Blow the Whole Team up in the Off-Season - It's the Only Reasonable Thing to do

[phil_soisson]

11 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Haven’t read the thread yet so I’ll edit this as necessary after I do but a big blowup is the last thing we need. Any sort of tear it down, long form build back up would be literal poison. Adams isn’t going to shift from his plan but if and when a new GM is brought in, it absolutely cannot be someone talking the long game. And it can’t be someone that only views the current results as a means to facilitating something better in the future: talking sustained, contender type success is utter hubris for this franchise at this time. The focus and goal needs to be one thing, I somehow  nailed this 2 years ago and have been saying it since: just make the playoffs. That needs to be the goal: nothing else matters. 

We are trying to facilitate step 5 before ever firmly getting our footing on step 1. We are the receiver turning our head to look down field before the ball is caught.

I disagree; the only thing that could be worse is the status quo. I think the irony is that this team has regressed so much, that even after thirteen seasons of futility, the majority of fans would be open to a tear down with the right President, GM, and HC (collectively) in place.

Edited January 24 by phil_soisson

[Mango]

8 minutes ago, WhenWillItEnd66 said:

Ok, some of my opinion on this:

- Either Pegs needs to be an involved owner or we need a POHO. Someone needs to hold KA responsible. As of right now, now way either KA or Granato are feeling any heat from Pegs. That is not acceptable.

- At the end of the season when KA does his end of the year meeting with Pegs, if he says anything towards "Another year will make this team better" he needs to be immediately fired. Status quo is not helping this team

- Team is built wrong and we have plenty of capital to fix that. Anyone thinking the answer lies within, needs to be shown the door. What is on the Sabres is pretty much what's in the farm system with the exception of 1, 2 players.

- A reactive leadership is a failed leadership. Staying reactive is saying that mediocrity is ok. If that's their true thinking i hope our attendance drops below 5K.

- Coaches need to go. There is no reason for a team to sleep 50-55 mins of a game and only show up for small spurts. That team needs to be bag skated as soon as the fans leave the building until they all puke. The play is totally unacceptable. Also, coaching perimeter offensive and defensive play is totally bad hockey sense. When announcers and fans and everyone else sees that and comments but the own coaches do not, thats a monster issue.

 

This is not going to be anything close to an easy fix. We took a huge step back and most likely added 2 more years of non playoff hockey to this team.  even hardcore fans are going to turn away eventually. But sitting and doing nothing is just poor business decision and sense by all involved. A poor crappy ice product does not make money. Accountability needs to be held on all positions in the organization from Owner to the players as there is absolutely zero right now.

I was definitely a very hardcore Sabres fan, but 13 years has sapped even my love of the sport. Watching other teams play pisses me off more, wondering why we are so inept. This team has found a way to kill my love of hockey. Until there is accountability in the Sabres organization, i am done getting frustrated with this team. I cannot even support a tank as they will draft more useless players like all the rest instead of what's needed to move forward.

I am done.... rant and opinion over.

 

 

The sad part is, I think Terry is a very involved owner, and Adams is basically the de facto POHO. That is the whole reason we are in this mess. Terry is too involved. 

I hope Terry either: 

1. Sells the team to somebody who is committed to keeping the franchise in Buffalo for eternity.
2. Relinquishes control of the org to a true POHO and stays in Florida for eternity. 

EDIT: That said, I am hoping that the talk about Adams not reaching out to Mitts, and Granato not being fired are because the plan is to move on from Adams when the season is over. 

Edited January 24 by Mango

[Thorner]

1 minute ago, phil_soisson said:

I disagree; the only thing that could be worse is the status quo. I think the irony is that this team has regressed so much, that even after thirteen seasons of futility, the majority of fans would be open to a tear down with the right President, GM, and HC (collectively) in place.

I’m not arguing for the status quo. 

