Muel Presser

[Doohicksie]

"I would say we wouldn't really need to bring in, like, veteran leadership.  I think guys have been in the league long enough now where it's on us.  We don't need someone else to tell us how to do it."

I've been thinking this to an extent.  They jettisoned Okie and several people have mentioned in the exit interviews and discussions about them how the new coach will likely want to bring in veteran leaders.  I think the leaders are here.  I'm not saying we shouldn't bring in any veterans to fill needs on the team, but I really don't think leadership is something we have to bring in.  Dahlin will be in his 7th NHL season next year.  Clifton's 28.  Tuch is 27.  A lot of players are 25.

I think a lot of the players had a real reality check this year rather than losing their love for the game, they seem, as a team, to be more determined to improve next year.

Edited April 19 by Doohickie

[Billznut]

None of your “leaders” mentioned know how to win, Tuch with some experience with Vegas. I strongly believe they need a vet or two with winning experience that can actually contribute to the product on the ice. Erik Johnson wasn’t that guy. 
 

We have plenty of guys with experience now. We don’t have enough guys with experience winning games. There is a difference. Chris Drury changed the culture in the locker room years ago, THATS the kind of leader they need to bring in. But with no move clauses being what they are these days, I don’t think there is another Drury type that will ever agree to a trade to Buffalo sadly. 

[Doohicksie]

I understand what you're saying.  I disagree.

[Billznut]

Well I’d agree that even a Drury type player won’t change the culture in Buffalo anymore. In the past 13 years there have been several iteration's of rosters or mini eras and none of them knew how to win. So I’m not expecting any savior to come in and save this franchise at this point. The product on the ice the past 13 years is FAR more than the quality of players on the roster. We’ve had talent here and it hasn’t mattered. The real change needs to come from above from the head coach, GM etc   Maybe one of these days we will find the right combination. Done holding my breath waiting on it though. Will be happy whenever it finally happens. 

[Slack_in_MA]

And we’re listening to Muel opine about leadership because…?

Does anyone consider him to be any kind of authority on the subject?

Work on your durability, young man.

[Doohicksie]

19 minutes ago, Slack_in_MA said:

And we’re listening to Muel opine about leadership because…?

Does anyone consider him to be any kind of authority on the subject?

Work on your durability, young man.

He speaks with an authority beyond his years.  Teammates have said as much.  It might be because he grew up in an NHL family.

[Doohicksie]

And I'm not saying he's the next captain or anything.  I just thought what he said was interesting.

I mean everyone's busting on the team because other players said they need to be pushed harder.  Now Muel says, no, we need to do it for ourselves and when I post it I get panned for it.

 

 

Some days you just can't win.

[JoeSchmoe]

34 minutes ago, Billznut said:

None of your “leaders” mentioned know how to win,

Crosby "knows how to win" better than anyone in the league. Now he's golfing.

[Mango]

I was happy to catch some of the early clips from locker clean out. But man, the more I hear the more I am a little irked.

Basically we’re hearing 2 things. We need somebody to make us work harder and we don’t need any outside leadership to show us how it’s done. 

I get one is a coach and one is a player but it’s weird.

Also, often when you coaches get fired guys stand up and say “if I was better coach would still be here”. Not the case here. 

Maybe I am just broken from the last 13 years but the more this team talks the last few days and the big picture comes together the more I’m a little weary that this locker room is too entitled. Coach be damned. 

[Mr Peabody]

9 minutes ago, Doohickie said:

And I'm not saying he's the next captain or anything.  I just thought what he said was interesting.

I mean everyone's busting on the team because other players said they need to be pushed harder.  Now Muel says, no, we need to do it for ourselves and when I post it I get panned for it.

 

 

Some days you just can't win.

I agree with you that it’s an interesting statement from Muel and tend to agree with Muel that the players should be capable of pushing themselves.  The question it raises is why didn’t it happen?  
 

Intentionally or not the exit interviews seem to toss Donnie under the bus and with Muel’s comments maybe Kyle and the A’s as well?  

 

 

 

[Doohicksie]

30 minutes ago, Mr Peabody said:

Intentionally or not the exit interviews seem to toss Donnie under the bus and with Muel’s comments maybe Kyle and the A’s as well?  

With the youth on the team, and the ascension through Donny's coaching tenure until dropping off this year, I think the younger players on the team basically took for granted that they should just follow the leader.... "Trust the process."  With the dip this year and Donny's firing, I think it was a wakeup call to all the younger players on the team.  I think this will make all these guys take more ownership in the process going forward.

