GDT/ Buffalo Sabres @ Seattle Kraken Monday 3-18 / 10pm ESPN+ MSG & WGR Radio

[SabresVet]

Funny thing is I can envision Seattle firing Hakstool if they miss the playoffs this year after being the 1st WC last year with 100 points.  

You set the standard and then achieve it or else in most organizations.  Not making it should never mean re-inventing the standard of performance unless a major injury or several injuries occur.  As in, that they're developing, but not enough to make the playoffs after saying so to end last season.  

That's what I see is creating the most heartache here.   Changing the standard to meet current season performance.

[Marvin]

Machine washed, tumble dry.

[PromoTheRobot]

29 minutes ago, SabresVet said:

Funny thing is I can envision Seattle firing Hakstool if they miss the playoffs this year after being the 1st WC last year with 100 points.  

You set the standard and then achieve it or else in most organizations.  Not making it should never mean re-inventing the standard of performance unless a major injury or several injuries occur.  As in, that they're developing, but not enough to make the playoffs after saying so to end last season.  

That's what I see is creating the most heartache here.   Changing the standard to meet current season performance.

This assumes that change = improvement. 

[Stoner]

2 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

This assumes that change = improvement. 

Are you that afraid of change? Of course no one can say firing Granato will lead to improvement. You have to try. You know what you have in the guy.

[Thorner]

Kraken in their joint today. 

I’ve only got it in me to smoke one of those tonight, Sabres gotta hold up their end of the bargain 

[...]

1 hour ago, PromoTheRobot said:

This assumes that change = improvement. 

The bar is pretty low in Buffalo.

[nfreeman]

JFC.  So in their stirring rally to make the playoffs, the Sabres are 5-5 in their last 10?

Gimme a freaking break and fire DG yesterday.

[inkman]

0-5 vs Kraken in their history.  Doubt they break the goose egg.  

[K-9]

6 minutes ago, inkman said:

0-5 vs Kraken in their history.  Doubt they break the goose egg.  

Yep. For some reason the words “slim” and “none” keep popping up in my brain.

[Claude Balls]

Time for the Sabres to finally smoke that Kraken tonight. 

[#freejame]

22 minutes ago, K-9 said:

Yep. For some reason the words “slim” and “none” keep popping up in my brain.

8-0 Sabres win income. 8 being a “slim” zero with a belt around its waist 

[PerreaultForever]

42 minutes ago, inkman said:

0-5 vs Kraken in their history.  Doubt they break the goose egg.  

I was just thinking if I was right that they've never beaten them so I guess that's it. Kraken play with pace as we like to claim and that's why we can't handle them. They have pace combined with tenacity and that's the key. 

BUT, they are hurting this year, lost some people. Soucy was obviously more important than they thought as he's made a difference in Vancouver. They did not replace Sprong's goals. Beniers has had a bit of a sophomore slump. Goaltending not quite a s good. Wright looks like a long term project at best. Most of all right now Dunn and Schwartz are out so they are not the team they were last year. Very beatable, but Sabres will have to be at their best. 

One has to hope the Kraken have given up after their last loss. Not that it will matter. 

Edited March 18 by PerreaultForever

[Brawndo]

UPL in net tonight, Granato said Levi likely tomorrow 

[Thorner]

1 hour ago, nfreeman said:

JFC.  So in their stirring rally to make the playoffs, the Sabres are 5-5 in their last 10?

Gimme a freaking break and fire DG yesterday.

Keep saying it, it’s fun to be “in the hunt” but that it’s even theoretically possible is significantly more a reflection of how bad this range of the league is this year than any sort of aptitude on our part.

It comes back to the most frustrating thing about the drought: *it’s not hard to make the playoffs*. A team that isn’t good is going to make it and we can’t even be that, ever 

We didn’t even need to improve this year, we merely needed to equal our 91 points and we’d likely be in. But instead of attempting an offseason where we actually built on things, aimed for something, didn’t sit on our laurels and left it all to career-year chance, we just ran it back and left ourselves no room for step-back error 

its infuriating. If they weren’t allergic to expectations and moving this along as slowly as humanly possible we could have easily been in a position where even the set backs we saw wouldn’t have prevented a playoff berth. We always just run a “if everything goes right” strategy rather than incorporating fail safes in acting like achieving a goal is actually being demanded 

Edited March 18 by Thorny

[nfreeman]

8 minutes ago, Thorny said:

Keep saying it, it’s fun to be “in the hunt” but that it’s even theoretically possible is significantly more a reflection of how bad this range of the league is this year than any sort of aptitude on our part.

