Archie Lee

Agreed. 1) New GM 2) New coaching staff 3) Targeted roster surgery. No need for a grenade. A good GM will get the job done with a scalpel.

I agree. I think the ratio of “guys who stand up for their teammates” to “guys who need a teammate to stand up for them” is not what it needs to be. This is on the GM. I have been very critical of Ruff. I think his hiring was a sham and that no legit NHL contender would have had any interest; further, I think he has done a worse job than I feared. In this case though, I think he was just standing up for his team. I think he sees they have been playing better lately and does not want this to become a distraction. I would bet it was addressed internally and that it won’t take much of a transgression by Columbus to get a response. Just my view.

Totally agree. Of those three, Outlaws is the only good option (and is actually pretty good).

I largely agree with this. I think this is a case where the general lack of response that this team has to these situations, going back many years, has caused this singular case to be magnified. But this is what happens when you overlay a team that has been bad as long as the Sabres have been with them also having a reputation for being soft. It all comes back to the team the GM has built and to the reality that he is not equipped to fix it.

Watching a lot of NHL hockey, I will say that it isn’t always clear when a team will respond and when they won’t in these situations. The issue with the Sabres is less about this one situation than it is that after all this time under Adams and with much being made about changing the culture and, to a degree, the make-up of the team under Ruff, they still don’t respond in these situations in general. If you are a team that typically responds, you can plausibly point to the game situation or to nobody on the ice seeing the hit. When you are a team that doesn’t typically respond, it all just seems like more excuses. Anyway, every failure today brings me back to the same thing: this is what we have after almost 5 years of Adams as GM. There is just no reason to think that he is capable of managing the big picture needs that have to be addressed for this team to become a playoff group.

Man do I disagree with this take. I don’t always agree with @mjd1001, but I find their posts to be thoughtful and often more interesting than what you would find in the sports pages. I like the short-form stuff too. Read what you like and skip what you don’t.

I suspect the barrier with Zucker will be $$$ and term. If Zucker wanted to play for a contender he could have signed for much less with a contending team each of the last two years. If the Sabres offer something similar in AAV for 2 years, I would be surprised if Zucker leaves.

This is so true. But the right mix doesn’t just mean more capable vets. It also means less inexperienced kids. If we ever get a capable GM and they strive to actually find this balance, it will mean some kids leaving.

You could not be more wrong.

Cody Ceci played 24 Stanley Cup playoff games last season and a Stanley Cup contender believes he upgrades their defence. He is precisely the type of right shot D-man we need to play on the 2nd pair with one of our young lefties.

It is a cautionary tale. Four years ago there were fans and media members unironically suggesting Cozens could replace Eichel as captain. Last off-season Quinn and Benson were the untouchable youngsters (some thought Quinn was our best forward). None of this is to say we should trade Kulich. As fans, we are not paid for our opinions. Eventually, if we are honest, we all will have bad takes. But the GM is paid to sort the signal from the noise. It is Adams’s job to determine who to keep and who to move. He seems paralyzed by fear of a mistake.

Well, they got a 1st and 4th for Granlund and Ceci. Granlund plays C and is out producing Zucker. Maybe this is crazy, but should a team like the Sabres be in on a deal like this? Granlund and Ceci would be good veteran adds. They are UFA’s, but acquiring them now would have given the Sabres a 5 month window to get them signed. We couldn’t offer a 1st, but the Dallas 1st is likely to be in the bottom 10. We could have offered a high 2nd, a 3rd in 2026, and/or a good young player or prospect. We should be past the stage of hoarding picks and prospects. Some risk needs to be taken at some point.

Benson/Kulich/Tuch in 2025-26, is not the 2nd line of an NHL team that expects to be in the playoffs. Could happen, but it would require 2 young players to take giant leaps forward.

I think we are in splitting hair territory. You think he is incompetent and terrible, but not so incompetent and terrible that he could have thought he had assembled a playoff team.

