Murray, Prow and MacInnis assigned to Amerks

[Brawndo]

 

[LGR4GM]

Please dear god can we get a LHD back or up from Rochester. Please. please. begging here. 

[dudacek]

9 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

Please dear god can we get a LHD back or up from Rochester. Please. please. begging here. 

Who do you want, Schuldt?

As of yesterday, Samuelsson and Davidson were still out.
 

[Drag0nDan]

13 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

Please dear god can we get a LHD back or up from Rochester. Please. please. begging here. 

I have to assume Brysons back if they're making this move.

[dudacek]

13 minutes ago, Brawndo said:

 

Prow may have had the worst 4 shifts to start a game by a Sabre D since MA Gragnani, and Donnie was not happy.

No surprise there.

Murray is interesting. Is this just to help the Amerks out over the weekend, or is it more permanent with a many as 5 fresh forwards (Krebs, Tuch, Bjork, Okposo, Caggiula) available for Tuesday's game?

Murray wasn't good last night and seemed to be a prime example of the hesitancy Donnie was so upset with.

[LGR4GM]

20 minutes ago, dudacek said:

Who do you want, Schuldt?

As of yesterday, Samuelsson and Davidson were still out.
 

I want Sammy because he is ready. If he is still out (f you covid), then I want one of the LHD in Buffalo back such as Bryson. 

It is still crazy to me that 50% of our defense will be different by April. 

This will shock many of you... I want Samuelsson up to play with Joker so that defensive pairing has a strong, BIG, defender with solid defensive zone positioning to help Joker who has struggled a little being on Dahlin's pair. 

[bob_sauve28]

3 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

I want Sammy because he is ready. If he is still out (f you covid), then I want one of the LHD in Buffalo back such as Bryson. 

It is still crazy to me that 50% of our defense will be different by April. 

This will shock many of you... I want Samuelsson up to play with Joker so that defensive pairing has a strong, BIG, defender with solid defensive zone positioning to help Joker who has struggled a little being on Dahlin's pair. 

I think you might be able to say the same thing about the forwards, at least from who played last night. This is a team in serious transition 

[Drag0nDan]

4 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

I want Sammy because he is ready. If he is still out (f you covid), then I want one of the LHD in Buffalo back such as Bryson. 

It is still crazy to me that 50% of our defense will be different by April. 

This will shock many of you... I want Samuelsson up to play with Joker so that defensive pairing has a strong, BIG, defender with solid defensive zone positioning to help Joker who has struggled a little being on Dahlin's pair. 

Who do you think works best with Dahlin?  Pysyk maybe?  Or is this guy possibly (probably) not on the roster yet?

[dudacek]

I'm not making excuses or suggesting the following players are lifesavers, but we haven't seen anything close to next year's roster together in Buffalo this year:

The Sabres have played 34 games

• Luukkonen 8
• Anderson 6
• Jokiharju 18
• Tuch 3
• Mittelstadt 4
• Power 0
• Samuelsson 0
• Krebs 3
• Quinn 0
• Peterka 2

We've been missing our projected 1G, 1C, 1RW, and 1RD for most of the year, as well as watching our 1LW struggle with an injury that has robbed him of his shot.

And we've got 5 prospects who are tearing it up at lower levels and look very close. We have more talent than we've seen.

 

[LGR4GM]

22 minutes ago, Drag0nDan said:

Who do you think works best with Dahlin?  Pysyk maybe?  Or is this guy possibly (probably) not on the roster yet?

Right now probably. I just think Jokiharju needs a different partner. 

[bob_sauve28]

5 minutes ago, dudacek said:

I'm not making excuses or suggesting the following players are lifesavers, but we haven't seen anything close to next year's roster together in Buffalo this year:

The Sabres have played 34 games

• Luukkonen 8
• Anderson 6
• Jokiharju 18
• Tuch 3
• Mittelstadt 4
• Power 0
• Samuelsson 0
• Krebs 3
• Quinn 0
• Peterka 2

We've been missing our projected 1G, 1C, 1RW, and 1RD for most of the year, as well as watching our 1LW struggle with an injury that has robbed him of his shot.

And we've got 5 prospects who are tearing it up at lower levels and look very close. We have more talent than we've seen.

 

And, I know he is playing, but something is wrong with Ollie. No where near the same player he was before injury 

[Sabres Fan in NS]

Who, who and Al's kid.  Got it.

[Drag0nDan]

13 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

Right now probably. I just think Jokiharju needs a different partner. 

