Rank 'The Tank'

[YardRat]

The main object of team athletic competition, regardless of level, is to achieve something. An organization defines a clear-cut goal, builds a roster that they believe is best suited to work for that goal, and competes against their peers over the course of a league year to achieve it. Considering the Sabres goal was to be the worst team in the NHL in an effort to acquire the best opportunity to be able to select a player that is considered by conventional wisdom to be the best, or at the very least guarantee them the chance to get one of the top 2, and they have achieved that goal, along with...

The Super Bowl teams were great, but were never able to reach their ultimate goal of bringing home a Lombardi Trophy. They fell short.
The Sabres NHL Finals series of '74-'75 and '98-'99 never attained their ultimate goal either, acquiring Lord Stanley's Cup. They fell short.
Back to back AFL Championships in '64 and '65? Does pre-merge NFL really count for the average fan of today?
Bandits lacrosse championships? Really?

...should 'The Tank' be considered the city of Buffalo's greatest professional sports accomplishment ever?

[Guest]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

LOL!!!!!

[coastal]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

well considering Buffalo Sports hasn't accomplished a damn thing, the tank is viewed by many as an essential part of the process in order to obtain a franchise player.

In doing so, the belief is that this will help them finally accomplish that.

plenty of historical evidence that shows it's an effective strategy.

[YardRat]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

well considering Buffalo Sports hasn't accomplished a damn thing, the tank is viewed by many as an essential part of the process in order to obtain a franchise player.

In doing so, the belief is that this will help them finally accomplish that.

plenty of historical evidence that shows it's an effective strategy.

So it's a great accomplishment in your opinion. The best ever?

[coastal]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

Read what i wrote.

[Skooby]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

I'll take what you're smoking.

[Dr. Who]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

The AFL championships are the greatest Buffalo sports' accomplishments to this point.
The tank is a rational means to acquire an extraordinarily gifted player who, along with a plethora of rising young talent, will give the Sabres multiple chances to win the Cup over the next ten years.
If you can't figure that out, you're pretty hopeless.

[BuffaloRedleg]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

I know you're not really being serious but going to 4 straight superbowls is incredibly impressive, and not managing to win one of them might be equally impressive.

[WagonCircler]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

The AFL championships are the greatest Buffalo sports' accomplishments to this point..

I disagree. I think it was a greater accomplishment to win 4 AFC Championships in a row. At best, the AFL titles are equivalent to AFC Championships. They are greater in semantics only.

Winning 4 in a row, (especially in a 32 team league/16 team conference) is unequaled. By any other football team in the modern era.

[JATMtheJATM]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

well considering Buffalo Sports hasn't accomplished a damn thing, the tank is viewed by many as an essential part of the process in order to obtain a franchise player.

In doing so, the belief is that this will help them finally accomplish that.

plenty of historical evidence that shows it's an effective strategy.

This. They will finally get a player to truly build around.

[WagonCircler]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

Here's the second greatest tank:

tx-bills-rutkowski-68.jpg

The Buffalo Bills barely lost a game in 1968 by missing on a bad pass for a touchdown and a failed FG attempt (the game ended Oakland Raiders 13 -10 Buffalo Bills). In the closing minutes of play, the Bills were within a yard of victory and a couple of feet of tying the defending champion Oakland Raiders. QB Ed Rutkowski fumbled as he reached the Raiders' one-yard line to stem the possible victory. Then, with the final seconds ticking away, Bruce Alford was straight - but short - with a field goal attempt that would have killed Oakland's Western Division chances, instead of keeping their 13-10 margin safe.
Thanks to this loss, their season ended at 1-12-1, one of only two teams in AFL history (the other being the 1962 Oakland Raiders) to finish the season with only one victory.

That loss allowed them to get the first pick in the combined NFL-AFL draft (a win for the Bills would have given the 2-12-0 Philadelphia Eagles first choice), and they chose O.J. Simpson.

Years later, Rutkowski actually admitted to intentionally fumbling.

[YardRat]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

Interesting...never heard that story before.

[Skooby]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

The moral of the story, sometimes it takes the worse to get better. See Luck and Indy, one year tank and next year playoffs for the past several years in a row since. Getting deeper into it, RGIII was # 2 & looked pretty good there for bit. Reality was he wasn't and he's been shaky since, so who knows.

After looking at both players, McDavid is choice.

[WagonCircler]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

Interesting...never heard that story before.

To me, that's sort of the moral of the story.

Someday, when we are retiring the uniform number of McEichel, or watching McEichel in a slow white Bronco police chase, no one will remember that some Sabres fans cheered at a home game in 2015 when Arizona scored a game winning goal.

[YardRat]

Re: Rank 'The Tank'

I think it's interesting that the only references to that text I can find are relative to a Kim Kardashian/OJ Simpson Seven Degrees exercise. Did you include the intentional fumble comment completely on your own, or has that actually been out there somewhere?