Official Ralph Krueger named Sabres Head Coach

[IKnowPhysics]

Tom Renney as assistant coach?

[steveoath]

Let's get the party started....

 

[MODO Hockey]

I am litterly stunned.

What in the actuall ****, Ralph Kreuger .. REALLY ??
I'm gonna say right now, what a incredible misstake by Sabres organisation, and i sure hope im wrong

This is bad bad bad and utterly bad. May everyone including Freddy prove me wrong.

[nucci]

3 hours ago, Sabre1974 said:

Hockey buzz website very positive about this hire. Saying sabres may have just made best coaching hire off this off season.  Time will tell and still to be officially announced

wasn't everyone positive and excited about Housley when he was hired?

[Curt]

4 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I hate to say this but he sounds like Ted Nolan.  Motivator but not an X and O guy.  This teams real structure and real coach'em up coaching.  Motivation is not enough.  Who is going to provide the structure?  Who is going to make sure that Risto isn't overplayed and who is going to teach him how to pass to facilitate the breakout?  Not Krueger.

On second thought, my initial reaction of Meh! was wrong. This is a bad hire.

First I will say that I see your point that he is more of a motivator than a X and O guy.  However, I think you are off base to label him TN 2.0.  Krueger will know that this is his weakness and make sure that he has the correct people on his staff to compensate/help him.  The Sabres will not be playing a “no system” type of system.  Krueger believes in using all information at his disposal, including analytics and all things that Nolan shunned.

Lastly, I’ll add that Risto’s problems are probably confidence based as much, or more so, than they are anything technical.

[Brawndo]

 

[Huckleberry]

2 hours ago, MODO Hockey said:

I am litterly stunned.

What in the actuall ****, Ralph Kreuger .. REALLY ??
I'm gonna say right now, what a incredible misstake by Sabres organisation, and i sure hope im wrong

This is bad bad bad and utterly bad. May everyone including Freddy prove me wrong.

Don't really know who they should have taken besides him though.

Tippet / Keefe were the ones I thought were the frontrunners.     Besides them and Boughner I think Kreuger isn't a bad choice.

[Cascade Youth]

The arena is two blocks from Elm Street.  Just sayin’....

[Derrico]

I think I would of rather tippet.  Who knows though.  Told myself at the beginning I’m not going to get worked up on who it is until I see results one way or another.  Today is a day for optimism.

[Stoner]

6 hours ago, Doohickie said:

Let's see how he really is with the Xs and Os before we label him Teddy Nolan 3.0.

His hockey IQ will never be questioned like that, for obvious reasons. See also Risto, Evander Kane...

2 hours ago, nucci said:

wasn't everyone positive and excited about Housley when he was hired?

I was just going to say. Is a hot take one way or the other really required at this point? I'll hope for the best and wait until October to start opining on what I see in front of my face.

[Stoner]

He comes off as very good-natured and he talks good. That'll be a refreshing change from every Sabre coach ever.

https://www.nbcsports.com/video/southamptons-ralph-krueger-sits-down-roger-bennett

 

[Pimlach]

I don’t know.  He is a sharp guy, motivator type, maybe a culture changer.  

On the  other hand he never head coached an NHL 82 game season. 

We shall see.  

[SDS]

 

[Brawndo]

 

[Torpedo Forecheck]

This is a hard to tell hire for me. His strengths have been showcased by many on here so I won't go into them. I am on record as saying I thought they needed an ass-kicker during the season. Sheldon Keefe was my preferred hire because he is a tough, intense dude who will not allow losing easily. His teams win championships and he will win in the NHL some day.

This was a team that was good for 2 months and then slid and slid and slid. They never recovered and showed no resiliency or adaptability. If the playoffs show us anything it is you need these 2 traits in spades.

Sounds like Ralph K. has a different approach and I will be curious to watch and cheer for his success. A couple points I haven't seen mentioned- he is 59 years old. He has a lot of experience, but not winning in the NHL over 82 games. Other than winning in Austria back in the 90s, I see a lot of coaching lesser talented teams to 6th and 8th place finishes. Makes me wonder if this is a culture changer in the short term and nothing more than that.

He has his chance to succeed on the ultimate level now. Good luck Ralphie

[Stoner]

Can anyone translate this story about Krueger's departure from Southhampton? Specifically, unravel the many layers of power in that organization? What did Krueger do? Was he good at it? Why did he leave?

Warning: And you thought Terry-Kim?-Darcy-Lindy-Ted-Ken-Cliff-Joe was convoluted.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/football/2019/04/12/southamptonchairmanralph-krueger-steps-six-years-st-marys-leading/

[matter2003]

3 hours ago, MODO Hockey said:

I am litterly stunned.

What in the actuall ****, Ralph Kreuger .. REALLY ??
I'm gonna say right now, what a incredible misstake by Sabres organisation, and i sure hope im wrong

This is bad bad bad and utterly bad. May everyone including Freddy prove me wrong.

You have no clue what you are talking about.

[Stoner]

5 hours ago, steveoath said:

Let's get the party started....

 

If the Sabres were a fun organization, they could make a lot of hay with this. Alas...

[Zamboni]

Like every coaching hire, I’ll give him time to turn the team around and see what he can do. It won’t be overnight. It won’t be over a month or two most likely. It may take ⅔ of a season to really see the fruits of his labor and have a team that’s sooooo used to losing, change it’s mindset and believe in themselves and compete and win at a consistent clip. 