[Thorner]

I’m saying you make the changes necessary to field a team capable of making the playoffs. The idea we don’t have enough talent in the organization, when considering prospects and picks, is absurd. We ought to wield our considerable currency in the name of converting on a playoff berth.

That’s the funny thing: it’s really not that hard. 50 percent of teams making the playoffs isn’t frivolous: it’s a definitive stat. It’s not hard to make the playoffs. Again, what we continually see with the Sabres is they are an *anomaly*. This is a very important word: they are exceptions to almost every rule. You can’t be THAT bad without a ton of manual, human error.

Because we are bad by choice. People don’t want to hear it because it’s scary: we need to trade away our prospects and draft capital in the name of an honest roster with a lower ceiling, sure, but one that measures results in actual wins in the now. That’s the answer. If you don’t like it, I’m sorry. Enjoy being at the top of prospect lists - I mean that in sincerity: that’s probably the extent of what you are comfortable with.

It’s simply what’s necessary and they need the b*lls to do it 

Edited January 24 by Thorny

[phil_soisson]

4 minutes ago, Thorny said:

I’m not arguing for the status quo. 

Point taken. Not making the playoffs would also be a suitable definition of status quo.

[Crusader1969]

1 hour ago, GASabresIUFAN said:

Much easier to fire the coaches and see if the team responds.

Yep.  If you bring in Brind'amour , or someone else who has a history of hard working teams and you still can't get results, then you turn to the players 

Would be crazy not to try a change in coaching first 

can anyone provide a coaching staff with less experience than the Sabres? They are in way over their head, completely outmatched and if you saw the in-period interview of granato, they are a staff who are completely out of answers.  
At this point the Sabres would be doing Granato a service by firing him 

[mjd1001]

10 minutes ago, Thorny said:

We really need to get away from this “our top 6 / top 9 / forwards look set” stuff. Nothing is set on this team when you are sitting at the bottom of the league. There is no way you can be that bad and that stench be totally absent from what amounts to a 50% chuck of the roster. We’d be better, if that were the case, and we had as much as you say “set”. A lot of our defensive woes are linked to the poor play of the top 9

I agree with you here.  The top 9 forwards LOOKED like they could be set coming into the year, but apparently they are not. Even if they were playing as well as last year, rosters are fluid, guys have good and bad years.  Skinner is who he is now..but at some point with his age his scoring will fall off, and that leaves you with nothing. He's not there yet, but it could come in 2 years or in 2 weeks.  Cozens, you would be 'set' if he was a 30+ goal guy like last year, but with each passing day it looks like he is more of a 15 goal guy than a 300 goal guy.  Tuch, he's not at Samuelsson level of always being hurt, but he just might be a guy that will hardly give you a full 80 games at full strength. We have hopes for Peterka and Quinn and Benson, but the NEED to keep developing and get better. If that development stops (it shouldn't but it might) you aren't set there either.

1 minute ago, Crusader1969 said:

Yep.  If you bring in Brind'amour , or someone else who has a history of hard working teams and you still can't get results, then you turn to the players 

Would be crazy not to try a change in coaching first 

can anyone provide a coaching staff with less experience than the Sabres? They are in way over their head, completely outmatched and if you saw the in-period interview of granato, they are a staff who are completely out of answers.  
At this point the Sabres would be doing Granato a service by firing him 

If you go by the theory that Pegula is reluctant to pay another head coach to sit at home, and Adams still wants Granato, how about assistant coach changes?  Even without those 2 factors, I would pull Granato in and tell him, you NEED to make changes to the staff right now (and of course make sure you let him pick someone legit, don't force one of your development coaches on him) and go from there.

