Help understanding our system?

[ndirish1978]

Pardon my question as someone who is just getting back into the swing of things here on the hockey board and whose general hockey knowledge is weak. I was thinking about the draft and realized I have a very limited knowledge of what this team actually runs. Watching the games I hear things like the Sabres play "an aggressive possession" game but that doesn't really tell me much.  I know we're looking at players who fit our system, so my question is: what system do the Sabres run?

1. What forecheck system do we typically run? 2 1 2? 1 3 1?  I know people complain that when the center ice is clogged by opposition teams we have a harder time, but as a neophyte I don't know how to translate that. 
2. What is our typical defensive system?
3. Do we employ more fronting or net-side positioning?

I appreciate any help you all can give. Learning this stuff really helps me enjoy the games more. Thanks!

 

[That Aud Smell]

Welcome (back)!

But listen, you can’t say your general hockey knowledge is weak and then ask questions about specific forecheck strategies and distinctions between positioning styles near the goal.

*My* hockey acumen *is* weak. I don’t know what you’re talking about.

[LGR4GM]

9 hours ago, ndirish1978 said:

Pardon my question as someone who is just getting back into the swing of things here on the hockey board and whose general hockey knowledge is weak. I was thinking about the draft and realized I have a very limited knowledge of what this team actually runs. Watching the games I hear things like the Sabres play "an aggressive possession" game but that doesn't really tell me much.  I know we're looking at players who fit our system, so my question is: what system do the Sabres run?

1. What forecheck system do we typically run? 2 1 2? 1 3 1?  I know people complain that when the center ice is clogged by opposition teams we have a harder time, but as a neophyte I don't know how to translate that. 
2. What is our typical defensive system?
3. Do we employ more fronting or net-side positioning?

I appreciate any help you all can give. Learning this stuff really helps me enjoy the games more. Thanks!

 

I think they do a 1-3-1 generally. 

Defense is 2-1-2 roughly. 

Although I've heard the defense described as 1-2-2 so really all depends on how you examine it

[Doohicksie]

I think one thing that's evolved overall since Eichel was traded is that the Sabres are incorporating more dump & chase zone entries.  Eichel was very good at possessing the puck through zone entry.  Tage is good for possession on entry too, but with strong forecheckers (Tuch, Skinner, Greenway, Quinn), it provides multiple options for zone entry.  If a team is contesting the blue line, the Sabres are more likely to adjust to dump and chase and be successful than they used to be.  Also, with fast, large forecheckers, particularly Tuch and Greenway, you can wear down a defense with dump and chase as the game goes on which can lead to more controlled zone entries late.

[Eleven]

1 hour ago, Doohickie said:

I think one thing that's evolved overall since Eichel was traded is that the Sabres are incorporating more dump & chase zone entries.  Eichel was very good at possessing the puck through zone entry.  Tage is good for possession on entry too, but with strong forecheckers (Tuch, Skinner, Greenway, Quinn), it provides multiple options for zone entry.  If a team is contesting the blue line, the Sabres are more likely to adjust to dump and chase and be successful than they used to be.  Also, with fast, large forecheckers, particularly Tuch and Greenway, you can wear down a defense with dump and chase as the game goes on which can lead to more controlled zone entries late.

Back in the day when video game franchises were proliferating ("Joe Montana Football," "Mike Tyson's Punch-Out," "Magic Johnson's Fast Break,"  etc.) I really wanted one named "Buffalo Sabres Dump-n-Chase Hockey."

What is it with this team and the dump and chase?!  It's like it's in a DNA pattern or something.

[ndirish1978]

5 hours ago, That Aud Smell said:

Welcome (back)!

But listen, you can’t say your general hockey knowledge is weak and then ask questions about specific forecheck strategies and distinctions between positioning styles near the goal.

*My* hockey acumen *is* weak. I don’t know what you’re talking about.

Thank you! I really enjoy getting in the weeds with football and isolating players when I re-watch games to see what the real issues are with our play so I spent a couple hours reading about hockey strategy last night. It's a little daunting starting from scratch, but I'd like to be able to look at a player (like Defensemen this offseason) and understand why they would or wouldn't be a good fit with our team. I keep hearing we need a Top 4 Defenseman but hockey has so many versions of Defensemen that I think I and a lot of people would benefit from understanding why someone is or isn't a fit with the Sabres. I was reading an article about Chris Tanev having triple digits in blocked shots over the last 5 seasons and then talking about advanced metrics like his Fenwick and Corsi numbers and my head wanted to explode. Right now I've just been watching highlights and looking for someone who plays more like Samuelsson, but I think I'm wrong in doing that.

