Lindy Ruff officially hired as Sabres HC

[LabattBlue]

39 minutes ago, bob_sauve28 said:

 

I said it last summer and I will say it now, KO & Girgs were a waste of two roster spots and $5mil in cap space.  Now the question is, who does Adam bring in(and hopefully not promote from within) to replace them. 

[thewookie1]

2 minutes ago, LabattBlue said:

I said it last summer and I will say it now, KO & Girgs were a waste of two roster spots and $5mil in cap space.  Now the question is, who does Adam bring in(and hopefully not promote from within) to replace them. 

I still don’t feel they were a waste, overpaid, sure but both still contributed positively to the team. 

[shrader]

1 hour ago, bob_sauve28 said:

 

I’ll believe it when I see it… especially since the link says he MIGHT move on. 

[Derrico]

1 hour ago, thewookie1 said:

I still don’t feel they were a waste, overpaid, sure but both still contributed positively to the team. 

[sabremike]

I don't think people realize just how horrible a job Granato and his staff did last season when you look at the other coaches who got sacked for poor results. All of the other guys essentially got sunk by terrible goaltending while Granato got very good goaltending with UPL playing close to Vezina level from January on. When you fail miserably with solid goaltending that's as inexcusable and awful a failure as possible. If there was an Anti-Jack Adams award he would deserve to win it unanimously.

[PerreaultForever]

On 5/15/2024 at 2:29 PM, bob_sauve28 said:

 

That's funny, but also kind of weird. 

Now can we somehow factor in how much Ted Nolan is loved in Latvia?

[Sabres Fan in NS]

On 5/15/2024 at 8:30 PM, shrader said:

I’ll believe it when I see it… especially since the link says he MIGHT move on. 

This is exactly right.

Both are going to test the FA market, which does not mean they will be leaving the Sabres.  Although, I do think that VO said he planned to play in Europe.  That would be very likely, I think.  Maybe Girgs too.

[MISabresFan]

On 5/15/2024 at 6:14 PM, thewookie1 said:

I still don’t feel they were a waste, overpaid, sure but both still contributed positively to the team. 

I flip flop on those two.  Not sure I wouldn't have minded a youngster playing for either one of them, especially the way the season went.  

[Archie Lee]

On 5/17/2024 at 10:48 PM, sabremike said:

I don't think people realize just how horrible a job Granato and his staff did last season when you look at the other coaches who got sacked for poor results. All of the other guys essentially got sunk by terrible goaltending while Granato got very good goaltending with UPL playing close to Vezina level from January on. When you fail miserably with solid goaltending that's as inexcusable and awful a failure as possible. If there was an Anti-Jack Adams award he would deserve to win it unanimously.

I’m fine with Granato’s departure. I just think it is a bit unfair to point out, correctly, that other coaches were sunk by bad goaltending while not acknowledging that the Sabres were sunk by other deficiencies. Coaching was one of the deficiencies to be sure (poor starts, bad PP), but we had a very young roster that was constructed the opposite of what you see with almost every team in the playoffs (little experience, no grit or toughness).  The Sabres of last season did not have a playoff calibre roster. That sunk Granato as much as his coaching. I think the outlier in Granato’s 3 full years as coach was not last year’s disappointing results, but that he somehow managed to get them to within a point the year before. 

[JohnC]

31 minutes ago, Archie Lee said:

I’m fine with Granato’s departure. I just think it is a bit unfair to point out, correctly, that other coaches were sunk by bad goaltending while not acknowledging that the Sabres were sunk by other deficiencies. Coaching was one of the deficiencies to be sure (poor starts, bad PP), but we had a very young roster that was constructed the opposite of what you see with almost every team in the playoffs (little experience, no grit or toughness).  The Sabres of last season did not have a playoff calibre roster. That sunk Granato as much as his coaching. I think the outlier in Granato’s 3 full years as coach was not last year’s disappointing results, but that he somehow managed to get them to within a point the year before. 

Granato was the right coach to take over for the system rigid Krueger. Under Granato the younger players were allowed to play a looser style that allowed them to express their talent and personally flourish. It seems to me that Granato couldn't make the next transition/adjustment from player development to team development. Individual player and team development are related but also are distinct. Granato is a good and honorable man. He is a credit to his profession. Changing the HC was the right thing to do. 

