BREAK IT DOWN

[OpIv37]

Fire Ruff and Regier.

Ditch Roy, Stafford, Boyes and Weber. I'd like to see Leino gone, but his contract probably makes it impossible to move him.

I wouldn't be above trading Vanek for the right return either. The guy went stone cold when it counted most.

But, clearly, this **** isn't working. Since Black Sunday, this team has 3 seasons with no playoffs and two first round exits.

Once again, it's another off-season without the Sabres, sitting around watching the teams we hate the most continue to win. And it's 1 year of calendar time and 82 games before we get another crack at it.

Time for major changes. It may suck in the short term, but it beats 3-4 more years of mediocrity before having to break it down and start over anyway.

****, I feel like I'm talking about the Bills.

[trapezeus]

reiger brings in talent, ruff under utilizes it. paille, macarthur, dominic moore, raffi torres, boyes, etc, have been good elsewhere. They were average to below average under ruff. To me Reiger gets touted as a good talent evaluator. Ruff is an enigma around the league. Ruff also has made a point of trying to protect 1 goal leads since hasek. the last time he should of realized that was a bad idea was after game 7 in carolina. And yet again, he did the same thing last night. and the winning goal was a break away. REALLY?

Leino i'd keep. one bad year on a struggling team.

Vanek, i'd entertain offers, but whoever you get, you need to get a center as well. so if you can get a top center without moving vanek, i'd like to see what vanek can do healthy and with a legit center. last year he was so much better without roy.

Stafford looked like a new guy with ennis and foligno. i'd keep him.

I'd like to see enroth play the 15-25 games we thought he would and more spaced out. and back to backs unless in must win situations should be split. even if we made it, we were riding miller hard from february to april. that's like a stanley cup playoff run right there. and he'd have been asked to do it again for another 3 months. Not good odds.

and the team needs to face facts, this wasn't about injuries. We struggled to beat bad teams during the run. we gave up 5 goals to toronto and lost to them. We couldn't beat philly's mentally rested attitude of "whatever happens happens, focus on pitts" team. That's a 5 seed. and our desperation was just squashed by a team that was overlooking us and also had their star center injured.

You can't change 26 guys, but you can change the coach and you can change the culture.

i know pominville played well this year, but he's not a captain. where was he during the last week? I know he's stuck with roy, but he was invisible.

all we did was lose a chance at the #1 pick and a definite #3 pick. That run was detrimental. If ruff is back, it honestly feels like when jauron was resigned for doing nothing. you just know we are throwing away another season just to make sure we know what we know.

very frustrating.

[PTI]

Ruff sucks. It was clear Miller was out of gas. Ruff has no idea how to use goalies.

[Philagape]

In the post-Hasek era, they've missed the playoffs in six of 10 seasons.

They're failures. Darcy should have been gone five years ago, and Lindy has lost the team many times over.

[PTI]

In the post-Hasek era, they've missed the playoffs in six of 10 seasons.

They're failures. Darcy should have been gone five years ago, and Lindy has lost the team many times over.

Hasek is a HOF player, he cannot treat every #1 goalie like that.

[OpIv37]

Ruff sucks. It was clear Miller was out of gas. Ruff has no idea how to use goalies.

While I agree, I don't think last night was Miller's fault. He let in 2 goals. One of them he arguably should have had, but he was completely hung out to dry on a 1 on 0 on the other one. And he also pulled 3 or 4 spectacular saves out of his ass and kept us in the game way longer than the rest of the team deserved to be.

[trapezeus]

i've said this alot, but no one ever makes a comment, so i don't know if i am being fair or not.

but stanley cup WINNNING coaches who go 5 years with 3 no playoff appearances and 2 first round exits would have been fired by now. there is zero reason for him to stay.

his system to play defensively gives up at least 2 odd man breaks a game (even when they are protecting the lead) and his defensemen are supposed to pinch to add offense, and their offense this year was putrid. So what is the system?

the favortism towards certain players was maddening. because let's be honest, in a year you miss the playoffs, getting adam to work through his issues would have been a huge help than to have him do that next year. have him replace roy and send roy a message would have been good. benching a struggling stafford might have put foligno and kassian on a line together. it may have been a kick start during the middle of that 12 game losing period.

there was nothing imaginative to get us out of the rut. the thing that did was the ruff broke his ribs and left the bench. and then it started.

