Jack Eichel: Trade rumors and speculation

[Sabres Fan in NS]

5 minutes ago, JohnC said:

As noted by Paul Hamilton on WGR he wanted a 6 term from Buffalo while Boston offered a 4 yr. term.  And he was asking for a higher average salary than what Boston offered him. I hated to see him leave but Adams made the right decision. 

Play your BS games with someone else. 

I don't trust anything Hamilton says.

I think @Thorny is asking a legit question.  Why are you afraid to answer it?

[Doohicksie]

20 minutes ago, JohnC said:

With respect to the Ullmark situation I absolutely believe that he handled it right. Giving him a 6 yr term and a higher average than he got from Boston would have been a mistake similar to the contract mistake that was made with Skinner. He placed a value on a player and had the judgment and fortitude to abide by his decision. 

The mistake he made was not recognizing that Ullmark was leaving and getting assets for him at the deadline.

[JohnC]

1 minute ago, Doohickie said:

I think you could question some of the moves he made last off-season but it's reasonable to give him a pass since it appears that as the new guy he deferred to Krueger's wishes. If he was instructed in the beginning to keep Krueger on it would make sense to come in and at least try to cooperate. As the Krueger situation played out it seemed that the vision for the team shifted to that of Adams. So from that standpoint it's kind of like Adams is still in his first off-season.  (Last year he was essentially red shirted.)

I agree with you that Adams was for the most part was implementing what Krueger wanted done. The players that were brought in were Krueger players. And I agree with you that he is basically starting fresh and is in control. Hopefully, the owners don't interfere too much. 

[JohnC]

1 minute ago, New Scotland (NS) said:

I don't trust anything Hamilton says.

I think @Thorny is asking a legit question.  Why are you afraid to answer it?

Afraid of answering what? I stated my position on the Ullmark decision. As it stands the goaltending situation is tenuous. That's obvious. 

[Sabres Fan in NS]

2 minutes ago, Hoss said:

It’s a chicken or the egg situation but Samson, Jack and Risto all made it clear they wanted to be elsewhere.

A far as I know, all they ever said publicly was that they didn't really care if they played in Buffalo, or elsewhere, especially Sam and Risto.  Jack was mostly moaning about a disconnect and looking forward to next season here or someplace else.

[Sabres Fan in NS]

This is how we will get to 500+ pages on this beaut.

I don't think anything has been posted about a rumour or speculation in a hundred pages.

I'm with @Doohickie and think this thing should be locked.  Maybe pin it first so it can't just drift away.

[JohnC]

3 minutes ago, Doohickie said:

The mistake he made was not recognizing that Ullmark was leaving and getting assets for him at the deadline.

That's hindsight. I'm sure that after communicating with his agent he believed he could sign him. In the end he wasn't going to go beyond the value he placed on him. That was the right thing to do. As I said in a prior post Ullmark acted in his best interest and so did the organization. When a player is an UFA you don't have total control. There is certainly more to do to address that critical position. 

[JohnC]

4 minutes ago, New Scotland (NS) said:

A far as I know, all they ever said publicly was that they didn't really care if they played in Buffalo, or elsewhere, especially Sam and Risto.  Jack was mostly moaning about a disconnect and looking forward to next season here or someplace else.

Sam made it clear through his agent that he was not signing a long term deal here. He was going to be an UFA if he signed the one year deal. And Sam was explicit in some end of game interviews that scoring winning goals in end of season meaningless games meant little to him. Understandably, he wanted out and he was going to position himself to get out. All this was played out in the open. 

[Doohicksie]

18 minutes ago, JohnC said:

Hopefully, the owners don't interfere too much. 

I think KA played it right. I suspect the subjects of coaches and team vision came up, and Adams was told to get Krueger what he wanted. As the season played out he waited until it was clear Krueger had to go before revisiting the issue with the Pegulas.  At that point (the meeting in Boca), I think KA secured the endorsement to do things his way. And so far they're letting him run with it.  Compared to past GMs I feel that KA understands and is better prepared to handle ownership and still get what he wants.  The Pegulas hired him because he was familiar but I don't think he is by any means their lapdog.

Edited August 23, 2021 by Doohickie

[Doohicksie]

13 minutes ago, JohnC said:

That's hindsight. I'm sure that after communicating with his agent he believed he could sign him. In the end he wasn't going to go beyond the value he placed on him. That was the right thing to do. As I said in a prior post Ullmark acted in his best interest and so did the organization. When a player is an UFA you don't have total control. There is certainly more to do to address that critical position. 

I agree he did the right thing in not raising the offer, but when Ullmark didn't sign an extension and said he wanted to test the market he should have been moved. Chalk it up to experience and I bet KA will be more ruthless in the future.

Edited August 23, 2021 by Doohickie

[Thorner]

7 minutes ago, New Scotland (NS) said:

I don't trust anything Hamilton says.

I think @Thorny is asking a legit question.  Why are you afraid to answer it?