[Archie Lee]

13 minutes ago, JohnC said:

Granato was the right coach to take over for the system rigid Krueger. Under Granato the younger players were allowed to play a looser style that allowed them to express their talent and personally flourish. It seems to me that Granato couldn't make the next transition/adjustment from player development to team development. Individual player and team development are related but also are distinct. Granato is a good and honorable man. He is a credit to his profession. Changing the HC was the right thing to do. 

I wholly agree with your 1st sentence and the last two. The middle part I’m not sure about. Granato never got an opportunity to coach a playoff style or calibre team. I’m not convinced he can’t adapt if given a team to coach that is built to win. That said, a change to the head coach position was needed to reset culture and expectations. 

[JohnC]

3 minutes ago, Archie Lee said:

I wholly agree with your 1st sentence and the last two. The middle part I’m not sure about. Granato never got an opportunity to coach a playoff style or calibre team. I’m not convinced he can’t adapt if given a team to coach that is built to win. That said, a change to the head coach position was needed to reset culture and expectations. 

It's inarguable that the Sabres were not a complete team last year. But adjusting to your limitations and making alterations to compensate for them, is part of the job. Our PP faltered last year yet there were inadequate changes to the unit and strategy as the team struggled in that aspect of the game. Was there enough structure and accountability last year? I don't believe so. 

I'm not a harsh critic of Granato. He deserves a lot of credit for being adept at handling young player and advancing their game. However, in my view, the coaching change was the right thing to do. 

[shrader]

I know there's been a couple jokes here about Granato coaching the Amerks, but that's exactly where he belongs.  I hope he catches on somewhere in the AHL.  He should be developing guys.

[Weave]

3 hours ago, shrader said:

I know there's been a couple jokes here about Granato coaching the Amerks, but that's exactly where he belongs.  I hope he catches on somewhere in the AHL.  He should be developing guys.

Im not even sure he’s AHL material.  May main concern is that he seems more skill development then overall game development.  Thinking specifically of word regarding practice prep, season prep.  In my head I think AHL is more than skill and positional development.  I would hate for my AHL team to not be getting these kids ready in terms of overall pace of practice, etc.

He might be capped out at pure developmental levels.

[Taro T]

4 hours ago, Weave said:

Im not even sure he’s AHL material.  May main concern is that he seems more skill development then overall game development.  Thinking specifically of word regarding practice prep, season prep.  In my head I think AHL is more than skill and positional development.  I would hate for my AHL team to not be getting these kids ready in terms of overall pace of practice, etc.

He might be capped out at pure developmental levels.

Could be.  But he seems to be a pretty bright guy.  If he truly reflects upon what could've been done differently this past season (just looking at game night adjustments: bring in an assistant that has a bloody clue about how to run a PP, being one; matching lines from the get go when at home rather than in just short segments of games being another; and doing something (ANYTHING) different right before the game starts to get the team ready to come out of the gate flying, being another; certainly there are things he could've done differently in practices as well), he could still at least be a good AHL coach.

Not sure if he'd be too stubborn to make those sorts of changes though.

[shrader]

5 hours ago, Weave said:

Im not even sure he’s AHL material.  May main concern is that he seems more skill development then overall game development.  Thinking specifically of word regarding practice prep, season prep.  In my head I think AHL is more than skill and positional development.  I would hate for my AHL team to not be getting these kids ready in terms of overall pace of practice, etc.

He might be capped out at pure developmental levels.

Just for the record, he has 7 years as an AHL head coach under his belt. 

[Weave]

2 hours ago, shrader said:

Just for the record, he has 7 years as an AHL head coach under his belt. 

Don’t bring me facts to fight against.

[PerreaultForever]

15 hours ago, Archie Lee said:

I wholly agree with your 1st sentence and the last two. The middle part I’m not sure about. Granato never got an opportunity to coach a playoff style or calibre team. I’m not convinced he can’t adapt if given a team to coach that is built to win. That said, a change to the head coach position was needed to reset culture and expectations. 

That's kind of a strange way of looking at it imo. Granato never got that "opportunity" because he wasn't a good enough coach to get his team to the playoffs. 

Unlike many people here who believe he is this great development guy I think he was an incredibly over rated coach and somewhat clueless at the NHL level. We haven't had a good coach since Ruff, and now we are there again. Hopefully he's still a good coach. 