It comes back to the most frustrating thing about the drought: *it’s not hard to make the playoffs*. A team that isn’t good is going to make it and we can’t even be that, ever 

We didn’t even need to improve this year, we merely needed to equal our 91 points and we’d likely be in. But instead of attempting an offseason where we actually built on things, aimed for something, didn’t sit on our laurels and left it all to career-year chance, we just ran it back and left ourselves no room for step-back error 

its infuriating. If they weren’t allergic to expectations and moving this along as slowly as humanly possible we could have easily been in a position where even the set backs we saw wouldn’t have prevented a playoff berth. We always just run a “if everything goes right” strategy rather than incorporating fail safes in acting like achieving a goal is actually being demanded 

It's an interesting question as to what their philosophy was last summer.  Clearly they thought they had the bulk of what they needed and that internal development would result in continued improvement.

In goal, I think they thought they had 3 viable candidates -- including the prince who was promised -- and they'd get good goaltending out of whichever 2 of them emerged from the 3-way battle.  This is more or less what ended up happening, although it was too late to save their season. 

At forward, they thought they were loaded, that TT had arrived as a franchise 1C, that Tuch and Skinner gave them a high-end top line, and that guys like Cozens, Quinn, JJP, Mitts, Krebs, etc would give them plenty of scoring.

On D, they added 2 credible guys in Clifton and EJ, plus a good-looking rookie in Ryan J.

And I think they were in on some bigger names, both at the deadline last year and over the summer, and the players either said no or the price was too high for KA's liking.

Behind the bench, they were happy with their progress so they kept DG.

All of these decisions were, IMHO, defensible in a vacuum -- but clearly the sum total was a major fail.  I completely agree with you that KA's work last summer wasn't good enough and that he is accountable.

I expect him to take further real steps this summer, although I unfortunately do not expect bringing in a real coach to be one of them.

[Crusader1969]

anyone else notice that the game day threads are dominated by Killjoys???

 

We all know the playoffs are a long shot but lets enjoy the ride. The team has improved a lot since the turn of the calendar, 

 

[ska-T Palmtown]

4 minutes ago, Crusader1969 said:

anyone else notice that the game day threads are dominated by Killjoys???

 

We all know the playoffs are a long shot but lets enjoy the ride. The team has improved a lot since the turn of the calendar, 

 

It is in my nature to be generally positive. (As a very youngest child, I developed some excellent coping mechanisms which include finding the joy in little things) - but I can see how venting online to a group of people who have a far greater than average appreciation for this particular sports situation may be helpful to some people. In the last game thread I asked about the ignore feature - added a few people who did not add anything of value, to me, to the discussion and am quite happy about it.

That said, I am the guy that says "Hey, if the other team hung 5 goals on us in period 1, nothing says we can't hang 5 on them in period 2." I don't say it here, cuz no one wants to hear it, lol. So, until the math says "nay" - I say "yay"!

[PromoTheRobot]

4 hours ago, PASabreFan said:

Are you that afraid of change? Of course no one can say firing Granato will lead to improvement. You have to try. You know what you have in the guy.

No, you don't have to do anything. 

3 hours ago, ... said:

The bar is pretty low in Buffalo.

That next pull of the one-armed bandit is gonna be a jackpot. I can feel it.

[PromoTheRobot]

3 hours ago, nfreeman said:

JFC.  So in their stirring rally to make the playoffs, the Sabres are 5-5 in their last 10?

Gimme a freaking break and fire DG yesterday.

They are 6-4 in their last 10. Look it up.

[CallawaySabres]

37 minutes ago, Crusader1969 said:

anyone else notice that the game day threads are dominated by Killjoys???