I can't speak for him but I'm assuming he thinks my question was either "leading" into some sort of "gotcha" or potentially even irrelevant, as evidenced by labelling what for me is interesting conversation as "BS games". 

They may seem to be leading questions, I admittedly think they can and do read that way sometimes. What I am actually trying to do though is fill in a few hypothetical variables so as to better isolate an opinion, so as to better understand said opinion. Ie - if dell and whoever play mostly as expected, would one consider Adams' work to potentially still be satisfactory. The reason I think this argument may still be possible is because of perceived contextual limits - ie Adams made the right decision with Ullmark regardless of positional aptitude, and no team was offering any kind of upgrade that could be reasonably attained. 

I suspect this is a viewpoint that may be held - where it would be proclaimed that Adams did the best possible with what he had to work with on the goalie front, and that regardless of the aptitude of the goaltending position, Adams would be allowed a passing, or good grade for his work on that front due to how we was limited by outside factors. 

It would be an interesting viewpoint - one I wholeheartedly disagree with, for reasons, there-in lies the potential for further banter, but going further down the road in this post isn't much use if it's not a discussion anyone wants to have. 

[thewookie1]

7 minutes ago, Thorny said:

I can't speak for him but I'm assuming he thinks my question was either "leading" into some sort of "gotcha" or potentially even irrelevant, as evidenced by labelling what for me is interesting conversation as "BS games". 

They may seem to be leading questions, I admittedly think they can and do read that way sometimes. What I am actually trying to do though is fill in a few hypothetical variables so as to better isolate an opinion, so as to better understand said opinion. Ie - if dell and whoever play mostly as expected, would one consider Adams' work to potentially still be satisfactory. The reason I think this argument may still be possible is because of perceived contextual limits - ie Adams made the right decision with Ullmark regardless of positional aptitude, and no team was offering any kind of upgrade that could be reasonably attained. 

I suspect this is a viewpoint that may be held - where it would be proclaimed that Adams did the best possible with what he had to work with on the goalie front, and that regardless of the aptitude of the goaltending position, Adams would be allowed a passing, or good grade for his work on that front due to how we was limited by outside factors. 

It would be an interesting viewpoint - one I wholeheartedly disagree with, for reasons, there-in lies the potential for further banter, but going further down the road in this post isn't much use if it's not a discussion anyone wants to have. 

The one thing that lends credit to Adams being sort of stuck after Ullmark would be what Colorado had to pay for 1 year of Kuemper. No one in their right mind would trade that much to backstop a rebuilding team.

[Digger]

19 minutes ago, That Aud Smell said:

I really liked this post. Eichel is a wonderful talent, a game-changer. Generational? Probably not. A rare player for any given team to have? I'd say so.

He was just horribly miscast here in Buffalo, which is such a shame. Now, I acknowledge that the "casting" that occurred wasn't totally of the team's making. I reckon he wanted some of it, demanded some of it ... or just felt obliged to take it on.

Miscast?  Maybe so but how much did Eichel bring to the scenario himself?  We see that both he and his agents are pretty active in trying to control his career (yes I know that's their jobs but still seems to be out of line with other players).  He was drafted behind McDavid.  He got his big contract and was named captain after McDavid got his contract and captaincy in Edmonton.  He hadn't earned the contract but it was expected that he would grow into it.  He hadn't shown that he was ready to be a captain or even an assistant captain.  What would he have done if they asked him to sign a bridge deal and earn the big contract?  What would he have done if he hadn't been named captain?  I think many of the moves the Sabres made were around trying to keep Eichel happy just to avoid a situation like we are in now.

Following McDavid and Eichel, Austin Mathews did get the big contract (although shorter term) and was not named captain.  That was the right move to give the C to another player.

I agree the management is to blame but there are now so many GM's to spread the blame.

[Sabres Fan in NS]

16 minutes ago, JohnC said:

Sam made it clear through his agent that he was not signing a long term deal here. He was going to be an UFA if he signed the one year deal. And Sam was explicit in some end of game interviews that scoring winning goals in end of season meaningless games meant little to him. Understandably, he wanted out and he was going to position himself to get out. All this was played out in the open. 

How do you know the bolded to be true?  Are you Sam's agent?  Are you KA secret assistant?

And his statement about scoring goals in meaningless games meant little to him is exactly what I expect him to say.  It does not mean that he wants to be traded.  It simply means that he wants to play meaningful hockey in April, May and June.  All hockey players will say that.

None of what you describe was 'played out in the open'.

[Thorner]

1 minute ago, thewookie1 said:

The one thing that lends credit to Adams being sort of stuck after Ullmark would be what Colorado had to pay for 1 year of Kuemper. No one in their right mind would trade that much to backstop a rebuilding team.

I think there are a lot of situations we can look at and say, well Adams shouldn't have paid that price, but I come down on the side in the end that it would be pretty logically unlikely to think that, over the course of building for 2 seasons, there wasn't a single situation KA could have capitalized on to better upgrade the position. That seems unlikely to me. We can't know without all of the information, but I much sooner default to the actual results, in lieu of having all of the facts, than I would to the "Adams did what he thought was best through the prism of the moment" side of things.