[Crusader1969]

13 minutes ago, Thorny said:

We really need to get away from this “our top 6 / top 9 / forwards look set” stuff. Nothing is set on this team when you are sitting at the bottom of the league. There is no way you can be that bad and that stench be totally absent from what amounts to a 50% chuck of the roster. We’d be better, if that were the case, and we had as much as you say “set”. A lot of our defensive woes are linked to the poor play of the top 9

Change the coach first.  Then let's discuss.  I'm still of the belief their top 9 forwards are set and good enough to get them to the playoffs as they mature and have a competent coach to guide them 

I am i. total agreement with you that someone needs to grow a set and make tough decisions.  
 

 

3 minutes ago, mjd1001 said:

I agree with you here.  The top 9 forwards LOOKED like they could be set coming into the year, but apparently they are not. Even if they were playing as well as last year, rosters are fluid, guys have good and bad years.  Skinner is who he is now..but at some point with his age his scoring will fall off, and that leaves you with nothing. He's not there yet, but it could come in 2 years or in 2 weeks.  Cozens, you would be 'set' if he was a 30+ goal guy like last year, but with each passing day it looks like he is more of a 15 goal guy than a 300 goal guy.  Tuch, he's not at Samuelsson level of always being hurt, but he just might be a guy that will hardly give you a full 80 games at full strength. We have hopes for Peterka and Quinn and Benson, but the NEED to keep developing and get better. If that development stops (it shouldn't but it might) you aren't set there either.

If you go by the theory that Pegula is reluctant to pay another head coach to sit at home, and Adams still wants Granato, how about assistant coach changes?  Even without those 2 factors, I would pull Granato in and tell him, you NEED to make changes to the staff right now (and of course make sure you let him pick someone legit, don't force one of your development coaches on him) and go from there.

I get that but how much is Granato earning?  I'm guessing it's well below avg coaches salaries   Think compared to other teams, firing Granato should come cheap 

[Thorner]

2 hours ago, Sabres Fan in NS said:

Some of the assistant coaches seem to be in over their heads.

It's the fine tuning that needs to be done.

The decision was made to sacrifice some offence for better defence.  Teaching defence takes time.

Playoff was likely not a reasonable goal this season with the change to focus on the defencive game.

The Sabres will be fine.  They need a bit more time.

Oy vey, my friend

ideally you teach *before* handing out the 50 million dollar contracts, no? I know YOU don’t even believe what you are saying. 

the national hockey league is professional hockey. It’s not a development league. It’s a product that fans need to pay for. These guys are *paid professionals*. They aren’t “learning to play D”. Absurd. That’s what you do *to* get drafted.

Hindsight need not apply. My favourite term nowadays: I told you, NS, this would happen, I told you all offseason. I’m not a wizard: it was just obvious. Simply adding defensive acumen to the forwards while retaining their stellar offence *was never an option*. There would be sacrifice. There would be suffering, I said. It’s a shell game. If we didn’t want to pay the cost to upgrade from the outside: we’d pay it from within. We have sacrificed offence for D. We cannot sit here and say “they’ll learn to do both”.

Manager needs to MANAGE 

- - - 

As for your other point: if they didn’t configure the roster in such a way, in their *4th year* that playoffs would be a reasonable expectation: that’s assuredly a THEM problem 

Edited January 24 by Thorny

[Thorner]

56 minutes ago, Marvin said:

If memory serves, @Brawndo said that it is hard to get anyone to come to Buffalo at the best of times, be they players or coaches.  Am I correct?  In any event, what would need to be offered said quality, established coaches for them to come here?  I suspect that said conditions would be a very rude awakening for management.

Jets haven’t seemed to have any issue remaining very competitive. All it takes is competence 

@TageMVPhad it: 3 buffoons all in one way or another obsessed with a big tear down and rise to prominence. Some master plan just to do something half the league does every single year.
 

It’s actually rather comical, if you think about it. Like in a truly funny way. They are hilariously out of touch 

Pinky and the Brain level schemes to figure out how to assemble a barbecue 

Edited January 24 by Thorny

[bunomatic]

I guess my big take away is the talking point of building a team that will have sustained success and compete for the cup year in and year out. Its laughable to state that as a long term goal of development when you can’t even develop, compete and make the playoffs.

