GDT: Sabres @ Sharks 11/2/2021, 10:30pm est

[dudacek]

30 minutes ago, klos1963 said:

Cozens shouldn't even be in the NHL right now. Couture was a star from his first full season. No comparison.

It’s Cozens D3 year. In Couture’s D3 year he had 9 points in 25 NHL games.

24 minutes ago, Norcal said:

Skinner with some impressive puck control followed by a below average decision 

It was a vintage Skinner performance tonight. Which is frustrating as hell, but I’ll certainly take over what we saw the past two years.

[DarthEbriate]

And finally...  I hope they play like madmen on the final game of the road trip because I want to be entertained in my first Kraken-Sabres game.

[SwampD]

I really hope that Granato is as good as I think he is and can wake Dahlin TF up.

Rasmus, we get it. You can skate really pretty. But when you are playing defense, you play the man, not the puck. That’s hockey 101.

[PerreaultForever]

This is beginning to look like the same anemic disorganized mess we've seen for years. Kind of figured this would happen. The D is running around again and making mistakes, we get pushed around in front of the net, and we basically fall apart easily. 

We're still passing better than last year, and that's good, but lots of other things are looking familiar. 

Cozens is really struggling and I think it's time to think about sending him down to Rochester. I think it would do him a lot of good, much like it did for Mitts. 

Best part of the game was, as mentioned above, listening to the anti Kane stuff. Felt satisfying. 

 

[dudacek]

Not blaming him, but Anderson looked more like what I expected from him.

[K-9]

First taste of a little adversity for them. Looking forward to seeing how they respond to that Thursday night. 

[Norcal]

 

[triumph_communes]

A bunch of deflected goals from the point. Deflating like the Miller years.  Ugly game but those bounces go both ways. 

[Doohicksie]

7 hours ago, Pimlach said:

We are seeing the real team now  I’m afraid to say.   
 

We can play fast at times.  We are young and we try hard.  The lack of talent and lack of size is getting obvious.  

I see it mostly as Cozens isn't ready for top line duty and the team is really missing Casey and Olofsson.  They're protecting JJ, Quinn and Weissbach to ensure they properly develop.  And.... West Coast road trips are always hard.  Yes this is the real team, but it's the real team at its worst.

Edited November 3, 2021 by The Ghost of Yuri

[Doohicksie]

7 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

Cozens is really struggling and I think it's time to think about sending him down to Rochester. I think it would do him a lot of good, much like it did for Mitts. 

That can't happen until Mitts is back unfortunately.

What this really comes down to is that Murray and Hayden are much worse than Mitts and Olofsson.  If they're rotating in for other JAGs they might be fine, but when you take the cream off the top you can't replace it with just anything.

[Thorner]

Heard Cozens and Dahlin were pretty brutal...didn't get to watch.

Not sure why they are doing to Cozens exactly what they did to Casey, why this franchise has a fetish for trading their good centres and failing to properly man that area of the ice. It looked odd in the offseason when we saw who the centres were they were penciling in, and we asked why not giving proper vet insulation would be ok this time when it wasn't before...still wondering. 

[bob_sauve28]

7 hours ago, dudacek said:

Not blaming him, but Anderson looked more like what I expected from him.

They did get people in front of him though

[elijah]

I get the frustration starting to boil over after a loss on top of a streak of poor performances

But this was their best game in maybe 4 or 5 games in my opinion. The high pressure system was back to work for a full 60 minutes and it looked mostly good in doing so. A couple of bad bounces on defense and goaltending returning to the mean, as well as an offense that didn’t penetrate the slot quite enough.

Outside of that, you can still see the progress over last years team which is the biggest facet here. But also this is a game that might be in the W column on a different night with a little bit more puck luck. 

Maybe my eye is still untrained for hockey and I’m better off sticking to commenting on the Bills, but that’s just what I saw last night. I think the fancy charts might back me up and show that it was closer than some may have expected, but I can’t find any for last night yet

[Thorner]

8 hours ago, DarthEbriate said:

The difference is they're rolling Couture, Hertl, and Bonino vs. Thompson, Cozens, and Eakin down the middle. Cozens can be Couture some day. Thompson could maybe be a Hertl...maybe. Eakin is nowhere near Bonino.

Agree, though Thompson won't become Hertl haha

[Thorner]

8 hours ago, klos1963 said:

Yeah, let's hope. But Cozens really doesn't do much right now.  Still very early to judge, but between him and Dahlin, a couple high picks not contributing much right now.

Kevyn Adams spoke endlessly of the "blinding light" of the youth and Cozens was front and centre in that. I think the light blinded him to the fact we wasn't ready to be one of our top offensive centres this year. 

[Pimlach]

Can we stop the blaming Cozens?  If we had a better team, if we went out and added a solid veteran center, then Cozens might be in Rochester now.   Mitts is out. Eakin was out. Tage was moved to center.  Cozens is playing a role he is not ready for.  None of this is his fault.  The effort is there. 
 

Let’s beat Seattle and get 4 points on the trip.  They need to go back to basics and work for 60 minutes. 