[French Collection]

21 minutes ago, ndirish1978 said:

Right now I've just been watching highlights and looking for someone who plays more like Samuelsson, but I think I'm wrong in doing that.

Another guy like Samuelsson would set the Sabres up really well. Preferably a RHD to balance a pairing with Power but Dahlin/Mule make the 2xLHD thing work.

 

[Brawndo]

25 minutes ago, ndirish1978 said:

Thank you! I really enjoy getting in the weeds with football and isolating players when I re-watch games to see what the real issues are with our play so I spent a couple hours reading about hockey strategy last night. It's a little daunting starting from scratch, but I'd like to be able to look at a player (like Defensemen this offseason) and understand why they would or wouldn't be a good fit with our team. I keep hearing we need a Top 4 Defenseman but hockey has so many versions of Defensemen that I think I and a lot of people would benefit from understanding why someone is or isn't a fit with the Sabres. I was reading an article about Chris Tanev having triple digits in blocked shots over the last 5 seasons and then talking about advanced metrics like his Fenwick and Corsi numbers and my head wanted to explode. Right now I've just been watching highlights and looking for someone who plays more like Samuelsson, but I think I'm wrong in doing that.

Chris Tanev would be an ideal addition to the Sabres Blueline. He is one of the best defensive defensemen in the NHL. 

[Randall Flagg]

35 minutes ago, ndirish1978 said:

Thank you! I really enjoy getting in the weeds with football and isolating players when I re-watch games to see what the real issues are with our play so I spent a couple hours reading about hockey strategy last night. It's a little daunting starting from scratch, but I'd like to be able to look at a player (like Defensemen this offseason) and understand why they would or wouldn't be a good fit with our team. I keep hearing we need a Top 4 Defenseman but hockey has so many versions of Defensemen that I think I and a lot of people would benefit from understanding why someone is or isn't a fit with the Sabres. I was reading an article about Chris Tanev having triple digits in blocked shots over the last 5 seasons and then talking about advanced metrics like his Fenwick and Corsi numbers and my head wanted to explode. Right now I've just been watching highlights and looking for someone who plays more like Samuelsson, but I think I'm wrong in doing that.

No - keep doing this 

If you're good at/passionate about video editing, show us what you're doing too

[Randall Flagg]

8 hours ago, ndirish1978 said:

Thank you! I really enjoy getting in the weeds with football and isolating players when I re-watch games to see what the real issues are with our play so I spent a couple hours reading about hockey strategy last night. It's a little daunting starting from scratch, but I'd like to be able to look at a player (like Defensemen this offseason) and understand why they would or wouldn't be a good fit with our team. I keep hearing we need a Top 4 Defenseman but hockey has so many versions of Defensemen that I think I and a lot of people would benefit from understanding why someone is or isn't a fit with the Sabres. I was reading an article about Chris Tanev having triple digits in blocked shots over the last 5 seasons and then talking about advanced metrics like his Fenwick and Corsi numbers and my head wanted to explode. Right now I've just been watching highlights and looking for someone who plays more like Samuelsson, but I think I'm wrong in doing that.

Learning/studying football is like learning/studying famous games of chess, or mathematics (at the fringes where new things are happening). It's loads of fun, but it takes years to be able to do on your own, and it's much more beneficial for fans like us to have an expert walk through plays/concepts/strategies (that's why JT O'Sullivan and Brett Kollmann have such popular youtube channels, and why Cover 1 is awesome)

When you watch NFL game film, it is almost always possible to break down what you see into at least variations of concepts you recognize - Beasley/Davis running split level route patterns, LBs playing deep in Tampa-2, offensive line shifts called out by the QB, whatever. NFL teams are constantly stacking changes onto these things which makes it hard sometimes, but I like to think that football games usually consist of largely-well-performed strategies that play out according to the skills of the most important/relevant players involved in the play, coaches having a strategic edge through creativity or game planning or in-game adjustments, and a dash of randomness. When things go wrong, you can usually see why, and imagine how proper execution in that role would make things work again.

