Doohicksie

You reckless gambler, you!

I missed two or three games recently, two I recall were wins, That's actually the most Sabres hockey I've missed consecutively in probably a decade.

I still believe the Sabres make the playoffs this year. I will continue to believe until it is determined one way or t'other.

Stranger things have happened.

Seriously though: MUST WIN

I don't think Foligno can keep up with this team. Yep. It would be like bringing back Pommer: Expecting him to perform like he did during his first stint with the Sabres and then realizing there are a lot more miles on the odometer.

I realize that. I think at the start of his first year on the job, Kevyn was told by ownership that it was his job to take the team to the playoffs ASAP, with a desire to keep Krueger and build around Eichel. Given those instructions, Kevyn worked with Krueger to bring in the players Krueger felt would best work with Eichel. Had Eichel not had injury problems things might have worked out differently. My personal opinion is that would have played out the same, just taken longer to get there. But maybe not. Maybe they would have made the playoffs and built from there. I think Kevyn knew what kind of a team he wanted to build and Eichel was not part of it, but that he made an honest effort to work within the constraints imposed by ownership. I also suspect he advised them about his misgivings but obeyed his bosses' wishes. When things went off the rails, ownership acquiesced and agreed to go his way. This is where his long term rapport and his strong personal skills paid off. A Tim Murray couldn't have navigated his way through this situation, but Kevyn was well-suited to manage his bosses and steer them the way he wanted to go. XGMTM and JBott were both hockey first guys and I think they both kind of discounted the hockey sense of the Pegulas. I suspect their communications with ownership was primarily surface level and they didn't really welcome involvement from the owners. But Kevyn's people skills means that he includes the ownership in important decisions, not just on a perfunctory basis but actually spending the time to do the two-way communications to understand where Terry's coming from and invests the time to explain things to him to get not only buy-in, but true understanding to the point that it's a joint decision. Kevyn is not an autocrat, he's a consensus builder.

Saying they're virtually identical.

I think the fact that he was with the team prior to his promotion to GM really helped Kevyn. After he was hired he already knew what was going on; there wasn't any figuring out. I think on Day One his plan was to jettison Risto, Reino and Eichel, and fire Ralph, but it took him a while to convince the Pegulas it was the right course of action. Bringing in Hall and Staal and whatnot was an honest attempt by him to go in the direction the Pegulas wanted but the Eichel injury ultimately doomed that effort and only made it more obvious that his plan was better than the Pegulas' misguided desire to stay loyal to Eichel and try to build around him.

On the other hand, if a player who's actually good at hockey "doesn't want to be here" and is a distraction in the locker room, then his talent is meaningless. (See Jack Eichel)

Yes the second he signs he burns a year More on the subject of college players signing: Which I am NOT okay with. I have Bashful Bladder.

My first impression was he is hot trash. My first impression was wrong.

The release was wrapped in a time warp. I didn't think a human could move that fast.

Looked like the lower bowl had a lot of empty seats on TV.

The thing I look forward to if the Sabres make the playoffs is seeing how Mitts does. I think he will be one of our best playoff players.

Skinner was driving through to the puck carrier; if anything you could say the Carolina player he hit was interfering with Skinner's attempt to play the puck carrier.

OH COME ON.

Joki flattened someone. Huh.

He wants to have his bottle pointing downwards and the refs don't want it dripping on the ice. The Buffalo coverage discussed that.

Baby steps.

OMG Tommer! How did you get that shot off????

But wait... I thought Dahlin plays too offensively?