I do believe that GMs are judged on results, in the end, not on whether they made perceived good decisions based on the info available at the time. 

[Weave]

7 minutes ago, New Scotland (NS) said:

How do you know the bolded to be true?  Are you Sam's agent?  Are you KA secret assistant?

And his statement about scoring goals in meaningless games meant little to him is exactly what I expect him to say.  It does not mean that he wants to be traded.  It simply means that he wants to play meaningful hockey in April, May and June.  All hockey players will say that.

None of what you describe was 'played out in the open'.

NS, I think you are being willfully blind here.  All 3 made enough noise to easily connect the dots that they preferred to be elsewhere.  It is a rate athlete that comes out and directly states this, but they often say enough to convey the message.  That was the case here.

[mjd1001]

1 hour ago, Thorny said:

 

The post you were responding to was a glorification of Allen (not saying he's not great), the juxtaposition was a bit striking is all. 

That had no bearing on my post whatsoever. My post itself had nothing to do with Allen, I was not attempting to continue a conversation about Allen, I did not bring him or the bills up in my post.  If the post I was responding to did bring him up, I moved the topic of my post away from that and I only brought up the Sabres.

[Thorner]

1 minute ago, mjd1001 said:

That had no bearing on my post whatsoever. My post itself had nothing to do with Allen, I was not attempting to continue a conversation about Allen, I did not bring him or the bills up in my post.  If the post I was responding to did bring him up, I moved the topic of my post away from that and I only brought up the Sabres.

Then don't respond to my post? It wasn't a shot across the bow, it was an invitation for conversation. Jebus

[Sabres Fan in NS]

1 minute ago, Weave said:

NS, I think you are being willfully blind here.  All 3 made enough noise to easily connect the dots that they preferred to be elsewhere.  It is a rate athlete that comes out and directly states this, but they often say enough to convey the message.  That was the case here.

I agree that there was a lot between the lines and both Sam and Risto have been traded.  So, it is most likely that both parties decided it was time to move on.

People post things as fact when they have no way to know these facts.  Unless they are real insiders, as in working for player agents or work for the Sabres, there is no way for any of us to know exactly what happened.  That's my point.

[mjd1001]

5 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Then don't respond to my post? It wasn't a shot across the bow, it was an invitation for conversation. Jebus

Wow, Look in the mirror, you are the one that responded to MY post with something that made no sense at all regarding what I was saying. All I was doing was asking you what the heck you were responding to my post about.  This one is all on you buddy.  All I did was simply as you what you meant because I couldn't figure out what you were saying because it didn't have any bearing on the post of mine you responded to.

Edited August 23, 2021 by mjd1001

[Sabres Fan in NS]

Welcome to page 278, same as the last page and the page before that and ...

 

[PromoTheRobot]

2 hours ago, Thorny said:

Like McDavid in Edmonton. 

This is a very common misconception. By "lift" the Sabres, what really happened is Drury's considerable leadership ability provided a key variable in filling out an equation, the equation of a winning hockey team. Jack may not have the leadership abilities of Drury, sure. But he's also much better on ice. Jack *was* providing a key variable, too, it's just that Jack's wasn't in a position to "make a difference", in perception, because the rest of the equation was too barren. Look at the roster around Drury, and the one around Eichel, and tell me you are comfortable saying Eichel didn't provide "differential value" with all of the other question marks left unsatisfied. 

Just because leadership lifts teams doesn't mean talent doesn't, also. Jack provides great value - he finished 8th in MVP voting his last full year. That's value to his team. This is a player who ranked near the top of the league year in, year out in percentage of team goals he had a hand in. He was literally right before our eyes making his line mates, both at even strength, and on the powerplay, better. This is provable statistically. 

He did lift the team, he just couldn't lift them enough. 

In Eichel's case it doesn't 

[Thorner]

4 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

In Eichel's case it doesn't 

So there isn't one player on the team we can say "lifted" them? It's a condemnation of every player?

The coming response is probably "we expect more of Eichel", and my response to that would be: and he delivered. I mean, he was far and away our best player when on the ice, and contributed more than anyone to the scoresheet. Directly responsible for upping the production of other players on the team better than anyone else on the roster, statistically. 

Edited August 23, 2021 by Thorny

[Sabres Fan in NS]

Just now, New Scotland (NS) said:

Welcome to page 278, same as the last page and the page before that and ...

 

Oh, can we get a kiss and make up thing happening between @mjd1001 and @Thorny??

This thread is bring out the worst in us.

Who in blazes started this thread??  Oooooo ... never mind .........

[Thorner]

1 minute ago, New Scotland (NS) said:

Oh, can we get a kiss and make up thing happening between @mjd1001 and @Thorny??

This thread is bring out the worst in us.

Who in blazes started this thread??  Oooooo ... never mind .........

Disagree. I'm just trying to talk hockey.