And I think that's what I found interesting in Muel's statement.  To me it articulated that sentiment.  "it's on us."

Because face it, the core of this team is not a bunch of young kids anymore.  They are, collectively hitting their career primes at the same time.  It's been painful to get to this point and they are by no means over the hump, but when Kevyn said he had a plan I think having a large group of players all peaking at the same time was part of that plan.  Then you feed in a Benson this year, maybe a Savoie or Kulich next..., and keep the train a rollin', even when you have to move some of the more developed players because it would mess up the cap structure.

I know that sounds like rose colored glasses but really, for me as a fan, I have to have a future that looks bright.  I have to believe in the team and the direction it's going.  Realistically it likely won't work as swimmingly as what I mapped out, but I need a light at the end of the tunnel.

[dudacek]

3 hours ago, Doohickie said:

And I'm not saying he's the next captain or anything.  I just thought what he said was interesting.

I mean everyone's busting on the team because other players said they need to be pushed harder.  Now Muel says, no, we need to do it for ourselves and when I post it I get panned for it.

 

 

Some days you just can't win.

I think that the biggest single message coming out of the locker room is “this was on us”.

Whether they think it needs to come from within the room, within themselves, or both, they all want a higher bar of accountability set for themselves and those around them.

Whether that’s a reason for hope or a scathing indictment is going to be in the eye of the beholder.

Don’t take it personally.

[Billznut]

4 hours ago, JoeSchmoe said:

Crosby "knows how to win" better than anyone in the league. Now he's golfing.

Lol Crosby is golfing because his GM decided to be a seller at the deadline over Crosby’s objections. And Crosby was the Pens best player the final six weeks. So not sure your point. 

[mjd1001]

I go back and forth on how important leadership and 'knowing how to win' actually are.  Something I think it doesn't matter, others I think it does.

For the, this team has brought in veteran 'leaders' throughout the drought, but none of them were really the 'best' player (or even close to it) in the team. The young guys with 'all the talent' who are told they are the 'future of the organization' aren't likely to listen to someone who they think isn't as important as they are, or isn't as good, or isn't likely to be around for a while.

For veteran leadership to work, I think you need a guy that is at least in the same neighborhood in talent as those around him (someone who will be a top 5-6 guy on your team) AND he needs to be someone who is here on more than just a 1 or 2 year deal...in order for the 'young guys' to actually lead and follow him.

[Night Train]

Leadership in coaching and a core of players that won't accept floaters. 

[Weave]

1 hour ago, mjd1001 said:

I go back and forth on how important leadership and 'knowing how to win' actually are.  Something I think it doesn't matter, others I think it does.

For the, this team has brought in veteran 'leaders' throughout the drought, but none of them were really the 'best' player (or even close to it) in the team. The young guys with 'all the talent' who are told they are the 'future of the organization' aren't likely to listen to someone who they think isn't as important as they are, or isn't as good, or isn't likely to be around for a while.

For veteran leadership to work, I think you need a guy that is at least in the same neighborhood in talent as those around him (someone who will be a top 5-6 guy on your team) AND he needs to be someone who is here on more than just a 1 or 2 year deal...in order for the 'young guys' to actually lead and follow him.

I don’t believe they need to be the best players as long as there are enough of them to have critical mass in the room.  One or two bottom of the roster guys doesn’t create enough influence to matter.  A handful of players sprinkled throughout the lineup does.

This team’s biggest mistake over the last decade has been the decision to cheap out on leadership and depend on 1 or 2 leaders, generally bottom of the lineup role players.  ROR may have been the only exception.

[LGR4GM]

My issue with all of these, they are focused on Granato. "We didn't play well enough for Granato to keep his job. Donny would still be here if we were better" and that isn't the f-ing point. The Sabres missed the playoffs, again. They weren't good enough to make it to the playoffs again. Donny is collateral damage and the fact the players only could focus on that shows their lack of maturity IMPO. That coupled with the idea they all seem to have assumed Granato would just be back next year is interesting. 

Only other thing I will say is there was clearly a team meeting of some kind after Granato was let go in which "it is on us" "gotta practice the right way" and "next head coach needs experience" were the talking points because they all spewed the same thing. I am not saying they don't necessarily think or believe it but it was a little too uniform. 