Hockey is a lot different, you can't watch it this way. Studying hockey is more like judging different types of music or art than studying Bobby Fischer. You can know all of the different types of forechecking, PP/PK strategies, whatever, but 70% of what you see in the game can't really be cleanly classified by those things, and the network of what "systems" and "styles" work well or poorly against each other isn't nearly as well defined as, say, finding the hole shot against Cover-2, over routes against single high, screens against blitz etc. It's messy and beautiful. Coaches always talk about how they draw up plays during timeouts at the ends of games, and have basically never seen it happen as drawn up. 

The best way to learn what you are seeing, learn what players are good and why, is to watch a lot of hockey. You will develop the ability to meaningfully distinguish between players and teams, and will be able to tease out interesting nuances over time. As ill-defined as hockey is, that makes the well of things to notice infinitely deep. There are posters here who are good at this sort of thing, I can tell you will be one of them if you stick around. But the difference between most teams on either side of the good/bad delineator is pretty small and takes dozens of games to flesh out, which is why they play so many games and why you always read that "we need to see 20 games before we know what this team is". Every "advanced stat" you mention, save for the very best and very very worst teams and players, ranges from about 47% to 53%. You want your team to be slightly better than their opponent at creating chances, shots, and limiting them for the other team, and stopping them in net, over long periods of time. This will get you to 50 wins and in instead of 40 wins and out, or 30 wins and drafting top 5.

The coach's job is not to develop advanced new plays that attack the weaknesses of a defense, to study another team's offense and find ways to stop it - well, that is part of his job, but he will never drive his team's success through this medium the way an NFL coach can. This sort of skill does increase in importance in a playoff series, when you see the same team over and over again, but to get to the playoffs it's more important that a coach can keep his team focused, together, playing cohesively, while balancing chemistry, rest, and preparation over a grueling 6 months. Part of this is "film study," but sticking Cozens against McDavid in 2021 to get a 3-2 win was not mathematician Granato, it was gut-feel, psychologist Granato. The same decision might not work nearly as well 3 days later. What buttons can you push at just the right time?

You are asking very good questions and your eagerness and enthusiasm are just what you'll need to be an elite hockey mind. No real need to dig into the calculus though, because there isn't too much there (at least at a level we fans have access to)

I have come to watch hockey two ways - focus on individual skaters that I like or want to learn more about (this usually happens when i get a chance to watch extended highlights, or rewatch games, where you can pause and rewind etc.) and then focusing on space, how teams make space, where they are capable of making space. Where are the best places, what are the best ways to open up space. And how can you close up space on other teams, make it hard to get to the important spaces in your zone. There is no right answer for any of that, but you can start to tell over time if your team is good at it, and which players do it in what ways. Take a snap shot of the screen any time there is a decision being made by a skater on your team or the opposition - does he have multiple options, or is everything closed off? A turnover is bad, but the player making it didn't necessarily make a bad play if there are acres of ice between him and a teammate. When you watch Carolina and do this, almost all of the time they are in mini-odd-man-advantage situations where the decisions are easy and obvious, whether they are in their own zone, on the boards in the NZ, or in the slot. For so long, the Sabres, whether good players or bad, through tactics or no chemistry or for a million other reasons, were constantly being suffocated, nothing was easy, options were an exception.

I could ramble forever, but yeah, try not to go turbo-geek with hockey, just watch and enjoy how awesome it is and whatever makes itself available to you will come eventually. The game can talk if you are willing to listen, and sometimes it will let you in on some pretty cool secrets

 

Oh, and advanced stats are basically an acknowledgement that it's hard to quantify hockey, but we are going to throw whatever techniques we have at it anyway and see what we get. They're cool and interesting, and provide a lot of info since it's impossible to watch every team 82 times, but when you can watch a team 82 times I would trust what you see over what they say 

 

Edited June 6, 2023 by Randall Flagg

[ndirish1978]

1 hour ago, Randall Flagg said:

Learning/studying football is like learning/studying famous games of chess, or mathematics (at the fringes where new things are happening). It's loads of fun, but it takes years to be able to do on your own, and it's much more beneficial for fans like us to have an expert walk through plays/concepts/strategies (that's why JT O'Sullivan and Brett Kollmann have such popular youtube channels, and why Cover 1 is awesome)

When you watch NFL game film, it is almost always possible to break down what you see into at least variations of concepts you recognize - Beasley/Davis running split level route patterns, LBs playing deep in Tampa-2, offensive line shifts called out by the QB, whatever. NFL teams are constantly stacking changes onto these things which makes it hard sometimes, but I like to think that football games usually consist of largely-well-performed strategies that play out according to the skills of the most important/relevant players involved in the play, coaches having a strategic edge through creativity or game planning or in-game adjustments, and a dash of randomness. When things go wrong, you can usually see why, and imagine how proper execution in that role would make things work again.

