IKnowPhysics

@FakeJoeSacco I'm gonna trade the ###### out of that kid at the deadline next year.

THIS JUST IN: SABRES KEEP TYLER ENNIS.' But Jordan Leopold and Drew Stafford also rumored to be part of the deal.

This is the good part. Unusual signs of intelligence coming from Calgary.

If you're playing along at home, here's the evolution of trade proposals for O'Reilly thus far (sorry for any I left out, most package deals were ignored, parentheses include stuff coming back): 2/13/13 10:30 Sekera Catenacci 2/13/13 12:00 Leopold Adam 2/13/13 12:11 Foligno Pysyk 2/13/13 12:25 Ennis 2/13/13 12:25 Stafford McNabb 2/13/13 12:35 Stafford Leopold 2/13/13 12:46 Stafford Pysyk 2/13/13 19:49 Stafford Pysyk 2/13/13 20:09 Stafford Sekera Adam (+2nd rounder) 2/14/13 12:25 Sekera Adam 2/15/13 10:02 Stafford Pysyk 2/15/13 10:47 Ennis Pysyk 2/15/13 14:33 Foligno Armia 2/18/13 03:33 Sekera Girgensons 2/18/13 20:15 Stafford 2/20/13 12:56 Sekera Brennan 2/27/13 13:04 Miller Stafford (+Pickard) 2/28/13 09:58 Miller (+Pickard) I bolded the ###### I would actually consider and italicized the ###### I laughed at.

Also, Myers has an NMC.

Corsi number was devised more than six years ago by a guy with a graduate engineering degree who happened to work in hockey. It's not a system used for coaching players, let alone goalies, just a little bit of math to look at results of games. And besides, we've already seen that you're completely biased against using advanced statistics.

Thanks. The Corsi is an indirect measure of how the player performs and it should be taken in context of some of the other stats. To get a good handle on what it actually means in reality, you have to break down the context a little, and especially consider quality of competition. Quality of competition is much more of a factor determined by coaching decisions and ends up being one of the crucial stats used for examining player usage. Lots of other factors can influence shot attempts. - Linemates can influence this. If you had some player that attempted 1000 shots in a season, it would skew the Corsi for the players that always play with them, but maybe those players actually perform better or get more assists because of the vast shot differential. Likewise, if your all star player plays with a bunch of schmoes, his Corsi could be lowered, but his performance would also likely be hurt too by playing with those players. They're all tied together, but in reality, so is the performance of the players that play together. - Coaching styles could influence Corsi numbers too- lines of players that are told to sacrifice offense to provide defense can influence the Corsi numbers. Regehr last year, Gaustad last year, Ott this year, have all had low Corsi numbers recently with us- not only do they not shoot a lot, their linemates haven't exactly shot the lights out either. But depending on the situation, especially QoC, maybe they're struggling at preventing the other team from taking shots. In summary, just as a player's real performance is a product of lots of variables including coaching, linesmates, quality of competition, the Corsi number for that player can be influenced by those things as well. Corsi might tell you how well a player performed, but more importantly, the other related stats might tell you why he performed that way.

Gracias.

######, I think I figured it out. It's complicated to explain, so stick with me here and please feel free to ask questions. The result doesn't account for all of our problems, but it raises some big red flags to me. Here we go... I've been looking at the 5-on-5 Corsi numbers (use this link in a new tab/window if you;d like to play along) in the context of the Corsi Rel QoC. [side note from the stats in that link: Kaleta does a great job drawing penalties. He nets about 2.4 minutes of drawn penalty time per game after you subtract the penalties he takes. He's a walking powerplay.] For those not in the know, and I wasn't really before this evening, here's the glossary for Corsi stuff. This is the hard stuff: Examples to help folks get the idea what the Corsi stats can tell you: An interesting aside using Corsi numbers, not relavant to the big point, but kind of interesting: The main point: If you sort the team by Corsi Rel Quality of Competition (highest to lowest/most negative). Take a look at the players that have played against the highest competition. Ignore Pardy and Porter if you like. Then eyeball who has negative Corsi numbers: Brennan, Leopold, Weber, Gerbe, Ott, Myers, Hecht... These are players who are struggling (bad Corsi) but face the competition's best players (high Corsi Rel QoC). This begs the question of which of your players you want to face the opponent's best players. A third line that struggles against those players (bad Corsi)? Or your top line that does great offensively but struggles defensively (even Corsi)? Pominville, Hodgson, Vanek, Stafford, and Ennis are all evenish at Corsi, but play very hard competition. Our opposing teams are sending their best players to successfully shut down our best line and then sending their best players to "pick on" (ie get favorable matchups vs) our struggling players. Our shutdown-type players (Ehrhoff, Sekera, Kaleta, Sulzer) are seeing the weakest competition. And according to Corsi, our defense (outside of Ehrhoff and Sulzer) is playing like trash: Regehr, Weber, Sekera, Leopold, and Myers are all in the league's bottom 24 players (that have played 5+ games) in Corsi. (Ehrhoff is 15th best by the way.) And the should-be shutdown players on the 3rd and 4th lines are playing horrible defense (never mind contributing offensively). At the end of the day, our defensemen are mostly awful, our weakest forwards are ending up in horrible matchups, and our best defensive role players don't play against the opposition's best players, and our best offensive players STILL see the hardest competition. If these stats are telling, then I could try to recommend a path forward:

Oh, I know.

Post lockout, our best teams did a lot of "rolling four lines" which ignored zone starts. Ruff also played chess, not with zone starts, but with line matchups (especially at home) so that should be figured upon as a reason why his zone start stats look like a mess.

I can't imagine how ###### this team would be to watch if we had worse goaltending. The existence of Ennis, Hodgson, Vanek, Pominville, Ehrhoff, and Miller is the only reason I haven't thrown something through my television.

What's the timeline? Do we try to get better immediately or do we admit and commit to a rebuild (which we haven't done in years)?

Yes.

Trading a guy who's averaged 68 points per season over the last six seasons for an unestablished 55 point kid. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQB4nAjZIdE

Ugh, I've done that in games a few times. It blows. Last time I did that (I was tripped), I slid on my belly and my shoulder smashed into the end boards. It was the first time I couldn't get up immediately after because it jarred my neck, head, and spine. I finished the game, but the next day, I went to work with my arm in a sling. It didn't get separated (I was surprised) or break, but I had bruising and muscle sprains 360 degrees around my shoulder front and back. If you're not on your side and facing the boards when you're sliding, there aren't many good ways of protecting yourself and cushioning the impact.

The night is always darkest before the dawn.

If you get bored, the science museum is nice and is close to the RnR HOF. HOF's worth it. Don't skip out on the Great Lakes Brewery either, some of the best beers in the nation, IMO.

Right. And there's been more than a few tough times that encouraged the media to badger Regier about what has to change and he's put in a position where he almost has to say that to get them off his back about Ruff, but I still don't think he'd try to give the impression that it could never happen. Seems unprofessional.

Miller is leading the league in saves by almost 80. That's about four games worth of shots against for St Louis. Miller's sav% is 0.913. Nabokov, who we just made look like an all star, is at 0.903.

I was doing a little more reading so that I was prepared to deal with whatever service I can get when I move to my new place shortly. DirecTV and Dish Network already carry just about every regional sports network in HD, so when it's time for Center Ice to pump the feed to you, they just switch that channel on for you. That means you often get both feeds and usually both in HD. Cable and FiOS use inDemand, which broadcasts many feeds in SD, mostly for the reason of saving the digital cable providers some bandwidth (inDemand is owned in a joint venture by several of the large cable conglomerates). I might have to do my best to remain with DirecTV.

One of the little stats that makes this organization great is that the team has only finished a season with a record worse than .500 seven times (out of 41+ years!). Three of those were in the first four years of the Franchise, and none of the rest were sequential- we always bounced back. That's how bad this team is. They get the winningest coach in Sabres history fired and are on pace for the second worst points percentage in franchise history ('71-'72). I have some hope for next season, but this might be a long shortened season.

Kevyn Adams I believe, probably with a little in-game input from Teppo.

Not sure where to stick this nugget, here seemed as good a place as any... Ennis has recorded 9 points in his last 10 games. Hodgson has also 9 points in his last 10. The rest of the top six: Vanek has recorded 2 points in his last 7 games, Pominville 1 in his last 9, Foligno 1 in his last 8 games, Stafford 5 in his last 13 games. The young centers we were unsure about in the off-season now seem to be trying to carry the team offensively. And that's a big problem, because while we began the season as one of the higher scoring teams, we've only scored 10 goals in the last 7 games. Our major problems now to extend to just about every area of the ice outside of (minor issues at) goaltending. Shitsticks.

'95-'96? '71-'72?