dire. How could handing the reigns to Karmanos for 4 months make things worse?

You’re speculating. Which is fine. But there is no reason to assume that Karmanos would continue on with status quo. Just because Karmanos is working to help Adams fulfill his vision, doesn’t mean he has no ideas on how to do things differently.

Adams’s dithering is going to ruin some of these kids.

Todd McLellan says no

Todd Nelson would take it. Todd Reirden maybe. Trying to think of a third Todd.

Senior Advisor.

Your post is very thoughtful. I don’t think your last point is wrong, but it is hard for me to imagine they think they can string this out another two years and hold the interest of anyone. Though, I will likely still be here.

Well, I don't fully agree with this. I think there is an austerity plan and that Adams is on board with it. That doesn't mean that Adams wouldn't prefer to be a GM without such financial restraints. Rather, I think he knows who pays his salary and that it is best to support the vision that keeps him in his position. I know that Adams has commented before that he is hesitant to give out long-term deals to UFA's or to trade for older players, because he needs to retain space to sign the next group of RFAs (Peterka, Quinn, Byram, McLeod, Levi after this year, Benson after next year). Some have interpreted that to mean that we will eventually spend to the cap, and for now Adams is just saving the space for his own guys. The flaw with this is that it was never the case that all of these players would "hit". Indeed, it is starting to look as though some of the players he already signed long-term did not actually "hit" (Samuelsson, maybe Cozens). As I type this, only Byram of the upcoming RFAs looks like a player worthy of a long-term deal. Saving money for players who might never be worth the money you are saving, is not a good way to build a winning NHL team. He could have spent on a couple of veteran additions and then sorted out later who gets a big raise, who gets a small raise, and who gets traded. That's what most NHL teams who see themselves as playoff contenders do, I think.

I mostly agree. I would guess that Adams would prefer to have more money to spend. I don’t think Pegula is micromanaging what Adams does spend the available resources on. I think Pegula will spend more if a good case can be made, but Adams knows better than to go to that well too often.