[Thorner]

5 minutes ago, bunomatic said:

I guess my big take away is the talking point of building a team that will have sustained success and compete for the cup year in and year out. Its laughable to state that as a long term goal of development when you can’t even develop, compete and make the playoffs.

A blinding Occam’s razor 

It’s really (really) that simple 

[Thorner]

What we’ve created is a Disenfranchisement Factory for our players. We tie them in to these ridiculous long-form, long-haul, “WAAHNT to be here!1!” endeavours doomed to failure because you alienate the players before any real success is ever achieved 

It’s a conflict of interest: nhl PLAYER careers are short 

players want to win and make money. We always just give them the money.

Edited January 24 by Thorny

[Doohicksie]

45 minutes ago, phil_soisson said:

the only thing that could be worse is the status quo

Yeah, that's the mentality that led to The Tank.

 

Just sayin'.

[Flashsabre]

Looking around social media and a few other boards and this is the lowest I’ve ever seen the fanbase and that says a lot. Something has to give here and everyone has now come around to the fact that it has to be Pegula that goes to see any chance of real positive change with this franchise

[Thorner]

17 minutes ago, Doohickie said:

Yeah, that's the mentality that led to The Tank.

 

Just sayin'.

The mentality that led to the rank tank was the mistaken, ill-begotten idea that you need to have a superstar to be a good team: rather than the idea that if you have a good team, you don’t *need* a superstar. It’s the difference, in short, between Buffalo and Vegas. Acting like your work in filling out a good team is inconsequential because you’ve nabbed your superstar, and the contrasting realization that if you build a proper team said superstar isn’t necessary for success, at all: merely the key missing ingredient for a *championship* team.

But we didn’t want to build that, did we. We talk of building a long term cup champ right now, before ever even making the playoffs. We went ahead and tanked for the star, first. Cart before the horse, Cup before playoffs, par for the course 

a hair-brained scheme of one of the 3 GMs all attempting some grand design needlessly littered with pitfalls from the start 

Edited January 24 by Thorny

[zow2]

I would not go to a game with free tickets, and I was a huge fan for 30 years with seasons.. 

But anyway, this team has no culture of winning and making the playoffs.  It's really hard to blast off with a bunch of young guys.  I don't know what the exact answer is?  Teams with the culture of winning like Tampa can get injuries and call up a bunch of guys from the minors,,,and they still win.  Maybe not at the rate they used to, but the expectation and culture in is place.  Maybe Buffalo needs to swap out some guys that have no history of team success for Vets that have been there and done it.  

[oddoublee]

3 hours ago, phil_soisson said:

"...behind the scenes, they should be strongly evaluating...". Who is "they"? The deep state? I suspect "they" is, and has been, the problem.

sure. but who else is going to do it? hope is all we have - that and bitching and complaining!

[Thorner]

Just now, zow2 said:

I would not go to a game with free tickets, and I was a huge fan for 30 years with seasons.. 

But anyway, this team has no culture of winning and making the playoffs.  It's really hard to blast off with a bunch of young guys.  I don't know what the exact answer is?  Teams with the culture of winning like Tampa can get injuries and call up a bunch of guys from the minors,,,and they still win.  Maybe not at the rate they used to, but the expectation and culture in is place.  Maybe Buffalo needs to swap out some guys that have no history of team success for Vets that have been there and done it.  

There are much better coaches than Don Granato, like Mike Tomlin, who like to say, “The Standard is the Standard.” The desired culture is one of expectation; not camaraderie 

[Archie Lee]

1 hour ago, PASabreFan said:

You don't think Kevyn knows why he has the job? He's not going to cost Terry one plugged nickel by firing people who are under contract. That decision will come from Terry. All bets are off there. Track record would suggest changes, but the Decade of the Yacht is looming, too.