I wish i had the time to do some analysis on the numbers. there was a long period where we didn't score more than 2 goals in january through february. and it was against the best and worst teams.

hopefully the sabres brass gets in there and concludes what we know. there is a fundamental problem. this wasn't a team designed to squeak in and generate playoff revenue. it was supposed to be at worst a 6 seed; they were 15th out of 15 during this season. pathetic.

[OpIv37]

i've said this alot, but no one ever makes a comment, so i don't know if i am being fair or not.

but stanley cup WINNNING coaches who go 5 years with 3 no playoff appearances and 2 first round exits would have been fired by now. there is zero reason for him to stay.

his system to play defensively gives up at least 2 odd man breaks a game (even when they are protecting the lead) and his defensemen are supposed to pinch to add offense, and their offense this year was putrid. So what is the system?

the favortism towards certain players was maddening. because let's be honest, in a year you miss the playoffs, getting adam to work through his issues would have been a huge help than to have him do that next year. have him replace roy and send roy a message would have been good. benching a struggling stafford might have put foligno and kassian on a line together. it may have been a kick start during the middle of that 12 game losing period.

there was nothing imaginative to get us out of the rut. the thing that did was the ruff broke his ribs and left the bench. and then it started.

I wish i had the time to do some analysis on the numbers. there was a long period where we didn't score more than 2 goals in january through february. and it was against the best and worst teams.

hopefully the sabres brass gets in there and concludes what we know. there is a fundamental problem. this wasn't a team designed to squeak in and generate playoff revenue. it was supposed to be at worst a 6 seed; they were 15th out of 15 during this season. pathetic.

I noticed the 2 or less thing too. Interesting stat that MSG put up last night: The Sabres are 30-4-6 when scoring 3 or more.

The problem: That means that in 81 games, they only managed 3 or more 40 times. And that's WITH a system that encourages defensemen to jump in the rush and pinch in the offensive zone.

But we all know what will happen: We had a ton of injuries and we were very close to making the playoffs, so Lindy and the pathetic core will skate and we'll only have minor changes in the off-season. Boyes is likely gone because he is a FA but that will be the only big change.

[chernobylwraiths]

reiger brings in talent, ruff under utilizes it. paille, macarthur, dominic moore, raffi torres, boyes, etc, have been good elsewhere. They were average to below average under ruff.

You mention Paille first? Really? His best year was in Buffalo where he scored 19 goals and had 16 assists. His THIRD best point season was his best season in Boston where he had 10 goals and 9 assists. He's great. MacArthur had a pretty good year for a bad Leafs team last year, then his production dropped by 20 points this year. Yeah he's good too. Boyes is having the worst season of his career, that's on Lindy and Brad. His production was declining over the last few years though and he is just another soft player on a soft team. I can't believe you actually used deadline acquisitions as players Darcy brought in as talent. They each played less than 20 regular season games with Buffalo.

To me Reiger gets touted as a good talent evaluator.

I've done this before, Darcy's first round draft history:
1998 Dmitri Kalinin 1999 Barrett Heisten 2000 Artem Kryukov 2001 Jiri Novotny 2002 Keith Ballard & Daniel Paille 2003 Thomas Vanek 2004 Drew Stafford 2005 Marek Zagrapan 2006 Dennis Persson 2008 Myers and Ennis 2009 Zack Kassian 2010 Mark Pysyk 2011 Joel Armia
Vanek, Stafford (maybe) Myers and Ennis have shown to be good players. Several have never made it or only played a few games in the NHL.

Ruff is an enigma around the league. Ruff also has made a point of trying to protect 1 goal leads since hasek. the last time he should of realized that was a bad idea was after game 7 in carolina. And yet again, he did the same thing last night. and the winning goal was a break away. REALLY?

Leino i'd keep. one bad year on a struggling team.

Won't have much choice with that contract.

Vanek, i'd entertain offers, but whoever you get, you need to get a center as well. so if you can get a top center without moving vanek, i'd like to see what vanek can do healthy and with a legit center. last year he was so much better without roy.