Getting to that time where moving miller might make sense - but there is like no one capable in the system on the right at the moment.  Should be a priority trade/free agent target.  

[Brawndo]

Krebs probably would have joined him for these two games 

[inkman]

25 minutes ago, bob_sauve28 said:

And, I know he is playing, but something is wrong with Ollie. No where near the same player he was before injury 

He’s still injured 

[Thorner]

38 minutes ago, dudacek said:

I'm not making excuses or suggesting the following players are lifesavers, but we haven't seen anything close to next year's roster together in Buffalo this year:

The Sabres have played 34 games

• Luukkonen 8
• Anderson 6
• Jokiharju 18
• Tuch 3
• Mittelstadt 4
• Power 0
• Samuelsson 0
• Krebs 3
• Quinn 0
• Peterka 2

We've been missing our projected 1G, 1C, 1RW, and 1RD for most of the year, as well as watching our 1LW struggle with an injury that has robbed him of his shot.

And we've got 5 prospects who are tearing it up at lower levels and look very close. We have more talent than we've seen.

 

Really? That's not how the rest of the post read after the bolded 

Every team is missing players due to covid. Every team has young players coming. We have no idea how much of an affect rookies will have. Indeed, I've been saying all year they aren't going to make much of a dent on a roster that's sitting at the bottom of the league - that's why I want to see more actual success on ice this year. Why not add the proper context? "Missing our projected 1G" - You mean the guy *everyone knew* couldn't hold up for a whole season? "Missing our 1C" - the guy maybe not even negligibly better than the other Cs on the roster? Certainly the connotation of "1C" is ridiculously mismatched with the term "Mittelstadt" 

Unless the other 31 teams in the the NHL agree to not bring up any young players next season, adding a few rookies to a team that has 5 wins since October isn't going to amount to much. I don't think getting our "1G", 41 year old Craig Anderson is going to help, either. 

This team needs significant offseason work to be competitive next season, or we need to see them take strides on ice in the coming weeks. 

Edited January 7, 2022 by Thorny

[LGR4GM]

13 minutes ago, Drag0nDan said:

Getting to that time where moving miller might make sense - but there is like no one capable in the system on the right at the moment.  Should be a priority trade/free agent target.  

I keep looking for a reasonable under 23 RHD we could trade for and it just won't make sense for any of the teams. If Jake Sanderson had been a righty it would work for Ottawa but alas that isn't the case. 

[PromoTheRobot]

6 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Really? That's not how the rest of the post read after the bolded 

Every team is missing players due to covid. Every team has young players coming. We have no idea how much of an affect rookies will have. Indeed, I've been saying all year they aren't going to make much of a dent on a roster that's sitting at the bottom of the league - that's why I want to see more actual success on ice this year. Why not add the proper context? "Missing our projected 1G" - You mean the guy *everyone knew* couldn't hold up for a whole season? "Missing our 1C" - the guy maybe not even negligibly better than the other Cs on the roster? Certainly the connotation of "1C" is ridiculously mismatched with the term "Mittelstadt" 

While the bolded is true, unless you look at each team to see just what they lost and were dealing with, it's meaningless to use it as a blanket dismissal.

[LGR4GM]

 

[Thorner]

2 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

While the bolded is true, unless you look at each team to see just what they lost and were dealing with, it's meaningless to use it as a blanket dismissal.

I don't think it's meaningless, at all. Unless we think the Sabres have lost more talent relative to the rest of the league due to injury, I'd say we see nearly every team struggling with losing players to covid. Looking at each team, yes, most have lost key players for a significant amount of time. 

The Sabres aren't worse off - they are in the same boat as everyone else. We probably feel it more than other teams because of our lack of depth - but that isn't a positive. Lack of depth will *always* be a death knell for team, covid or not - the injury bug always comes around, as we've seen in every other year. 

Also, it wasn't a blanket dismissal, I went on to make several other points in that post 

[dudacek]

8 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Really? That's not how the rest of the post read after the bolded 

Every team is missing players due to covid. Every team has young players coming. We have no idea how much of an affect rookies will have. Indeed, I've been saying all year they aren't going to make much of a dent on a roster that's sitting at the bottom of the league - that's why I want to see more actual success on ice this year. Why not add the proper context? "Missing our projected 1G" - You mean the guy *everyone knew* couldn't hold up for a whole season? "Missing our 1C" - the guy maybe not even negligibly better than the other Cs on the roster? Certainly the connotation of "1C" is ridiculously mismatched with the term "Mittelstadt" 

Did I mention COVID?

I'd be surprised if there are 5 teams that have a group of players coming as good as the 6 I cited.