I'm not sure this is wholly accurate. Adams recommended the firing of Krueger and assistant coach Steve Smith.  I'm sure Adams won't be keen to go to Pegula and recommend firing a coach who he is close with and who was recently given an extension.  I think though that Pegula understands how it works.  A year ago, things were going well and Granato was going into the last year of his contract; typically in that situation you give the coach an extension. Now things have gone south and Pegula's much larger investments in Dahlin, Cozens, Thompson, Power and Samuelsson are in danger of not getting the required return.  If Adams gets to the point where he thinks Granato needs to go and he presents Pegula with a viable alternative, I would be surprised if Pegula did not give the green light for a change.

The bigger problem to me is that Adams did not address enough of the team's short-comings in the off-season to know for certain what the root cause of this year's regression is. Of course, it is likely a combination of things.  He didn't address the coaching, which was likely a big factor last year in poor special team's play and poor d-structure. We didn't address goaltending, and, somewhat frighteningly, if we had brought in a veteran, the odd man out may well have been Luukkonen. He didn't address the lack of depth up front when it was known Quinn was out, Tuch was battling something and Granato had wholly lost faith in Olofsson.  Instead he opted to "not block" our youngsters and left a spot open for the prospect who showed best in camp. He then allowed himself to be fooled by the kid with the most confidence, and now Benson is getting 8-10 minutes on his way to an 8 goal season when his value as an asset could be soaring while he scores 50 goals and 130 points in junior (not Benson's fault as he just showed up and played hockey). The team had cap space and the necessary draft and prospect capital to trade for a Tyler Toffoli and sign an Alex Kerfoot. 

I fully acknowledge that this is in the category of hindsight is 20/20, but swap Appert and Peca with Elis and Christie (Ellis and Christie to Rochester), sign Cam Talbot to replace Anderson and partner with Luukkonen, send Levi to Rochester, trade Oloffson at 50% and a 2nd for Toffoli and give Kerfoot more AAV or an extra year of term to what he got from Arizona and I think we could be in a much different place right now.  There are a hundred variations of this that could have been done.

The good news may actually be Adams's inexperience.  His inexperience might mean that he is not bad at what he does so much as he is learning.  He has done some good things and there is no denying that the team improved sharply in the first two full seasons post-Krueger.  I do think that sometimes when an inexperienced person has early success they can trick themselves into thinking it is because they are smart and did smart things and forget that they still need to observe and absorb what works elsewhere and for others.  Here is hoping that Adams actually understands that he made off-season mistakes and learned from them and now starts to fix them.

 

 

[steveoat87]

1 hour ago, WhenWillItEnd66 said:

Ok, some of my opinion on this:

- Either Pegs needs to be an involved owner or we need a POHO. Someone needs to hold KA responsible. As of right now, now way either KA or Granato are feeling any heat from Pegs. That is not acceptable.

- At the end of the season when KA does his end of the year meeting with Pegs, if he says anything towards "Another year will make this team better" he needs to be immediately fired. Status quo is not helping this team

- Team is built wrong and we have plenty of capital to fix that. Anyone thinking the answer lies within, needs to be shown the door. What is on the Sabres is pretty much what's in the farm system with the exception of 1, 2 players.

- A reactive leadership is a failed leadership. Staying reactive is saying that mediocrity is ok. If that's their true thinking i hope our attendance drops below 5K.

- Coaches need to go. There is no reason for a team to sleep 50-55 mins of a game and only show up for small spurts. That team needs to be bag skated as soon as the fans leave the building until they all puke. The play is totally unacceptable. Also, coaching perimeter offensive and defensive play is totally bad hockey sense. When announcers and fans and everyone else sees that and comments but the own coaches do not, thats a monster issue.

 

This is not going to be anything close to an easy fix. We took a huge step back and most likely added 2 more years of non playoff hockey to this team.  even hardcore fans are going to turn away eventually. But sitting and doing nothing is just poor business decision and sense by all involved. A poor crappy ice product does not make money. Accountability needs to be held on all positions in the organization from Owner to the players as there is absolutely zero right now.