Stafford looked like a new guy with ennis and foligno. i'd keep him.

Stafford looked like a new man last season too, look how good he played for most of this season. You don't keep a guy who can only play well occasionally or when with another good player. You need players who make their teammates better.

I'd like to see enroth play the 15-25 games we thought he would and more spaced out. and back to backs unless in must win situations should be split. even if we made it, we were riding miller hard from february to april. that's like a stanley cup playoff run right there. and he'd have been asked to do it again for another 3 months. Not good odds.

Yeah, that's all on Lindy. I don't think our backups have been as bad as we think. It's just that he never plays them.

and the team needs to face facts, this wasn't about injuries. We struggled to beat bad teams during the run. we gave up 5 goals to toronto and lost to them. We couldn't beat philly's mentally rested attitude of "whatever happens happens, focus on pitts" team. That's a 5 seed. and our desperation was just squashed by a team that was overlooking us and also had their star center injured.

You can't change 26 guys, but you can change the coach and you can change the culture.

i know pominville played well this year, but he's not a captain. where was he during the last week? I know he's stuck with roy, but he was invisible.

Absolutely 100% agree.

all we did was lose a chance at the #1 pick and a definite #3 pick. That run was detrimental. If ruff is back, it honestly feels like when jauron was resigned for doing nothing. you just know we are throwing away another season just to make sure we know what we know.

very frustrating.

I'm not trying to justify keeping Ruff. I would also like to see them both gone, but it won't happen. I don't like our team makeup. I don't like the fact that many of our defensemen chase the puck in the zone, don't hold up forwards coming into the zone (hey, it doesn't seem to be a penalty anymore as evidenced by EVERY time a Buffalo forward tried to go around a defenseman after throwing the puck in, the defensemen get away with holding them up) and are just adverse to taking any kind of hit. Also, most of our forwards could take a lesson from Foligno. Hit the defenese enough and they cough up the puck (as if that wasn't readily evident from watching their own defense cough up the puck to avoid a check).

[trapezeus]

I noticed the 2 or less thing too. Interesting stat that MSG put up last night: The Sabres are 30-4-6 when scoring 3 or more.

The problem: That means that in 81 games, they only managed 3 or more 40 times. And that's WITH a system that encourages defensemen to jump in the rush and pinch in the offensive zone.

But we all know what will happen: We had a ton of injuries and we were very close to making the playoffs, so Lindy and the pathetic core will skate and we'll only have minor changes in the off-season. Boyes is likely gone because he is a FA but that will be the only big change.

issue here is that the team wasn't designed to be an 8th seed team. they were supposed to be in the hunt for a division crown and be in the top 5-6 at worst.

Our injuries really weren't that bad. yes erhoff and myers went out twice. but our defense in rochester is young and up and coming. this points to coaching inadequecies. if we didn't hvae a 7th defensemen, if we didn't have depth in rochester, i'd be more apt to take the injury excuse.

the forwards were the problem. ennis was out. but top line was there. they scored alittle in vanek and pominville, but they werent' clutch. if i got fingers for every missed empty net opportunity roy had this season, i think i'd look like Ganesh.

The team doesn't have finishers. And they had no imagination during the lull. foligno and kassian could have been brought up immediately after the bruins debacle. Even for just a game to show a point to the guys who were on the ice for the run. one game with adam, foligno and kassian would have shown that line that backing down isn't accepted. And yeah, we probably would have lost that game with those youngins in, but it's better than losing 2-3 months because nothing happened.

And once we were in that 12 game losing streak, the literally changed nothing. "we got to just keep battling and putting pucks to the net." If pominville says that one more time in games where they neither battled nor put pucks to the net, i will go crazy.

[chernobylwraiths]

i've said this alot, but no one ever makes a comment, so i don't know if i am being fair or not.

but stanley cup WINNNING coaches who go 5 years with 3 no playoff appearances and 2 first round exits would have been fired by now. there is zero reason for him to stay.

his system to play defensively gives up at least 2 odd man breaks a game (even when they are protecting the lead) and his defensemen are supposed to pinch to add offense, and their offense this year was putrid. So what is the system?

the favortism towards certain players was maddening. because let's be honest, in a year you miss the playoffs, getting adam to work through his issues would have been a huge help than to have him do that next year. have him replace roy and send roy a message would have been good. benching a struggling stafford might have put foligno and kassian on a line together. it may have been a kick start during the middle of that 12 game losing period.

there was nothing imaginative to get us out of the rut. the thing that did was the ruff broke his ribs and left the bench. and then it started.