[sabrefanday1]

8 minutes ago, Pimlach said:

Can we stop the blaming Cozens?  If we had a better team, if we went out and added a solid veteran center, then Cozens might be in Rochester now.   Mitts is out. Eakin was out. Tage was moved to center.  Cozens is playing a role he is not ready for.  None of this is his fault.  The effort is there. 
 

Let’s beat Seattle and get 4 points on the trip.  They need to go back to basics and work for 60 minutes. 

stop making sense will ya'...we really needed to add an experienced center as both a player but more importantly a leader. Still like where we are headed 

[nucci]

7 minutes ago, Pimlach said:

Can we stop the blaming Cozens?  If we had a better team, if we went out and added a solid veteran center, then Cozens might be in Rochester now.   Mitts is out. Eakin was out. Tage was moved to center.  Cozens is playing a role he is not ready for.  None of this is his fault.  The effort is there. 
 

Let’s beat Seattle and get 4 points on the trip.  They need to go back to basics and work for 60 minutes. 

back to the basics is such a cliche. What does that mean? Not really blaming Cozens personally...it's just like you said. The team put him in this position. Playing a role he's not ready for shows a bad organization

[Thorner]

19 minutes ago, Pimlach said:

Can we stop the blaming Cozens?  If we had a better team, if we went out and added a solid veteran center, then Cozens might be in Rochester now.   Mitts is out. Eakin was out. Tage was moved to center.  Cozens is playing a role he is not ready for.  None of this is his fault.  The effort is there. 
 

Let’s beat Seattle and get 4 points on the trip.  They need to go back to basics and work for 60 minutes. 

Who's blaming him outright? I think most see it as a "not ready" situation, if they have a firm opinion on him at all, at this stage. 

[pastajoe]

So I made the right call to go to bed after the 2nd period. 🤔

[dudacek]

33 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Heard Cozens and Dahlin were pretty brutal...didn't get to watch.

Not sure why they are doing to Cozens exactly what they did to Casey, why this franchise has a fetish for trading their good centres and failing to properly man that area of the ice. It looked odd in the offseason when we saw who the centres were they were penciling in, and we asked why not giving proper vet insulation would be ok this time when it wasn't before...still wondering. 

Cozens and Dahlin were each badly embarrassed on a Hertl goal, which is going to reinforce the bad impression of what were uneven games.

Centre depth is a huge issue for the Sabres. But I'm not sure Cozens' issues are anything that would be fixed by having Eichel and ROR in front of him. He's getting offensive 3C minutes and hasn't really been forced to play elite opposition. He lacks the strength for the game he wants to play, he's squeezing his stick and he's trying too hard.

I think his personal struggles are more a Cozens issue than a lineup issue. Tage and Zemgus have been handed much tougher roles for their skillset than Dylan has, but are coping better.

Every game Dylan shows signs of how good he can be, and how young he is. I'm still thinking it's too early for the minors, but have to admit he is trending that way.

[Thorner]

2 minutes ago, dudacek said:

Cozens and Dahlin were each badly embarrassed on a Hertl goal, which is going to reinforce the bad impression of what were uneven games.

Centre depth is a huge issue for the Sabres. But I'm not sure Cozens' issues are anything that would be fixed by having Eichel and ROR in front of him. He's getting offensive 3C minutes and hasn't really been forced to play elite opposition. He lacks the strength for the game he wants to play, he's squeezing his stick and he's trying too hard.

I think his personal struggles are more a Cozens issue than a lineup issue. Tage and Zemgus have been handed much tougher roles for their skillset than Dylan has, but are coping better.

Every game Dylan shows signs of how good he can be, and how young he is. I'm still thinking it's too early for the minors, but have to admit he is trending that way.

I'm not really concerned about Cozens' long term development though

So the first half of the bold pretty much sums up my point - my frustration isn't that they are screwing up Cozens' development, it's that they are screwing up my viewing season, as a team. 

The team doesn't have good centres. 

Cozens issues wouldn't be fixed with ROR ahead of him, but the team's certainly would be - that's the dynamic I was referring to 

[PromoTheRobot]

8 hours ago, DarthEbriate said:

And finally...  I hope they play like madmen on the final game of the road trip because I want to be entertained in my first Kraken-Sabres game.

I don't want to lose to the expansion team that Jason Botterill now works for. 

[GASabresIUFAN]

Braves win! Braves win!

[Thorner]

Look at the roster and the stats breakdown thus far, it's abundantly clear we need a playmaking C in there, a facilitator - Hinostroza and Olofsson lead the forwards in assists with 4 each, one lower than our highest ranked D-man. Our leading C in the category is ZG with 3 assists. We don't have any playmaking-first centres in the system anymore with an NHL ceiling, aside from Mittelstadt - so it'll be nice to get him back. 

3 minutes ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

Braves win! Braves win!

It's why the Jays missing hurt so much - it could have been them. Hot down the stretch just like your Braves. Was glad to see them wallop Houston 

Edited November 3, 2021 by Thorny