Re: the possibility of Zucker and Greenway returning. With the cap going up as it is, I suspect that neither player takes a pay-cut. Maybe Zucker would take a slightly lower AAV on a 2 year deal. Greenway would get a bit of a raise I would guess. Specific to Greenway, if extended it will be at an AAV that places him as a middle-six player. Let's assume for a moment that the 4th line is set for next year with Malenstyn, Kozak, Krebs, and Lafferty. Krebs has been playing higher. Lafferty could be a candidate to be dumped, but the contract will be an issue I think. But, humor me for a moment and let's just say those 4 forwards are our (perfectly fine) 4th line next season. With Zucker and Greenway re-signings, looking at our existing roster, we would have the following players for top 9 roles (in order of likely salary next season, high to low): Thompson, Cozens, Peterka, Zucker, Tuch, McLeod, Greenway, Quinn, Benson, Kulich. That's 10 players for 9 roles. Also, in Rosen, we have a 21 year old who is 2nd in the AHL in goals in his 3rd AHL season Also, there is near consensus among Sabre fans that the teams needs 1 or 2 more Zucker, Greenway, McLeod, type additions, or better, in order to become the sort of more balanced team that can compete for the playoffs . We aren't re-signing Greenway to put him on the 4th line. In the scenario I present, I've already bumped Krebs to line 4. Benson has been on line 4 the last couple of games, but surely we didn't keep the 13th OA steal of the 2024 draft in the NHL for his 18 and 19 yr old seasons, just to relegate him to line 4 as a 20 year old. Quinn and Rosen aren't 4th line players. So, the question is: Who is leaving?

The follow-up trade last night for Marcus Pettersson, seems to signal the Canucks are planning to stick it out through this season. M. Pettersson is a significant upgrade to Desharnais. If Elias Pettersson is now dealt, I think it will happen in the off-season when there will be far more teams with the cap space to make such a trade.

I am flummoxed by your mixed messages on Adams.

To your last paragraph, I think it is giving Adams too much credit. It wasn’t a lie. He thought this was a playoff team, or at least close to it. A GM could not misjudge the potential of a team that he put together, more than Adams misjudged this team.

Again, I agree in principle with your point re: making astute moves to improve a team. You are undervaluing Jensen though, when you refer to him as middling, solid, or as not "good". Jensen has played with Chabot in Ottawa this year on their first pairing. They are by far and away Ottawa's most common D pairing. Jensen is exactly the type of veteran D-man we needed (still need) to bring in to pair with Power.

Some might disagree, but Nick Jensen is a good NHL player. I agree with your post in principle, but it isn't like they traded Joker or Bryson and a 3rd for Chychrun. Frankly, we could use a couple of Nick Jensen's.

I agree and don’t think Pettersson is soft. I think he is more in the category of moody or aloof and he sometimes seems disinterested. That’s just my observation. I remember an interview he gave a few years ago where he was asked about something that had happened recently in the NHL and he answered with: “I don’t know, I don’t watch hockey”. This may be unfair, but it came across as “I’m really good at hockey, but it’s not a passion”. I just couldn’t see Sid or MacKinnon or Dahlin answering the question that way. That could be unfair. He would have been 22-23 at the time and maybe it was just an awkward moment of honesty. My concern is not that he is soft and afraid to go to the dirty places, but rather that he doesn’t always care enough to. It could be that the combination of his knee and having to deal with a teammate who he just can’t stand (perhaps rightly), has caused him to checkout a bit. Here is what I’m pretty certain of: if we trade for Pettersson but do nothing else to address the poor construction of our roster when it comes to depth, maturity, experience, and grit, then the result won’t be much better. For Pettersson to thrive here, there are a lot of issues that need to be resolved. Just getting him won’t resolve our flaws.

I agree. The narrative at the deadline is always buyers and sellers with the teams out of it selling and contenders buying. But players like Bennett and Lehkonen should have been attractive acquisition options for any team not planning on a 5 year rebuild. I don’t really see any such player out there this deadline. The closest examples on teams that might end up being sellers are Cates in Philadelphia, Geekie in Boston, and Romanov with the NYI. McLeod and Byram would be in the category if we were not wanting to pay the going rate for either player, I guess.

Two relatively recent deadline trades that the Sabres could have been in on were Sam Bennett and Artturi Lehkonen. Both were heading into restricted free agency and a year from unrestricted. Florida and Colorado both gave up a 2nd and a prospect respectively. Those trades were steals.

The truth is in the middle. If Power was half as bad as you indicate, his trade value would already have tanked. If we trade Power and don’t get in return a player who provides us with top of the line-up performance for at least 4-5 years, then it will most likely end up being a bad trade. If we can get such a player for Power and find suitable partners for Byram and Dahlin (I don’t love the two together), then I think we are a better team.

Last night’s game did provide some cause to day-dream a bit about just how elite offensively a line of Pettersson centering Thompson and Peterka could be.