Doohicksie

After a little Googling, he is apparently deep in development- worked coaching at several colleges, US NTDP, minor pro teams and assistant to NHL teams. To the Ducks they may think they've got the next Don Granato.

Who?

I can totally see how that could be twisted by a Tucker Carlson type into "students identifying as cats."

I think one thing that's evolved overall since Eichel was traded is that the Sabres are incorporating more dump & chase zone entries. Eichel was very good at possessing the puck through zone entry. Tage is good for possession on entry too, but with strong forecheckers (Tuch, Skinner, Greenway, Quinn), it provides multiple options for zone entry. If a team is contesting the blue line, the Sabres are more likely to adjust to dump and chase and be successful than they used to be. Also, with fast, large forecheckers, particularly Tuch and Greenway, you can wear down a defense with dump and chase as the game goes on which can lead to more controlled zone entries late.

I think it is important to remember that at the beginning of 2021-22, Donny's first full season as HC, he had Mitts at 1C coming out of camp. Even with his struggles, he's worthy of that and only lost that slot due to injury in Game 1 that year. Thrilled with the emergence of Tage at 1C, as well as Cozens' development, but that doesn't take away from Mitts' talent and the way he's overcome his injury setbacks. The way his game has evolved I can easily picture a playoff scenario where the top line is neutralized; the second line holds its own, but the game is won by Mitts and the third line. When the clutching and grabbing kick in I think Mitts will best be able to handle it, at least right away (I have no doubt Tage and Cozens will learn how to battle, but I think Mitts is already there).

It's not a bad deal for Caufield... unless your standard is Tage/Cozens which are both very team friendly. I would say Caufield's deal is more typical for that level of player (he's very close to Cozens statistically).

If we trade Mitts now, we will regret it. Dude is just coming into his own and is playing a style that will work in the playoffs.

My wife complained about the late innings the last couple games where the Rangers had a reliever that allowed 3 runs in an outing. I told her: When you have that big of a lead, 3 runs is nothing. But it gives a struggling reliever game conditions to work on his pitching. A few weeks ago Leclerq was struggling that way; now he looks solid. Saturday it was King, Sunday it was Hernandez. After the bumpy outing on Saturday, King closed out the game on Sunday. Still not his best work (allowed a couple of hits) but was able to keep it scoreless in the 9th. Bochy is using the wealth of runs to enable in-game development of his relievers.

Yeah, you done got trolled. 😛

The story that started it all was proven false. My guess is there were some kids at the school that were trolling the administration.

This is false. It NEVER happened.

From my perspective it's allowing people to publicly be who they really are on the inside, which is a good thing. What you're talking about is akin to stuffing a genie back in the bottle. Don't think it's gonna happen.

Surely you know it's not black and white for every person? That some people are born with genitals that are not clearly male or female? That some people are born with genitalia that disagree with their chromosomal sex? That some people are born with something other than XX and XY chromosomes?

Additionally, as a doctor, surely you know that there are more than XX and XY genders, don't you? How would you refer to them, if even they don't know what they are?

Language changes and evolves Thee and thou were strictly singular and informal. Ye and you were either plural, or "formal"... in the same vein as "the royal we". You would only use "you" to refer to multiple people (plural) or to your superiors to indicate a formal sense. People adopted using "you" for informal singular as a snub to the nobility. At first it sounded just as awkward to say "ye/you" instead of "thou/thee" as it does to say "they/them" for "he/him" or "she/her" today. But there was change for a reason and "you" caught on; there was a functionality to the change. There is also a functionality to the singular "they/them" and frankly I'm surprised it took gender spectrum to bubble it up to the top. There are many, many times when, and reasons why, you don't know the gender of another person. So why is it so important to assign one? I used to be more resistant to this change, and I still feel awkward using they/them in the singular sense, but really it's just a question of semantics anyway and why do you really need to know another person's gender preference to interact with them?

Nice. I was just going to post that.

And the Game 5 winner is the strongest indicator of the series winner, iirc

Sorry... should have gotten that from context.

Fort Worth is a weird city with respect to sports teams. We're approaching 1 million in population so we should by that measure have some of our own professional sports teams, but we're an hour from Dallas (population 1.3 million but with several large suburbs even if you don't count Fort Worth). So mostly we're in the Dallas sports orbit. The fact that the Cowboys and Rangers play in the same county as Fort Worth (in Arlington) is a nod to Fort Worth's influence, but the NLL Panthers and the semi-pro National Premier Soccer League Fort Worth Vaqueros are the only teams branded with and playing in Fort Worth (and the official name of the NLL team doesn't even say Fort Worth; a blunder in my opinion). The lead sponsor of the Vaqueros, incidentally, is a dive bar made of cinder block 😛 I think a lot of people like the idea of having Fort Worth sports teams but the teams themselves haven't haven't done a very good job of marketing themselves to prospective fans. I know they're both Pegula owned, but the Bandits seem like they market a lot at Sabres games. That just doesn't happen with the NLL here.

One thing I noticed yesterday is that the Bandits won nearly every faceoff I saw. They were officially 13/20 but it seemed more dominant than that, especially late.

One last thought about Bruce Bochy: He seems to be a good developmental coach. He puts young players in challenging positions and by and large they've been succeeding. He has a quiet confidence in his players. He doesn't put them in over their heads but he doesn't hesitate to put them into positions that challenge their limits, similar to, for instance, how Granato improved Cozens' game by playing him opposite the other teams' best lines. But he's also very good at handling experienced veterans. I think his handling of the bullpen early the season, while not always yielding the best results, is now starting to pay dividends.

It's shocking how quickly the Rangers turned around. Bochy is the best manager they've had since Ron Washington, and as much as I liked Wash, Bochy is probably even better. He has the track record at least. The Rangers turned over the starting pitching staff, bringing in Jake deGrom, Nate Eovaldi and Andrew Heaney, all of whom have been stellar. deGrom has missed some games due to injury and former starter-turned-reliever Dane Dunning has been lights out filling in for him. They lucked out a bit (but I think it has a lot to do with Bochy's handling of the situation) that they have some emerging players that are instantly dominant. Jonah Heim (from the Buffalo area) is one of the best catchers in baseball. Josh Jung so far is hands down the rookie of the year, 1st among rookies in all offensive stats, in the top 5 league-wide for most of them. Ezequial Duran came out of nowhere to backfill injured Corey Seager and put up big offensive numbers and solid defense. His play has been so good that Bochy has been forced to get him playing time. Fortunately he's doing well at all the fielding positions so can be used to give the regular starters time off. Grant Anderson been dominant in his MLB debut as a relief pitcher. In two appearances he's struck out 8 of 13 batters, allowing just two singles so far. Early in the season the Rangers were having trouble holding leads; their Achilles heel has been the bullpen. But recently the bullpen has been greatly improved; not only with the appearance of Grant Anderson but in general. The bullpen's recent run of scoreless innings finally broke in the 9th inning of a 16-6 laugher against the Mariners, when John King allowed 3 meaningless runs in the 9th inning.

Rangers are gonna *own* the Stros this year 😄

I like what you did there 😉 "him"?

If home ice advantage is a thing, the Panthers only have to win one game in Vegas to break it (assuming they hold serve in Sunrise). If they come back to Florida tied 1-1 in the series, they will have the momentum. In the first two games, if they visitors win one, it's a victory.