EM88

Let us see if it continues with Krebs the rest of the year. Another handful of games will make the very small sample size slightly larger and somewhat more meaningful to evaluate. It appears Lindy finally got frustrated enough with Quinn so he took him off of McLeods line and put him with Krebs toward the end of the game. If Krebs is stuck with Quinn the rest of the season, his numbers may not look so good going forward.

Jack Quinn in the past 2 years has not shown that he is willing or that he has the ability to do the things that make up a complete hockey player. I am saying nothing that others have not said here. As you mentioned he is a very good sniper when he has open ice. He does not backcheck very hard. He does not seem to be able to carry the puck around the offensive zone and find his own shooting seam. He does not win battles, nor often even engage in battles for loose pucks. When I watch him play, it seems like he is doing everything at 60% maximum speed. I am glad he is scoring lately. But other than his shot he seems to be a minor league level player out there.

Cozens now -3 on the night...and back to a minus player just for the Sens. His shooting percentage in Ottawa has also fallen below 10%. He did put that pass right onto Krebs stick, tape to tape, as others have said.

I saw that on the replay just now coming back from the commercial break. The gathering in the corner with some slashes and pushing was going on for at least 10 seconds, Cozens glanced at it, then looked the other way and took a LONG time coming over to it.

3 more saves per 100 is a lot. 3 saves per 100 may not seem like much when stated that way, but that would be enough to take a league average starter and make him a vezina winner.

Jack Quinn and JJ Peterka scored playing with Ryan McLeod. That is the most important thing. But their play as a line would worry me if I were a coach or a Defenseman playing behind them. In the couple of games the 3 of them have played together, they have been on the ice for 13 scoring chances for, but allowed 36 against. That is awful. As a line they are generating 17.8 shots per 60. They are allowing 35.6. They have generated 2 high danger chances, but allowed 17 against. Historically bad ratio. The above is not deep dive analytics, it is pretty basic stuff. As for the more derivative analytics, it doesn't look any better: Expected goals for are 0.94. Against 4.37. Almost 4.5 times worse. Their corsi and fenwick for versus against are slanted almost 3-to-1 against them. The last 2 games Reimer saved their Butts a few times. A typical UPL game behind them may have had us thinking this line lost the games for them. The goals have been pretty to watch, but that line has been a disaster in the neutral zone and the defensive zone helping out the defensemen.

I was making reference to a post on the first page of this thread by @CallawaySabres who said he was never a problem here.

Some people may like Dylan Cozens and think he was the recipient of a raw deal here. But he was a problem. Other players on this team have been here for a while and probably have had their stats and their overall game negatively impacted by this organization. However, none of them were given as much of a chance and did so much harm to the Win-Loss record as Dylan Cozens did. I do wish him well in Ottawa, a change of scenery is doing him well so far and might be what he needs to turn his career around. But he was a bad hockey player most of his time in Buffalo.

Let us not forget how Byram did when Dahlin was hurt. There were 8 games (7 and a 1/2 actually) where Dahlin was hurt and Bryam was given the chance to step up and lead the Defensive group without Dahlin. He was given almost all the power play time and over 25 minutes of ice time per game. What did he do when Dahlin wasn't around? 8 games played, 0 goals, 4 assists, -7, and the team lost every game. The losing streak was not all on him, but when given the chance to step up, he was given every chance, all the ice time he could handle, was a fixture on the first power play unit and he produced very very little. He has talent. It is just in a bit of last season and all of this season, he has not shown that he impacts this team in a positive way anymore than a typical, run-of-the-mill middle pair guy that can not even carry his own pairing. Pay him big money on a long term contract at your own risk.

Some of the statistics do support that he is not as bad defensively as people think. This year the team does not allow any more goals when he is on the ice compared to not on a per minute basis. The numbers are the same. The team is actually better with him on the ice in terms of allowing less high danger chances with him compared to without him. For a guy who often goes deep into the offensive zone to generate offense, that does not show someone who is bad at defense when he is on the way back.

I disagree. Once the play got into the zone, he dropped back and took 'his guy' and let the scorer cut toward the center. But from the defensive zone through the neutral zone, he should have been with the opposing winger. It would have never gotten to him having to drop back and cover the top of the circle if he was with the winger on the way up the boards.

This Sabres team might actually be competitive the rest of the season if they could only get some league-average goaltending and Quinn starts to show he cares just a little bit.

Quinn is looking bad this way. On that goal allowed with just a bit more effort he could have gotten back and disrupted the shooter. He was not exactly gliding, but on the replay you can see he certainly was not digging hard to get back. And the goal was scored from where he could have been.

I would give this story a lot of attention if it came from one of the more reputable insiders. What kind of connections or what kind of journalistic legwork does he do that others do not so he is the one breaking this?

I did not think Cozens was fitting on the Sabres. Other than when the Sabres play Ottawa, I do hope he succeeds there. As a person and as far as putting effort into the Sabres, he did well in Buffalo. Regarding his success there more time is needed obviously. He does have 1 goal and 1 assist, but in the 2 games he has played his overall play still does not look good. In his 2 games, when he is on the ice the team has a -3 corsi % and a -15 fenwick %. Cozens on ice Ottawa has given up 4 more shots than they have taken, and are also negative in scoring chances for vs against, as well as negative in high danger scoring chances for vs against. He scored a goal that helped them win. But you do not have to go very deep at all into possession numbers to see when he has been on the ice, the Senators are worse positionally than they are when he is on the bench, and they are giving up more shots and legit chances than they are getting already through 2 games.