I was definitely a very hardcore Sabres fan, but 13 years has sapped even my love of the sport. Watching other teams play pisses me off more, wondering why we are so inept. This team has found a way to kill my love of hockey. Until there is accountability in the Sabres organization, i am done getting frustrated with this team. I cannot even support a tank as they will draft more useless players like all the rest instead of what's needed to move forward.

I am done.... rant and opinion over.

 

 

This is a good post.  You need a coach who demands accountability.  Watch a NY Knicks game. Watch what the coach does when the player does something stupid or doesn’t show enough effort.  Also watch how the point guard Jalen Brunson encourages other players when they make a dood play, yet gets in their faces when something isn’t right.  Haven’t seen this happen on this team.  No leadership and no accountability.  And this team  doesn’t pass the smell test.  Do they ever look like the dominant team.  Do they ever look like they know what they’re doing or are they always hesitant and floundering.  Enough said 

[Thorner]

1 hour ago, Thorny said:

I’m saying you make the changes necessary to field a team capable of making the playoffs. The idea we don’t have enough talent in the organization, when considering prospects and picks, is absurd. We ought to wield our considerable currency in the name of converting on a playoff berth.

That’s the funny thing: it’s really not that hard. 50 percent of teams making the playoffs isn’t frivolous: it’s a definitive stat. It’s not hard to make the playoffs. Again, what we continually see with the Sabres is they are an *anomaly*. This is a very important word: they are exceptions to almost every rule. You can’t be THAT bad without a ton of manual, human error.

Because we are bad by choice. People don’t want to hear it because it’s scary: we need to trade away our prospects and draft capital in the name of an honest roster with a lower ceiling, sure, but one that measures results in actual wins in the now. That’s the answer. If you don’t like it, I’m sorry. Enjoy being at the top of prospect lists - I mean that in sincerity: that’s probably the extent of what you are comfortable with.

It’s simply what’s necessary and they need the b*lls to do it 

Funniest thing is after a long, long 30 years I’ve essentially come full-circle back to the “lunch pail, hard hat” mentality they used to use on tv when speaking about the Sabres in the 90s haha. It’s not really about being a descriptor of the particular skill sets you look for in players you want to roster: but rather it speaks to the honesty of the mindset. None of the disenfranchisement I spoke of up thread: a refusal to turn your nose up at “just” making the playoffs.

I freaking love Buffalo. I love THAT Buffalo.

Make the playoffs. Make me the f*cking GM.

Edited January 24 by Thorny

[Hawerchuk]

7 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Funniest thing is after a long, long 30 years I’ve essentially come full-circle back to the “lunch pail, hard hat” mentality they used to use on tv when speaking about the Sabres in the 90s haha. It’s not really about being a descriptor of the particular skill sets you look for in players you want to roster: but rather it speaks to the honesty of the mindset. None of the disenfranchisement I spoke of up thread: a refusal to turn your nose up at “just” making the playoffs.

I freaking love Buffalo. I love THAT Buffalo.

Make the playoffs. Make me the f*cking GM.

Makes me long for the days of Jay McKee and Rhett Warrener. Both of those Defensemen could lay the hammer on opponents. This team needs more players like that.

[CallawaySabres]

I hate to say it because it just brings back nightmares of the tank era, but...this team needs to lose and lose badly for the next 5 games. This is not wanted for a better draft pick, but to tear this thing down once and for all. Make someone interim coach and then pounce on the very first coach that they feel can lead this team. THat could happen in a week or in a few months. 

[sabremike]

A friendly reminder: If you put together a team comprised of players we have lost/gotten rid of over the past 6 years it would be one of the best rosters in the league and a very strong cup contender. 

STOP. TREATING. THE. SYMPTOM.