Hockey is a lot different, you can't watch it this way. Studying hockey is more like judging different types of music or art than studying Bobby Fischer. You can know all of the different types of forechecking, PP/PK strategies, whatever, but 70% of what you see in the game can't really be cleanly classified by those things, and the network of what "systems" and "styles" work well or poorly against each other isn't nearly as well defined as, say, finding the hole shot against Cover-2, over routes against single high, screens against blitz etc. It's messy and beautiful. Coaches always talk about how they draw up plays during timeouts at the ends of games, and have basically never seen it happen as drawn up. 

The best way to learn what you are seeing, learn what players are good and why, is to watch a lot of hockey. You will develop the ability to meaningfully distinguish between players and teams, and will be able to tease out interesting nuances over time. As ill-defined as hockey is, that makes the well of things to notice infinitely deep. There are posters here who are good at this sort of thing, I can tell you will be one of them if you stick around. But the difference between most teams on either side of the good/bad delineator is pretty small and takes dozens of games to flesh out, which is why they play so many games and why you always read that "we need to see 20 games before we know what this team is". Every "advanced stat" you mention, save for the very best and very very worst teams and players, ranges from about 47% to 53%. You want your team to be slightly better than their opponent at creating chances, shots, and limiting them for the other team, and stopping them in net, over long periods of time. This will get you to 50 wins and in instead of 40 wins and out, or 30 wins and drafting top 5.

The coach's job is not to develop advanced new plays that attack the weaknesses of a defense, to study another team's offense and find ways to stop it - well, that is part of his job, but he will never drive his team's success through this medium the way an NFL coach can. This sort of skill does increase in importance in a playoff series, when you see the same team over and over again, but to get to the playoffs it's more important that a coach can keep his team focused, together, playing cohesively, while balancing chemistry, rest, and preparation over a grueling 6 months. Part of this is "film study," but sticking Cozens against McDavid in 2021 to get a 3-2 win was not mathematician Granato, it was gut-feel, psychologist Granato. The same decision might not work nearly as well 3 days later. What buttons can you push at just the right time?

You are asking very good questions and your eagerness and enthusiasm are just what you'll need to be an elite hockey mind. No real need to dig into the calculus though, because there isn't too much there (at least at a level we fans have access to)

I have come to watch hockey two ways - focus on individual skaters that I like or want to learn more about (this usually happens when i get a chance to watch extended highlights, or rewatch games, where you can pause and rewind etc.) and then focusing on space, how teams make space, where they are capable of making space. Where are the best places, what are the best ways to open up space. And how can you close up space on other teams, make it hard to get to the important spaces in your zone. There is no right answer for any of that, but you can start to tell over time if your team is good at it, and which players do it in what ways. Take a snap shot of the screen any time there is a decision being made by a skater on your team or the opposition - does he have multiple options, or is everything closed off? A turnover is bad, but the player making it didn't necessarily make a bad play if there are acres of ice between him and a teammate. When you watch Carolina and do this, almost all of the time they are in mini-odd-man-advantage situations where the decisions are easy and obvious, whether they are in their own zone, on the boards in the NZ, or in the slot. For so long, the Sabres, whether good players or bad, through tactics or no chemistry or for a million other reasons, were constantly being suffocated, nothing was easy, options were an exception.

I could ramble forever, but yeah, try not to go turbo-geek with hockey, just watch and enjoy how awesome it is and whatever makes itself available to you will come eventually. The game can talk if you are willing to listen, and sometimes it will let you in on some pretty cool secrets

 

Oh, and advanced stats are basically an acknowledgement that it's hard to quantify hockey, but we are going to throw whatever techniques we have at it anyway and see what we get. They're cool and interesting, and provide a lot of info since it's impossible to watch every team 82 times, but when you can watch a team 82 times I would trust what you see over what they say 

 

Thank you for this, I will follow your advice. I really appreciate the time you put into this answer and it makes a lot of sense. Look forward to watching more tape!

[PerreaultForever]

11 hours ago, LGR4GM said:

I think they do a 1-3-1 generally. 

Defense is 2-1-2 roughly. 

Although I've heard the defense described as 1-2-2 so really all depends on how you examine it

We do generally play a 1-3-1 but as for D, I can see why you aren't sure, because neither are they. It's not consistent and it's full of holes. We are employing a swiss cheese philosophy. 

and it's more net side than front. 

