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The Sabres beat the Islanders 4-1 in the playoffs.
Then the off-season occurs. The Sabres lose two key players to free agency and add ZERO free agents (okay, fine, one- a back up goalie). The Islanders go out and get enough FA's to create an entire new line.
Finally, the next season starts. What happens? The Islanders win the first two games against the Sabres, due largely to the play of that "FA line" on the Islanders.
The competition got better and we got worse.
There eventually comes a point where expensive, veteran talent needs to be replaced. However, I have two things to say about that: First, you can't lose players the quality of Drury and Briere in exchange for guys like Stafford and Ryan because there will be growing pains. Second, the time to get younger is NOT right after back to back trips to the Cup finals- that's indicative of a team that is missing one or two pieces to win it all, not a team that needs to get younger and rebuild.
The most disappointing thing, though, is the lack of attention paid to defense. I think with Vanek, Afineganov, Roy, Connolly, Stafford, etc, this team still has speed and offensive firepower. However, they still lack that physical presence on D and there is no one who can play the point on the PP, and the PK unit isn't physical enough. These are the exact same problems the team had last year and nothing was done to address it.
I know, someone's gonna jump in and say "you've said all this before". Well, before it was just conjecture. Now, its' actually manifesting itself on the ice. The FO botched the off-season and now we're stuck with the effects.
Then the off-season occurs. The Sabres lose two key players to free agency and add ZERO free agents (okay, fine, one- a back up goalie). The Islanders go out and get enough FA's to create an entire new line.
Finally, the next season starts. What happens? The Islanders win the first two games against the Sabres, due largely to the play of that "FA line" on the Islanders.
The competition got better and we got worse.
There eventually comes a point where expensive, veteran talent needs to be replaced. However, I have two things to say about that: First, you can't lose players the quality of Drury and Briere in exchange for guys like Stafford and Ryan because there will be growing pains. Second, the time to get younger is NOT right after back to back trips to the Cup finals- that's indicative of a team that is missing one or two pieces to win it all, not a team that needs to get younger and rebuild.
The most disappointing thing, though, is the lack of attention paid to defense. I think with Vanek, Afineganov, Roy, Connolly, Stafford, etc, this team still has speed and offensive firepower. However, they still lack that physical presence on D and there is no one who can play the point on the PP, and the PK unit isn't physical enough. These are the exact same problems the team had last year and nothing was done to address it.
I know, someone's gonna jump in and say "you've said all this before". Well, before it was just conjecture. Now, its' actually manifesting itself on the ice. The FO botched the off-season and now we're stuck with the effects.
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