[Archie Lee]

4 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

That's kind of a strange way of looking at it imo. Granato never got that "opportunity" because he wasn't a good enough coach to get his team to the playoffs. 

Unlike many people here who believe he is this great development guy I think he was an incredibly over rated coach and somewhat clueless at the NHL level. We haven't had a good coach since Ruff, and now we are there again. Hopefully he's still a good coach. 

I have no interest in carrying water for Granato. Better coaches than him get fired all the time.  That said, what is strange to me is to have the view that the Sabres are poorly built and missing many elements of a playoff team (very true) while simultaneously concluding that their head coach should have somehow squeezed a playoff spot out of them. It’s not unreasonable to conclude that Granato was part of the deficient make-up of the team. It is not at all or in any way strange to say that the Sabres did not have a playoff style or calibre lineup last year. 

[nfreeman]

2 hours ago, Archie Lee said:

I have no interest in carrying water for Granato. Better coaches than him get fired all the time.  That said, what is strange to me is to have the view that the Sabres are poorly built and missing many elements of a playoff team (very true) while simultaneously concluding that their head coach should have somehow squeezed a playoff spot out of them. It’s not unreasonable to conclude that Granato was part of the deficient make-up of the team. It is not at all or in any way strange to say that the Sabres did not have a playoff style or calibre lineup last year. 

Speaking only for myself, I'd say the Sabres are not currently built to be a cup contender, but had a good enough roster to make the playoffs this season -- i.e. they should've beaten out the Isles or the Caps -- and failed to do so because of coaching.

[PerreaultForever]

7 hours ago, Archie Lee said:

I have no interest in carrying water for Granato. Better coaches than him get fired all the time.  That said, what is strange to me is to have the view that the Sabres are poorly built and missing many elements of a playoff team (very true) while simultaneously concluding that their head coach should have somehow squeezed a playoff spot out of them. It’s not unreasonable to conclude that Granato was part of the deficient make-up of the team. It is not at all or in any way strange to say that the Sabres did not have a playoff style or calibre lineup last year. 

In regards to your comment, I think this nailed it:

4 hours ago, nfreeman said:

Speaking only for myself, I'd say the Sabres are not currently built to be a cup contender, but had a good enough roster to make the playoffs this season -- i.e. they should've beaten out the Isles or the Caps -- and failed to do so because of coaching.

If you are looking at talent on the roster we had more talent than Washington by far, more than the Islanders (I mean Hudson Fasching for f sakes) more than Nashville, as much as L.A., I think you could even make an argument that we had more "talent" on the roster than Boston has. 

Yes, the make up of the team wasn't built right for the playoffs but how that roster plays and who is on it is partly on the coach as well. It's his philosophy and his game plan. If he's not asking for the right kind of bodies to fill roles and is just a KA puppet then he's not a good coach either. 

There are teams that over achieve for what they have on their roster. Nashville, Washington, NYI and Boston would definitely be in that category as well as Philadelphia and some others. Then there are teams that underachieve, and that was Buffalo (again) and coaching has a huge role in that. 

[French Collection]

I read an interesting quote this morning that is attributed to Alexander the Great.

He said he would rather face an army of lions led by a sheep than an army of sheep led by a lion.

That says how much he valued leaders of men, let’s hope Lindy can bring out the best in these guys.

[nfreeman]

8 minutes ago, French Collection said:

I read an interesting quote this morning that is attributed to Alexander the Great.

He said he would rather face an army of lions led by a sheep than an army of sheep led by a lion.

That says how much he valued leaders of men, let’s hope Lindy can bring out the best in these guys.

An army of sheep led by a lion is a pretty good description of this team at present.  Very nice.

[PerreaultForever]

32 minutes ago, French Collection said:

I read an interesting quote this morning that is attributed to Alexander the Great.

He said he would rather face an army of lions led by a sheep than an army of sheep led by a lion.

That says how much he valued leaders of men, let’s hope Lindy can bring out the best in these guys.

So is this Adams and Ruff?

and is Dahlin Harold?

[shrader]

1 hour ago, French Collection said:

I read an interesting quote this morning that is attributed to Alexander the Great.

He said he would rather face an army of lions led by a sheep than an army of sheep led by a lion.

That says how much he valued leaders of men, let’s hope Lindy can bring out the best in these guys.

Mogilny said that?