Jumping off bridges and early declarations or conclusions now or a month into a season is obnoxious and short sighted in my opinion.

[nfreeman]

7 minutes ago, matter2003 said:

You have no clue what you are talking about.

This is obnoxious.  

[LGR4GM]

9 hours ago, nfreeman said:

Well, I posted in the other thread that I thought this was crazy, and I am still quite skeptical.  I have a hard time believing that leadership/positivity/communication/culture will overcome the handicaps he will face due to lack of familiarity with opposing NHL coaches, players and tactics.

It's also hard to ignore the undeniable fact that JB appears to have whiffed on a non-negligible number of major decisions during his short tenure. 

But but but...

They really are dying for someone to muscle them out of the idiotic-tank-induced loserville quicksand that they stupidly jumped into -- and this is more of a mental challenge than a physical one.  Maybe Mr. Positive Attitude/Culture/etc. is the guy.

And RK seems like a guy who could be smart enough and big-picture enough to figure out and implement best practices across a range of areas -- analytics, nutrition, matchups, etc.

And knowledgeable hockey people do seem quite impressed with him.

And maybe fortune does favor the bold.

And maybe if you hire 5 coaches eventually you stumble into the right one.

Now please find us a goalie JB and don't be wrong on RK either.

This is obnoxious

If you want to re-litigate the tank, we can do it but don't just do a drive by and drop it in a random thread. 

[LGR4GM]

7 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

I cannot decide if this is a bad hire designed to further pamper undeserved spoiled brats because JBot is afraid a tough demanding coach would make this bunch quit or a really good hire totally in step with the current generation so I suppose wait and see. 

Kind of hope we also hire some new assistants, including a Roger Nielson type for those X's and O's. 

otherwise I dunno, German engineering time. 

This is obnoxious. Nothing like hearing someone say the reason the team sucks is because of their generation. What a load of garbage. 

[LTS]

9 hours ago, dudacek said:

Thomas Vanek approves

https://theathletic.com/978383/2019/05/14/as-sabres-tab-ralph-krueger-to-become-their-next-coach-one-of-teams-former-stars-sings-his-praises/

From this article 

Quote

“He’s one of my favorite people,” Vanek said. “He’s such a good people person. He’s a great talker. He remembers names. He really, really cares about people. He doesn’t care about your best player. He cares about every single guy on the team, and he will make you feel that way.

This triggered a thought inside my head.  Twice in my life I have had the fortune to work underneath (not directly, either) a leader who reminds me of this quote.  Even though they might be someone you interact with once every few weeks it felt like you interacted with them every day. They remember everything that you tell them. They ask about things in your life and prove it's not just passing conversation when they recall that information and then follow up on it in later conversations (weeks later, months later). They do this with everyone they interact with. Why is this important?

Because those two leaders were people that everyone wanted to work for. Their people wanted that leader to succeed and the feeling was reciprocated. I had many conversations where I was given advice on how to improve my approach to things and it wasn't until a few days later you realized that you had been given the advice.  The way it was delivered just bypassed every rejection mechanism and you adopted that improvement without thinking about it.

 

8 hours ago, matter2003 said:

Honestly he seems gifted at pretty much anything he does, regardless of what industry it is or what job he is doing.

In continuing my above story, the two leaders I referred to always seemed to know about everything. They weren't going to win the nobel prize (well, okay, one might have had a chance) but they were never ignorant of a subject.  They were informed and could speak on seemingly everything at a colleague type level.  Granted they were also utterly brilliant in their specific field, but seemingly could understand anything.

7 hours ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

I'd love to be wrong.  We needed to find someone who could impact the roster like Trotz did in Washington and now w the NYI.  Instead we got Ted Nolan two.  I'm very disappointed.  If we were going to make a non-retread hire why not interview Sheldon Keefe, what more does this guy have to prove in the AHL to get a shot?  

While we have no experience with Krueger yet, the big difference from what I am reading is that Krueger appears to be more intellectual than Nolan when it comes to the game. I'm not trying to sleight Nolan here, but he was largely known for getting a lot out of his players without having a real hockey sense. He was motivational but not really strategic. It seems that Krueger has a better head for strategy and perhaps understands the game and the mechanics of it at a higher level.  In this way he can relate to players who think the game that way and in ways perhaps Nolan could not.  We shall see.

As for Keefe, I think it's premature to assume they did not inquire about him.  It may also be seen that he really wants to take over Toronto.  Finally, the stuff regarding his past, no matter how we feel about it, may be enough to red flag him with the organization. Right or wrong, it may be that they don't want to risk something bigger coming to light once he's a head coach.  I'm not saying that's the case, of course I have no idea.  I am merely stating that I don't think there's enough evidence to pass judgment on what did or did not happen with regards to Keefe.

----------------------

I have no idea how this hire will turn out. However, given what I've seen of this roster and its star players it seems clear that getting them to play together has to be a top priority and the past few coaches have not been able to do that. The team has the appearance of being together but its play on the ice suggests otherwise. I can only hope this is a step in the right direction.

[#freejame]

I’m a big fan of economics and of hockey. I like the hire, at least until he comes out as a salt-water economists and the Sabres go on their first losing streak. 

[LGR4GM]

No idea if this is a good or bad hire. Guess we will see. Will also depend on what kind of roster he gets going into the season. At the very least he sounds like a guy who can use players properly.