deluca67 Posted January 3, 2006 Report Posted January 3, 2006 Maybe I'm naive, but I would hope players don't go out and party the night before a game. You'd think the professional athlete, in general, is a person with a lot more discipline than the average Joe and with much more awareness and concern about how alcohol affects health, not to mention their performance within 18 hours. Maybe it happens, a guy here a guy there, but enough of the team to explain their listless performance? I don't think so. As for the road team on a business trip per se, do they really hit the Chip Strip the night before a New Year's Day game? Why am I thinking they don't. Am I naive? I think I'm naive. You are. And they do. I've seen players at the Canadian Ballet during past seasons. These are young rich atheletes. Do you really think they are looking at game film every night. What's the point of being a rich athelete if you can't enjoy the benefits. Just wear a condom and video tape it so the girl can't charge rape. That was Kobi's mistake.
DR HOLLIDAY Posted January 3, 2006 Report Posted January 3, 2006 Maybe I'm naive, but I would hope players don't go out and party the night before a game. You'd think the professional athlete, in general, is a person with a lot more discipline than the average Joe and with much more awareness and concern about how alcohol affects health, not to mention their performance within 18 hours. Maybe it happens, a guy here a guy there, but enough of the team to explain their listless performance? I don't think so. As for the road team on a business trip per se, do they really hit the Chip Strip the night before a New Year's Day game? Why am I thinking they don't. Am I naive? I think I'm naive. When Florida first came into the league, A buddy of mine who is friends with Ed Ronan (at that time playing for the Habs) told his buddy never to bet on the Habs when they go to Florida, the team spent the whole time enjoying the weather and getting worn out by the sun, (better then LA because of no time difference).........Sure enough the Habs sucked in Florida for a long time...........I wonder if the team put their foot down on some of the free time for the players.... B-)
hopeleslyobvious Posted January 3, 2006 Report Posted January 3, 2006 Hopeless, I think that strategy can be effective next time they play Florida. I don't know that it would have helped in this game as there were very few Sabres that seemed to have the legs to outskate the D to the puck if they were to dump it in. It seems that one team or the other parties waaaay too much on NYE (usually the Sabres) and the game tends to be dull like this one or a blow out like Anaheim in '99 (bad) or TO in '00 (good). Even if they couldn't outskate the D to the puck. Get the puck deep and send 2 forecheckers. Put the pressure on and force them to make mistakes. I can think of one play where Max tried to skate it in, was double or triple teamed, and actually tried to skate it in before dumping it. Maybe they didn't have the legs to do it that game, but let's hope they do next time, or some more teams are going to figure out how to beat us.
letsgobuffalo45 Posted January 4, 2006 Report Posted January 4, 2006 Guys, we're not going to win them all. I think some of us, and even myself at times, have gotten spoiled by how well the Sabres have been playing lately. Florida clearly has our number this year, but luckily, it doesn't look like they'd be a team that we'd run into during the playoffs. The absence of Briere has hurt a bit, but a majority of this recent hot-streak was played without him. Darcy needs to pull the trigger and trade Marty.... BUT, perhaps in return for a forward. I really feel we need a guy to step in and replace Briere and Dumont while they are gone. I'm sure St. Louis would dump one of their forwards in a trade, seeing as how they have nothing to play for. Maybe a Doug Weight? Scott Young?
hopeleslyobvious Posted January 4, 2006 Report Posted January 4, 2006 Guys, we're not going to win them all. I think some of us, and even myself at times, have gotten spoiled by how well the Sabres have been playing lately. Florida clearly has our number this year, but luckily, it doesn't look like they'd be a team that we'd run into during the playoffs. The absence of Briere has hurt a bit, but a majority of this recent hot-streak was played without him. Darcy needs to pull the trigger and trade Marty.... BUT, perhaps in return for a forward. I really feel we need a guy to step in and replace Briere and Dumont while they are gone. I'm sure St. Louis would dump one of their forwards in a trade, seeing as how they have nothing to play for. Maybe a Doug Weight? Scott Young? The team has played well without Briere and Dumont, I think we need a defenseman more.
Taro T Posted January 4, 2006 Report Posted January 4, 2006 Guys, we're not going to win them all. I think some of us, and even myself at times, have gotten spoiled by how well the Sabres have been playing lately. Florida clearly has our number this year, but luckily, it doesn't look like they'd be a team that we'd run into during the playoffs. The absence of Briere has hurt a bit, but a majority of this recent hot-streak was played without him. Darcy needs to pull the trigger and trade Marty.... BUT, perhaps in return for a forward. I really feel we need a guy to step in and replace Briere and Dumont while they are gone. I'm sure St. Louis would dump one of their forwards in a trade, seeing as how they have nothing to play for. Maybe a Doug Weight? Scott Young? I don't see the Sabres bringing in a high priced forward like Weight because I would expect it to significantly disrupt both team chemistry and team payroll. Scott Young would be far more affordable salarywise if they were to work out a deal with St. Louis for a forward. I still expect to see the Sabres trade for defense rather than offense. With the Olympic break the Sabres get 2 free weeks at the end of February for all the injured guys to start to heal up. Essentially anybody that is 8 weeks away right now is actually 6 weeks away. (And the Sabres have already been without Briere and Dumont for essentially 6 weeks.) I am still comfortable with the forwards and am comfortable with bringing Thorburn or someone else from Rochester back up if the Sabres have more injury issues. Gaustad could fill in on one of the top 3 lines until Dumont (or even better, Briere) comes back. On this current 11 game run through East Conference teams they are still 6-2-1 with 2 very winnable home games coming up. Even if you look at the past 6 games as a slump, they are over 0.500 (3-2-1). If you assume this "slump" will continue and they get a split with TB and NJ, they will be sitting 14 games over 0.500 with 40 games remaining. (Going 0.500 for the 2nd half of the season, and I expect them to play a slight bit over that even with the current lineup, would put them at 96 points on the season.) I don't expect to see the slump continue because I like how Buffalo has played against TB this season and they are better than NJ at this moment in time. Both of the losses in this slump have been to a team that has the Sabres number this year. I expect to see the team play 0.500 hockey through to the Olympic break as I can envision them going 2-3 vs the West Conference teams and then going 5-4 into the break. After the break the team will have Dumont and Pyatt available and Kalinin should be healthy by then as well. Assuming Darcy works his deadline "magic" the team should have one more solid defenseman and one less goalie and a little less forward depth at that time. If the Sabres play 0.500 from here on out, the Thrashers have to go 27-14 to tie them. Any additional wins above 0.500 makes the Thrashers, Devils, Panthers, Isles, or Bruins jobs all that more difficult if they hope to knock the Sabres out of one of the playoff spots. (Just going 5-4-1 over the final 4 - 10 game segments means Atlanta has to go 31-10 over the 2nd half; any of the other "outsiders" would have to play even better.) They should be able to play above 0.500 during the "killer" portion of their schedule because: 1. the team should be better (via health / trade(s)) and 2. they are young and should have more stamina than older teams and 3. they roll 4 lines and again should have more stamina than teams that use a shorter bench. Bringing in another D-man will also allow the Sabres the luxury of resting Teppo for a game here or there to keep him fresh for the playoff run. It would also give the Sabres a true top 6 defenseman (Campbell or Tallinder) as the #7 defenseman and could drop Rory back to emergency duty.
letsgobuffalo45 Posted January 4, 2006 Report Posted January 4, 2006 I'm just afraid that Marty's trade value will drop significantly if Darcy waits till the deadline to make a deal. Whether its for a d-man or a forward, I'd like to see Darcy deal Marty while he still has a high trade value.
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