I wish i had the time to do some analysis on the numbers. there was a long period where we didn't score more than 2 goals in january through february. and it was against the best and worst teams.

hopefully the sabres brass gets in there and concludes what we know. there is a fundamental problem. this wasn't a team designed to squeak in and generate playoff revenue. it was supposed to be at worst a 6 seed; they were 15th out of 15 during this season. pathetic.

I would take almost anything for Luke Adam. He is a big player that plays completely soft. If he isn't going to score a whole lot being that soft, he isn't worth the time to put into him.

[OpIv37]

I'm not trying to justify keeping Ruff. I would also like to see them both gone, but it won't happen. I don't like our team makeup. I don't like the fact that many of our defensemen chase the puck in the zone, don't hold up forwards coming into the zone (hey, it doesn't seem to be a penalty anymore as evidenced by EVERY time a Buffalo forward tried to go around a defenseman after throwing the puck in, the defensemen get away with holding them up) and are just adverse to taking any kind of hit. Also, most of our forwards could take a lesson from Foligno. Hit the defenese enough and they cough up the puck (as if that wasn't readily evident from watching their own defense cough up the puck to avoid a check).

our defensemen try to do this- they just have a bad habit of whiffing on the check at the blue line. McNabb is particularly bad at this. It's what led to the 1 on 0 go-ahead goal last night.

Regehr is the only one who does it right. He gets in the guy's face at the blue line then turns towards him and forces him to the outside. He did it to perfection at least 3 or 4 times last night. I think MSG highlighted it once.

[OpIv37]

issue here is that the team wasn't designed to be an 8th seed team. they were supposed to be in the hunt for a division crown and be in the top 5-6 at worst.

Our injuries really weren't that bad. yes erhoff and myers went out twice. but our defense in rochester is young and up and coming. this points to coaching inadequecies. if we didn't hvae a 7th defensemen, if we didn't have depth in rochester, i'd be more apt to take the injury excuse.

the forwards were the problem. ennis was out. but top line was there. they scored alittle in vanek and pominville, but they werent' clutch. if i got fingers for every missed empty net opportunity roy had this season, i think i'd look like Ganesh.

The team doesn't have finishers. And they had no imagination during the lull. foligno and kassian could have been brought up immediately after the bruins debacle. Even for just a game to show a point to the guys who were on the ice for the run. one game with adam, foligno and kassian would have shown that line that backing down isn't accepted. And yeah, we probably would have lost that game with those youngins in, but it's better than losing 2-3 months because nothing happened.

And once we were in that 12 game losing streak, the literally changed nothing. "we got to just keep battling and putting pucks to the net." If pominville says that one more time in games where they neither battled nor put pucks to the net, i will go crazy.

I don't disagree with any of that, especially the injury part.

I'm just saying that's the excuse they will use to maintain the status quo. I don't agree with it, but I don't run the team either.

[chernobylwraiths]

our defensemen try to do this- they just have a bad habit of whiffing on the check at the blue line. McNabb is particularly bad at this. It's what led to the 1 on 0 go-ahead goal last night.

Regehr is the only one who does it right. He gets in the guy's face at the blue line then turns towards him and forces him to the outside. He did it to perfection at least 3 or 4 times last night. I think MSG highlighted it once.

Funny, Regehr is the one who wiffed on the go ahead goal. McNabb is young and hopefully Regehr teaches him.

[chernobylwraiths]

I don't disagree with any of that, especially the injury part.

I'm just saying that's the excuse they will use to maintain the status quo. I don't agree with it, but I don't run the team either.

