Player Discussion Jeff Skinner

[Buffaloed]

I think Okposo is more likely. skinner has a career history of producing every other season, so I think they bank on a rebound year from him.

Krueger loves the guy and he's one of the most coachable players on the team. I can see him being bought out in a couple years.

 

[Zman5778]

If a reduced cap is accompanied by compliance buyout(s) does Skinner get the axe?

If it's one buyout, it's going to be between Skinner and Okposo. If Botterill was still GM, I'd say that it'd be Okposo by a mile.

All that said.......I could absolutely see Terry and Kim not wanting to admit that the Skinner contract is already bad, and that Okposo brings a ton to the locker room.

I think that there's a very real chance that if there's a compliance buyout, we do nothing.

 

[TheMistyStranger]

Krueger loves the guy and he's one of the most coachable players on the team. I can see him being bought out in a couple years.

That’s fair, too. Still too much money for a 4th like roleplayer. At least Skinner is only one snakebitten season away from 40 goals.

 

[flashsabre]

I think Ralph needs to reunite jack and skinner. You paid him to be a 40+ goal scorer, put him in a position to do it for you. Goaloffson had some nice chemistry with MarJo. They need to add that 2C but I would staple Skinner to Jack.

 

[TheStorm]

I think Ralph needs to reunite jack and skinner. You paid him to be a 40+ goal scorer, put him in a position to do it for you. Goaloffson had some nice chemistry with MarJo. They need to add that 2C but I would staple Skinner to Jack.

As soon as I saw that Skinner was being separated from the first line I knew right away he was going to drop in production. Such a stupid move

 

[slip]

To think at one time the Skinner trade was heralded as Botterill's finest move as GM.

We hand him to Housley, who sticks him with Eichel, leading to a career season. Epic contract follows. Now along comes Kreuger who finds the one dimensional play of Skinner unforgivable and banishes him to the third line, or staples him to the bench late in games we're losing. His production craters.

How many millions to buy this guy out? Probably too many for the Pegulas to stomach. I think keeping him and giving him some better tools to score makes more sense. Krueger needs to figure this out. The coach in no position to cling stubbornly to his preferred system of hockey -- whatever that may be -- given that he's never proven a thing at the NHL level. Let's not start making drastic roster moves based on Ralph Kreuger's interpretation of the world.

 

[HaNotsri]

11% of our cap for the coming three seasons.
He's been pretty uneven during his career so hopefully he can live up to it during two of those seasons.

 

[EichHart]

Put Skinner with Eichel and he will be fine. Krueger just couldn't realize that all of this year.

 

[Old Navy Goat]

Put Skinner with Eichel and he will be fine. Krueger just couldn't realize that all of this year.

Or maybe Kreuger saw that Eichel was a more effective player away from Skinner so kept them apart. Will be interesting to see what he does next season

 

[Aladyyn]

Or maybe Kreuger saw that Eichel was a more effective player away from Skinner so kept them apart. Will be interesting to see what he does next season

Then Krueger needs some really strong glasses.

 

[Old Navy Goat]

Then Krueger needs some really strong glasses.

Which Eichel was better: the '18-19, or '19-20? He was much more dynamic and imposed his will more last season.

Skinner-Majo-Sobotka was an effective line until the injury. At the time it gave Kreuger two effective scoring lines and Eichel was going even with Olofsson being invisible at ES. Kreuger probably saw that Olofsson was a more reliable defensive cog on the Eichel line, which allowed Jack more freedom.

Then again what would I know, more points produced, higher % of points scored away from Skinner comparing the two years, probably means Jack was dependent on Skinner to have his best year to date

 

[HaNotsri]

Put Skinner with Eichel and he will be fine. Krueger just couldn't realize that all of this year.

It's amazing how we only put upcoming rfa/ufa players in a position to succeed and follow up extensions by playing them in different roles. It's a Sabres special.

 

[EichHart]

It's amazing how we only put upcoming rfa/ufa players in a position to succeed and follow up extensions by playing them in different roles. It's a Sabres special.

Exactly! Why would we put Skinner with Eichel an entire year, put up career numbers just to have him sign a massive contract? Once he has contract put him on the 2nd/3rd line and struggle? Then we elevate Reinhart to play with Eichel to inflate his numbers before a contract year. This is why the problems with the Sabres run so deep its tough to even begin on how to fix this mess. It has infiltrated the entire organization to its core.

 

[Aladyyn]

Which Eichel was better: the '18-19, or '19-20? He was much more dynamic and imposed his will more last season.

Skinner-Majo-Sobotka was an effective line until the injury. At the time it gave Kreuger two effective scoring lines and Eichel was going even with Olofsson being invisible at ES. Kreuger probably saw that Olofsson was a more reliable defensive cog on the Eichel line, which allowed Jack more freedom.

Then again what would I know, more points produced, higher % of points scored away from Skinner comparing the two years, probably means Jack was dependent on Skinner to have his best year to date

Eichel's 5on5 production dropped this season, his line with Olofsson scored a full goal per 60 minutes less than his line with Skinner last year and struggled to create chances.

 

[Member 308457]

I think it was a coaching brainfart by a stubborn rookie coach Krueger to keep Skinner off Eichel's line. This might have cost a playoff spot as well as the mismangement of the goalies. Skinner was definitely in the coach's doghouse and obviously lost confidence under Ralph. Not sure he can regain it in Buffalo under Krueger unless there's a revolution with the team's character.