We don't have any idea on the impact of the rookies.

Craig Anderson has a .922 SV%. We spent 6 weeks after he went down with Tokarksi's .903, Subban's .876 and Dell's .872. Is that enough context?

Was Casey Mittelstadt projected to be the team's #1 centre this year, or not?

Do you not think upgrading 10 players is significant talent boost?

• Mitts > Eakin
• Tuch > Murray
• Jokiharju > Fitzgerald
• Anderson > Subban
• Luukkonen > Dell
• Power > Butcher
• Samuelsson > Prow
• Krebs > Jankowski
• Quinn > Hayden
• Peterka > Bjork

We both agree the Sabres aren't good now, we should agree there are better players coming. What exactly are you arguing?

 

[dudacek]

14 minutes ago, Thorny said:

I don't think it's meaningless, at all. Unless we think the Sabres have lost more talent relative to the rest of the league due to injury, I'd say we see nearly every team struggling with losing players to covid. Looking at each team, yes, most have lost key players for a significant amount of time. 

The Sabres aren't worse off - they are in the same boat as everyone else. We probably feel it more than other teams because of our lack of depth - but that isn't a positive. Lack of depth will *always* be a death knell for team, covid or not - the injury bug always comes around, as we've seen in every other year. 

Also, it wasn't a blanket dismissal, I went on to make several other points in that post 

What teams have been without 3 of their projected 1st-liners virtually the entire year, a 4th for half the year, and has had a 5th obviously limited for most of the year by injury?

[Thorner]

6 minutes ago, dudacek said:

What teams have been without 3 of their projected 1st-liners virtually the entire year, a 4th for half the year, and has had a 5th obviously limited for most of the year by injury?

My point is that there's little gap between our "projected" 1st liners and our "projected" 3rd liners. I don't care if it's Casey Mittelstadt this year or Zemgus Girgensons during the tank years - those guys being projected for a role doesn't mean they are actually of that quality. We didn't lose a 1C, we lost Casey Mittelstadt. 

Losing Craig Anderson isn't losing a 1G. He was never going to hold up as the 1G. Health wise, numbers wise, take your pick. A bad bet turning out bad isn't a cause for optimism, it's the revelation of bad planning by Kevyn Adams

- - - 

If every team was completely healthy, I'd imagine we'd be right about where we are in the standings. The types of injuries we've had certainly don't represent any kind of significant WAR differential - and certainly not to the point where we'd be making up ground on other teams, should they have all their health in tact, as well. 

Edited January 7, 2022 by Thorny

[dudacek]

1 minute ago, Thorny said:

My point is that there's little gap between our "projected" 1st liners and our "projected" 3rd liners. I don't care if it's Casey Mittelstadt this year or Zemgus Girgensons during the tank years - those guys being projected for a role doesn't mean they are actually of that quality. We didn't lose a 1C, we lost Casey Mittelstadt. 

I disagree. There is a huge gap between Mittelstadt and Eakin, Tuch and Murray, Jokiharju and Fitzgerald and Anderson and Dell.

 

Also, when you have 10 'real' NHLers, losing 4 or 5 of them affects you more than when you have 16 or 18.

[Thorner]

7 minutes ago, dudacek said:

I disagree. There is a huge gap between Mittelstadt and Eakin, Tuch and Murray, Jokiharju and Fitzgerald and Anderson and Dell.

 

I really don't think so. We've seen guys like Jokijarju shuffle back into the lineup and make not so much as a dent in team performance. If we were to add Mittelstadt and Tuch in, and let all the other teams get 2 players of their choice back, I really fail to see how we make up any ground at all. Every team has injuries and is missing players - this doesn't make up an avenue for improvement next year. The central point of your argument is at once correct, and relatively meaningless - sure, we'd be better with those guys. No, I don't believe there is much relative ground to be gained. Are injuries going to disappear from existence next season? Do we think universal health is on the way next season or something? So long as the Sabres don't have depth, they'll be shaken by the factors that test depth. 

Craig Anderson doesn't deserve an argument here. No way I need to formulate an argument for why that short stretch of good play from him was fool's gold when I spend all offseason predicting it's exactly what would happen. Everyone did. 

Again, an accurate point perhaps, with little meaning. Sure, Anderson's numbers were better. How does that represent an avenue for improvement next season? Do you think if we brought Anderson back next, that would be a viable strategy? Would you do it?

Of course you wouldn't, cause you know he doesn't actually represent an avenue for improvement. Which torpedoes the argument. 

Edited January 7, 2022 by Thorny