One thing I will say is, injuries DID play a huge part in how bad we played. Just look at the final season stats. Joe Finley played 5 games at defense for us, TJ Brennan played 10 and McNabb had 24. All on a roster that started the season with 7 defensemen. You CAN'T discount the fact that the loss of Ehrhoff and Myers was HUGE. They are a different team without them. Hell, the only reason I think they were even in the game last night was because they played very well defensively. Even the offense played defensively, that was why they showed little offensively. With Ehrhoff and Myers playing, the offense was much more effective. And Stafford was much more effective once Ennis was in the lineup. Ennis only played 47 games.

That will be the reason they do practically nothing in the off season. But if they sign Roy to an extension, a lot of people will be pissed.

[OpIv37]

One thing I will say is, injuries DID play a huge part in how bad we played. Just look at the final season stats. Joe Finley played 5 games at defense for us, TJ Brennan played 10 and McNabb had 24. All on a roster that started the season with 7 defensemen. You CAN'T discount the fact that the loss of Ehrhoff and Myers was HUGE. They are a different team without them. Hell, the only reason I think they were even in the game last night was because they played very well defensively. Even the offense played defensively, that was why they showed little offensively. With Ehrhoff and Myers playing, the offense was much more effective. And Stafford was much more effective once Ennis was in the lineup. Ennis only played 47 games.

That will be the reason they do practically nothing in the off season. But if they sign Roy to an extension, a lot of people will be pissed.

Injuries to the defense don't justify the poor play of Roy, Boyes or Leino or why Vanek fell apart late in the season.

[chernobylwraiths]

Injuries to the defense don't justify the poor play of Roy, Boyes or Leino or why Vanek fell apart late in the season.

They have been talking a lot in the local media about how Vanek is playing through injuries and always has and that he refuses to complain about them. Leino was forced to play a position he wasn't suited for, that's on Regier for signing a winger to play center. Boyes just isn't suited to the NHL game anymore. It is said that if you look at his numbers, his best season are in the years when they called obstruction and interference penalties. When it started going back to the "old rules" his production dropped.

[trapezeus]

and that's why its not defensive injuries that are the problem. its the forwards who don't score. too many 2-1 games. even during the streak they were winning 2-0, 1-0, 2-1.

You are asking your defense and goaltending to be perfect. and you look at the salaries on forward, and there is just no way they should be in month long stretches of struggling to score 2 goals a game.

i said this last year...the sabres don't have a line you throw out there when you go down 1-0 and say, "they'll get it back." they still don't hvae that. once they are down, you are frightened. and when they are up, they go into a shell. so **** them.

even in that rangers win, they scored cause of odd man breaks. everyone knows now since 2005-07, you don't get into a skating race with the sabres. and occassionally people break down and the sabres make you pay. but they only recently found one line that might be able to cycle it a little in FES line. Otherwise, they get bounced off the puck.

[Cali512]

Myers Sulzer
Leopold Sekera
Ehrhoff Brennan/new guy

Foligno, Ennis, Stafford
Pomms, ____, vanek
Tropp, Hodgson, ____
Leino, McCormick, Kaleta


Boyes, Webber, Regehr, Roy, Hecht, Ellis, and Boyes all gone

[chernobylwraiths]

Myers Sulzer
Leopold Sekera
Ehrhoff Brennan/new guy

Foligno, Ennis, Stafford
Pomms, ____, vanek
Tropp, Hodgson, ____
Leino, McCormick, Kaleta


Boyes, Webber, Regehr, Roy, Hecht, Ellis, and Boyes all gone

You've successfully softened our defense as well as made Hodgson and Leino practically useless.

[OpIv37]

You've successfully softened our defense as well as made Hodgson and Leino practically useless.
Leino was already useless

[chernobylwraiths]

Leino was already useless

I beg to differ. He played better towards the end of the seaon. It was his forced move to center that was stupid.

[PTI]

I beg to differ. He played better towards the end of the seaon. It was his forced move to center that was stupid.

He works hard along the boards on both sides, and gains good puck control, and sweeps the puck in front of the net a lot, with better coaching, I think that playmaking ability can add up in more goals, guys charging the net and having their sticks on the ice, Leino easily could have had 10-12 more assists this year. I would like to see him shoot a little more. He did play better towards the end, I agree.

[PTI]

Hodgson had like 3 good games, that was it. The rookie will be better next year we hope with the hole season and oof season with the Sabres.