[xzy89c1]

10 hours ago, Doohickie said:

And I'm not saying he's the next captain or anything.  I just thought what he said was interesting.

I mean everyone's busting on the team because other players said they need to be pushed harder.  Now Muel says, no, we need to do it for ourselves and when I post it I get panned for it.

 

 

Some days you just can't win.

the evidence says otherwise. 

[xzy89c1]

16 minutes ago, LGR4GM said:

My issue with all of these, they are focused on Granato. "We didn't play well enough for Granato to keep his job. Donny would still be here if we were better" and that isn't the f-ing point. The Sabres missed the playoffs, again. They weren't good enough to make it to the playoffs again. Donny is collateral damage and the fact the players only could focus on that shows their lack of maturity IMPO. That coupled with the idea they all seem to have assumed Granato would just be back next year is interesting. 

Only other thing I will say is there was clearly a team meeting of some kind after Granato was let go in which "it is on us" "gotta practice the right way" and "next head coach needs experience" were the talking points because they all spewed the same thing. I am not saying they don't necessarily think or believe it but it was a little too uniform. 

They should have made the playoffs. Poor coaching account for more than the difference in us missing out. If we had an average power play we would have made playoffs. Never won 4 games in a row. Woefully unprepared most nights. Each night in NHL you prepare for your opponent. What matchups will work and which will not. What to Watch for in their breakout, in your d zone etc...  We were not doing that. If you watched closely at home, granato would not utilize last change. He would change at same time or before the other team. Idiocy. At least make it seem like you are concerned with other team and matchups. 

Other teams were prepared for us. Forecheck hard because as soon as d gets possession sabres forwards leave the zone. pressure d into bad pass and watch for d to d behind the net. If you are carrying puck from neutral zone hold it as any backchecking is occurring they go to wrong player and the D will back up into the goalie before they will step up.

Other teams easily pushed us around and when that happened team disappeared. There was one game I think against Pittsburgh where we started off great and had a lead. Pittsburgh started getting involved after whistle and pushing sabres around. Game was over then. We wilted.

Can we please put to bed the idea Okposo was some great leader? He has barely seen the playoffs in his career. He was a mediocre player his entire run in buffalo. You never heard anything about him taking players aside and letting them know play was unacceptable. 

[#freejame]

1 minute ago, xzy89c1 said:

Can we please put to bed the idea Okposo was some great leader? He has barely seen the playoffs in his career. He was a mediocre player his entire run in buffalo. You never heard anything about him taking players aside and letting them know play was unacceptable. 

Good post all around, but this especially. Those interviews made it plenty clear he brought little to nothing to the table. 

[shrader]

6 hours ago, dudacek said:

I think that the biggest single message coming out of the locker room is “this was on us”.

Whether they think it needs to come from within the room, within themselves, or both, they all want a higher bar of accountability set for themselves and those around them.

Whether that’s a reason for hope or a scathing indictment is going to be in the eye of the beholder.

Don’t take it personally.

Accountability was the first word to immediately come to mind as I opened this thread. Even if players do want some veteran leadership brought in, I don’t want to hear them say it. I want to hear exactly what is said here, “we need to step up”. Adding and players stepping up, the two aren’t mutually exclusive,  it there’s only one side that a player can take care of. 

[SDS]

3 minutes ago, xzy89c1 said:

You never heard anything about him taking players aside and letting them know play was unacceptable. 

Why would you hear this? Who is the person who’s going to divulge this to the media? Kyle? The player he’s talking to?

[SDS]

1 minute ago, shrader said:

Accountability was the first word to immediately come to mind as I opened this thread. Even if players do want some veteran leadership brought in, I don’t want to hear them say it. I want to hear exactly what is said here, “we need to step up”. Adding and players stepping up, the two aren’t mutually exclusive,  it there’s only one side that a player can take care of. 

I brought this up in the past, but I’ll drop it here again. Accountability is this amorphous term that people throw around that means something different in everyone’s head.

No one ever defines what they think it means, what that actually looks like in practice, and how it would manifest itself in an exact situation that happened.

[Buffalonill]

Sadly I don't think samuelsson will be in buffalo next year 

[LGR4GM]

1 minute ago, Buffalonill said:

Sadly I don't think samuelsson will be in buffalo next year 

You don't think the guy with 6 years left on his deal that was signed by Kevyn Adams and is exceedingly well liked in that room while being a useful NHL defender will be in Buffalo next year? Odd.