 

We all know the playoffs are a long shot but lets enjoy the ride. The team has improved a lot since the turn of the calendar, 

 

I must say that I agree on this one. If I can have hope with these freakin' band of idiots, anyone can. Just win tonight so tomorrow means something. If they can somehow go 3-1 on this road-trip, the home building will be packed for the the next stretch of games. 

[PromoTheRobot]

39 minutes ago, Crusader1969 said:

anyone else notice that the game day threads are dominated by Killjoys???

We all know the playoffs are a long shot but lets enjoy the ride. The team has improved a lot since the turn of the calendar, 

 

Being miserable is all they have. Half the time people say they don't even watch. 

[Scottysabres]

Although we won last week's battles, showing 2 to 1 in victories to losses, we now travel west, where General Zemgus with 3 corps, forwards, defense and a reinforced freshness in goalkeepers, in to the wilderness of the unknown.

We must sweep the opponents from the field, we are now at the far flank of the season. Therefore, no player can retreat, no organizational bench officer can hesitate. The time is now.......

 

Edited March 18 by Scottysabres

[Thorner]

1 hour ago, nfreeman said:

It's an interesting question as to what their philosophy was last summer.  Clearly they thought they had the bulk of what they needed and that internal development would result in continued improvement.

In goal, I think they thought they had 3 viable candidates -- including the prince who was promised -- and they'd get good goaltending out of whichever 2 of them emerged from the 3-way battle.  This is more or less what ended up happening, although it was too late to save their season. 

At forward, they thought they were loaded, that TT had arrived as a franchise 1C, that Tuch and Skinner gave them a high-end top line, and that guys like Cozens, Quinn, JJP, Mitts, Krebs, etc would give them plenty of scoring.

On D, they added 2 credible guys in Clifton and EJ, plus a good-looking rookie in Ryan J.

And I think they were in on some bigger names, both at the deadline last year and over the summer, and the players either said no or the price was too high for KA's liking.

Behind the bench, they were happy with their progress so they kept DG.

All of these decisions were, IMHO, defensible in a vacuum -- but clearly the sum total was a major fail.  I completely agree with you that KA's work last summer wasn't good enough and that he is accountable.

I expect him to take further real steps this summer, although I unfortunately do not expect bringing in a real coach to be one of them.

It’s interesting to think about. What the philosophy was. Granato and Okposo stated outright it was about winning this year. Obviously they are versed in league relative reality. I’ll link those quotes after. The funniest quote in retrospect is what Adams had to say:

“Our expectation is to win the Stanley Cup. Period,” Adams said. “And, so, I don't want to get lost and all the other things that have to happen but here's the reality: “To win the Stanley Cup you have to win four rounds in the playoffs. To win four rounds in the playoffs, you have to make the playoffs. To make the playoffs, you have to win a lot of hockey games.
“To win a lot of hockey games during the season, you have to be a consistent team, a resilient team, a team that is able to handle adversity, highs and lows, matures. Those are the things that add up. So, at the end of the day, if you peel it all back and you boil it all down, it's about getting better every day.”

You can literally *feel* the sweat adding up on his forehead as he says it. You can see what is happening, right? He simply refuses to say “the goal this season is to make the playoffs.” Because he’s hiding. He boils it down to the simplest thing, “get better every day”, b/c HE KNOWS he can put his tail between his legs and revert back to “process!” at the drop of a hat. We don’t need to win the cup, we don’t even need to make the playoffs this year, cause don’t worry, we are ALREADY DOING ALL THOSE THINGS, we just can’t see it, yet!

“So, at the end of the day”. Absurd.

- - - 

“And, so, I don't want to get lost and all the other things that have to happen”

LMAO

“I don’t want to get lost in all the markers like making the playoffs that would indicate whether my plan is going well or not.”

Edited March 18 by Thorny

[Weave]

7 minutes ago, PromoTheRobot said:

Being miserable is all they have. Half the time people say they don't even watch. 

We’ve so missed your Buffalo fan condescension.

[Thorner]

55 minutes ago, Crusader1969 said:

anyone else notice that the game day threads are dominated by Killjoys???

 

We all know the playoffs are a long shot but lets enjoy the ride. The team has improved a lot since the turn of the calendar, 

 

Name em