[LGR4GM]

6 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

We do generally play a 1-3-1 but as for D, I can see why you aren't sure, because neither are they. It's not consistent and it's full of holes. We are employing a swiss cheese philosophy. 

and it's more net side than front. 

You are so annoying. It's just a constant bitch fest from you in every thread. 

I did 2-1-2 because technically they have 2 high forwards, 1 slot forward, and then 2 defenders but you could say it's a 1-2-2 because really you have 1 pressure on the puck and then the other 2 forwards sit behind that in case they get beat or the puck switches. We typically front the forwards down low. 

You're constant negativity over everything Buffalo ever does is boring, old, and doesn't contribute. This post above is a perfect example of it. 

[JohnC]

9 hours ago, Randall Flagg said:

Learning/studying football is like learning/studying famous games of chess, or mathematics (at the fringes where new things are happening). It's loads of fun, but it takes years to be able to do on your own, and it's much more beneficial for fans like us to have an expert walk through plays/concepts/strategies (that's why JT O'Sullivan and Brett Kollmann have such popular youtube channels, and why Cover 1 is awesome)

When you watch NFL game film, it is almost always possible to break down what you see into at least variations of concepts you recognize - Beasley/Davis running split level route patterns, LBs playing deep in Tampa-2, offensive line shifts called out by the QB, whatever. NFL teams are constantly stacking changes onto these things which makes it hard sometimes, but I like to think that football games usually consist of largely-well-performed strategies that play out according to the skills of the most important/relevant players involved in the play, coaches having a strategic edge through creativity or game planning or in-game adjustments, and a dash of randomness. When things go wrong, you can usually see why, and imagine how proper execution in that role would make things work again.

Hockey is a lot different, you can't watch it this way. Studying hockey is more like judging different types of music or art than studying Bobby Fischer. You can know all of the different types of forechecking, PP/PK strategies, whatever, but 70% of what you see in the game can't really be cleanly classified by those things, and the network of what "systems" and "styles" work well or poorly against each other isn't nearly as well defined as, say, finding the hole shot against Cover-2, over routes against single high, screens against blitz etc. It's messy and beautiful. Coaches always talk about how they draw up plays during timeouts at the ends of games, and have basically never seen it happen as drawn up. 

The best way to learn what you are seeing, learn what players are good and why, is to watch a lot of hockey. You will develop the ability to meaningfully distinguish between players and teams, and will be able to tease out interesting nuances over time. As ill-defined as hockey is, that makes the well of things to notice infinitely deep. There are posters here who are good at this sort of thing, I can tell you will be one of them if you stick around. But the difference between most teams on either side of the good/bad delineator is pretty small and takes dozens of games to flesh out, which is why they play so many games and why you always read that "we need to see 20 games before we know what this team is". Every "advanced stat" you mention, save for the very best and very very worst teams and players, ranges from about 47% to 53%. You want your team to be slightly better than their opponent at creating chances, shots, and limiting them for the other team, and stopping them in net, over long periods of time. This will get you to 50 wins and in instead of 40 wins and out, or 30 wins and drafting top 5.

The coach's job is not to develop advanced new plays that attack the weaknesses of a defense, to study another team's offense and find ways to stop it - well, that is part of his job, but he will never drive his team's success through this medium the way an NFL coach can. This sort of skill does increase in importance in a playoff series, when you see the same team over and over again, but to get to the playoffs it's more important that a coach can keep his team focused, together, playing cohesively, while balancing chemistry, rest, and preparation over a grueling 6 months. Part of this is "film study," but sticking Cozens against McDavid in 2021 to get a 3-2 win was not mathematician Granato, it was gut-feel, psychologist Granato. The same decision might not work nearly as well 3 days later. What buttons can you push at just the right time?

You are asking very good questions and your eagerness and enthusiasm are just what you'll need to be an elite hockey mind. No real need to dig into the calculus though, because there isn't too much there (at least at a level we fans have access to)

I have come to watch hockey two ways - focus on individual skaters that I like or want to learn more about (this usually happens when i get a chance to watch extended highlights, or rewatch games, where you can pause and rewind etc.) and then focusing on space, how teams make space, where they are capable of making space. Where are the best places, what are the best ways to open up space. And how can you close up space on other teams, make it hard to get to the important spaces in your zone. There is no right answer for any of that, but you can start to tell over time if your team is good at it, and which players do it in what ways. Take a snap shot of the screen any time there is a decision being made by a skater on your team or the opposition - does he have multiple options, or is everything closed off? A turnover is bad, but the player making it didn't necessarily make a bad play if there are acres of ice between him and a teammate. When you watch Carolina and do this, almost all of the time they are in mini-odd-man-advantage situations where the decisions are easy and obvious, whether they are in their own zone, on the boards in the NZ, or in the slot. For so long, the Sabres, whether good players or bad, through tactics or no chemistry or for a million other reasons, were constantly being suffocated, nothing was easy, options were an exception.

