Doohicksie

I think the Sabres are taking the right approach, as painful as it is at times. But also... I think the Sabres "got lucky" with the emergence of Tage and how his line maximizes the talents of Tuch and Skinner. Maybe if Mitts wasn't injured he would have been "that guy" last year and had a 30 goal season but I'm not seeing it. The fact that Tage got 1C minutes with the most talented guys on the team, but really only due to the injury to Mitts, was a stroke of luck and an opportunity that Tage was ready to maximize. For the Sabres that was like winning a lottery- something you don't expect and can't bank on. The Sabres have a decent center spine for a young team: Cozens is having a break out year, Krebs seems to be improving, Jost was a nice find, and only Mitts seems to be stagnating. But as you say, a lot of this is the philosophy of letting the kids go through their growing pains together and grow together as a team. As a development coach Granato is perfect for that assignment. I think Yzerman doesn't have the same appreciation that Adams does for stocking the system and giving the youth a chance to grow. He wants to start winning and it almost seems like he's making the same mistakes as XGMTM in terms of trading assets for good, not great, players to accelerate the build.

I miss that bloke.

No argument, but in their last game, when it was a tense 2-2 draw in the third, who scored the game winner that loosened up the Yotes and made them pull their goalie? I will say though that I don't see this Sabres team as necessarily having a specific "go to" guy like Drury and Briere were. I could see anyone from the top two lines being "that guy", mostly because those two lines work so well as lines. They can all pass, they can all finish. You don't see it as much on the bottom two lines but the way Jost and Krebs are working out I think there may be a bump up on bottom six scoring as well.

Unless, of course, a team is playing the Sabres and then they target Lyubushkin's and Jokiharju's ankles.

But they won't be, not with an arena deal in place.

The modest 3-game win streak they are currently on has been with a hodge-podge defense. The team may be maturing to the point that as long as they have a couple Top D to work with, they're learning how to win even with some depth level replacements. That may be more important than getting everyone healthy.

I was going to post it but I thought there was an error in the start time. It really is a 10 PM ET start, eh? Yikes. I will still watch the whole thing tonight. It's a 9 PM start for me and I am working from home in the morning so I can sleep in a bit longer.

You misunderstand. You *were* on my naughty list but I'm used to your style and stuff now so you're off. I don't see you getting back on.

You're not on it. This time.

I just want the team to win. If they win more than all the teams between them and the playoffs to a great enough extent, they're in. I'm not going to worry (as much) about the other teams; I just want the Sabres to win. If they do enough of that, the rest of the league will take care of itself.

To me he's only worth the schadenfreude. I love to see him cry.

fify. It's not just the defensemen.

He's fun to watch for his meltdowns when the Pats ***** up.

I expect that, as well as the maturation of the Cozens line, to happen this season which is why I'm still bullish on playoffs this year. You don't like dressing in suits made from curtains from cheap bordellos?

Yeah. Also Barstool Sports founder. Last year he was the one who held "Emergency Press Conferences" on Twitter to lament Pats losses to the Bills. Lament is too kind: They were meltdowns.

Hit it!

Talking about scoring when you really need it, not just number of goals.

And if you liked that, here's a longer version.

This guy 😄

Their footing was a lot worse than the Bills' was once the snow started. Right, but when it counted it affected them.

It just occurred to me that the Bills scored 10 points with 0:00 on the clock at the end of a half.

Mitts does appear to be on the upswing but Skinner is still a huge upgrade over Casey.

Best scrum goal since

Yeah, for anyone who says Skinner isn't that good... they're wrong. He's more than just goal scoring though. He draws penalties, he plays an unorthodox style that befuddles opponents (and sometimes his own coaches, current coach excluded), he gets under opponents skins and in their heads.

We haven't had that since Briere/Drury. Even Jack didn't provide that.