I could ramble forever, but yeah, try not to go turbo-geek with hockey, just watch and enjoy how awesome it is and whatever makes itself available to you will come eventually. The game can talk if you are willing to listen, and sometimes it will let you in on some pretty cool secrets

 

Oh, and advanced stats are basically an acknowledgement that it's hard to quantify hockey, but we are going to throw whatever techniques we have at it anyway and see what we get. They're cool and interesting, and provide a lot of info since it's impossible to watch every team 82 times, but when you can watch a team 82 times I would trust what you see over what they say 

 

Great post! Impressive analysis from a variety of perspectives. One point that you made that struck a chord is that after watching a lot of hockey and different teams you can make a fair assessment as to which are the better teams and who are the best players by trusting your eyes. What you see and the impression you get, especially with a large enough sample size, reflects the reality on the ice. 

[inkman]

20 hours ago, Doohickie said:

I think one thing that's evolved overall since Eichel was traded is that the Sabres are incorporating more dump & chase zone entries.  Eichel was very good at possessing the puck through zone entry.  Tage is good for possession on entry too, but with strong forecheckers (Tuch, Skinner, Greenway, Quinn), it provides multiple options for zone entry.  If a team is contesting the blue line, the Sabres are more likely to adjust to dump and chase and be successful than they used to be.  Also, with fast, large forecheckers, particularly Tuch and Greenway, you can wear down a defense with dump and chase as the game goes on which can lead to more controlled zone entries late.

Tuch is the best Sabres forechecker I’ve seen in a long while.  Relentless puck pursuit with skating and hands that allow him to engage physically, remove the puck from the opponent and instantly create offense. 

[matter2003]

21 hours ago, Doohickie said:

I think one thing that's evolved overall since Eichel was traded is that the Sabres are incorporating more dump & chase zone entries.  Eichel was very good at possessing the puck through zone entry.  Tage is good for possession on entry too, but with strong forecheckers (Tuch, Skinner, Greenway, Quinn), it provides multiple options for zone entry.  If a team is contesting the blue line, the Sabres are more likely to adjust to dump and chase and be successful than they used to be.  Also, with fast, large forecheckers, particularly Tuch and Greenway, you can wear down a defense with dump and chase as the game goes on which can lead to more controlled zone entries late.

Sabres transition game is deadly 

[GoPuckYourself]

19 hours ago, Brawndo said:

Chris Tanev would be an ideal addition to the Sabres Blueline. He is one of the best defensive defensemen in the NHL. 

I like him alot also but is there a younger version that we can have in his prime years?

[Doohicksie]

1 hour ago, inkman said:

Tuch is the best Sabres forechecker I’ve seen in a long while.  Relentless puck pursuit with skating and hands that allow him to engage physically, remove the puck from the opponent and instantly create offense. 

I think Skinner is very good at the forecheck too, but in a different way.  He doesn't have the size but he does have excellent skating and stick skills that enable him to pick a player's pocket.

[PerreaultForever]

6 hours ago, LGR4GM said:

You are so annoying. It's just a constant bitch fest from you in every thread. 

I did 2-1-2 because technically they have 2 high forwards, 1 slot forward, and then 2 defenders but you could say it's a 1-2-2 because really you have 1 pressure on the puck and then the other 2 forwards sit behind that in case they get beat or the puck switches. We typically front the forwards down low. 

You're constant negativity over everything Buffalo ever does is boring, old, and doesn't contribute. This post above is a perfect example of it. 

You don't have to read me but please refrain from insulting me.

If the mods don't stop you I will begin insulting you back. Just shut it and ignore my posts if you don't like me. 

[Marvin]

2 hours ago, GoPuckYourself said:

I like him alot also but is there a younger version that we can have in his prime years?

No one I can think of is as reliable or on a comparable contract.  Honestly, though, I think he would be like Teppo Numminen for this group.  And I think we need someone like that.