As for Olofsson, I know he's still young, but he's starting to remind me of former Sabre Ales Kotalik, a power play and shootout specialist with a big shot and also btw another low draft pick, a #6 I believe. Don't want to put him into a limited box this early but I'm hoping they can both be useful in certain ways.

Seems obvious to play Skinner with Eichel even strength and Olofsson with Eichel on power play. And try Olofsson on the shootout.

 

[Buffaloed]

Krueger's not going to cut Skinner any slack. It's up to Skinner to decide if he wants to be a great player on a bad team or a good player on a successful team. You're not going to win anything in the NHL unless you play a disciplined system and Jeff Skinner has proven that over the last 10 years. Jeff needs to grow up and realize this a job that he's being highly compensated for and when your boss asks you to do things a certain way, you do it. I think he's going to face a lot of peer pressure from his teammates to get with the system and he's going to work hard to do it.

 

[Aladyyn]

So what exactly did Skinner do "wrong" in Krueger's eyes?

 

[Wisent42]

I think we're looking at the Skinner-Eichel situation the wrong way. I don't think it was anything about Krueger wanting to keep Skinner away from Eichel. It was more about wanting to play Olofsson with Eichel, to put a rookie in a position where he could have success. I know that is unheard of in Sabres country but in the rest of the world, it happens.

The logical reasoning is that Skinner is a very established player so by plugging Olofsson with Eichel you release Skinner and make it possible to create a second scoring line. In theory, at least. But then Mittlestadt didn't pan out as we hoped so Skinner is playing with leftovers.

With one year under the belt of Olofsson and him showing at the end that he could perform away from Eichel, it will be interesting to see what happens going forward. Just make sure we have a decent center for the one not playing with Eichel and they'll be fine. I'm not worried about Skinner. Not yet.

 

[Gras]

I think we're looking at the Skinner-Eichel situation the wrong way. I don't think it was anything about Krueger wanting to keep Skinner away from Eichel. It was more about wanting to play Olofsson with Eichel, to put a rookie in a position where he could have success. I know that is unheard of in Sabres country but in the rest of the world, it happens.

The logical reasoning is that Skinner is a very established player so by plugging Olofsson with Eichel you release Skinner and make it possible to create a second scoring line. In theory, at least. But then Mittlestadt didn't pan out as we hoped so Skinner is playing with leftovers.

With one year under the belt of Olofsson and him showing at the end that he could perform away from Eichel, it will be interesting to see what happens going forward. Just make sure we have a decent center for the one not playing with Eichel and they'll be fine. I'm not worried about Skinner. Not yet.

Skinner was having success on the 2nd line before Sobotka got hurt.

 

[TehDoak]

Can we just take a step back for a minute and realize we are arguing about who's fault it is Jeff Skinner had a bad year.

Guy has has a full season where he only scored 31 points in 2014-15.

His career high is 63 points.

And we give him a 8 year, 72M deal with a full NMC.

And suddenly, he has a shit season (which he has done multiple times, hell, he took 1/4 of the last season off in 2019)

Skinner didn't change. He is inconsistent year to year.

We're just the idiots who are paying him 9M with a full NMC for 8 years.

It's not Krueger's fault. This is just who skinner has shown himself to be. We, as an organization, are just tremendously dumb.

 

[HogtownSabresfan]

[QUOTE
We're just the idiots who are paying him 9M with a full NMC for 8 years.
[/QUOTE]

Pegulas. Bid against themselves. LOL.

 

[Artorius Horus T]

I think it was a coaching brainfart by a stubborn rookie coach Krueger to keep Skinner off Eichel's line. This might have cost a playoff spot as well as the mismangement of the goalies. Skinner was definitely in the coach's doghouse and obviously lost confidence under Ralph. Not sure he can regain it in Buffalo under Krueger unless there's a revolution with the team's character.

As for Olofsson, I know he's still young, but he's starting to remind me of former Sabre Ales Kotalik, a power play and shootout specialist with a big shot and also btw another low draft pick, a #6 I believe. Don't want to put him into a limited box this early but I'm hoping they can both be useful in certain ways.

Seems obvious to play Skinner with Eichel even strength and Olofsson with Eichel on power play. And try Olofsson on the shootout.

Guest here. Rookie coach Krueger??...i think you might be a rookie to say something like this...
but i suppose, someone like Krueger, who has coached about 30 years, can be a rookie...in something.

 

[sabremike]

Guest here. Rookie coach Krueger??...i think you might be a rookie to say something like this...
but i suppose, someone like Krueger, who has coached about 30 years, can be a rookie...in something.

You aren't incorrect but the problem is that outside of half a season with Edmonton he's coached in nothing but the hockey equivalents of MLS or the J- League that aren't close to NHL level. They needed to find a legit proven NHL quality coach who could do the business after the Housley Armature Hour and instead hired an unproven high risk/high reward type and came up snake eyes yet again. He was sold as this forward thinking progressive type and ended up as just another stubborn uncreative stuck in the mud type that's a dime a dozen.

 

[Aladyyn]

Can we take a step back for a minute and realize that even in his terrible season Skinner had a higher 5on5 goalscoring rate than:
Nathan MacKinnon
Patrick Kane
Jack Eichel
Jonathan Huberdeau
Tomáš Hertl
Evgeny Kuznetsov
Mikko Rantanen
Filip Forsberg
Sidney Crosby
Patrik Laine
Mark Stone
John Tavares
Claude Giroux
Sean Monahan
Mark Scheifele
Johnny Gaudreau

just to name a few

 

[Member 308457]

Guest here. Rookie coach Krueger??...i think you might be a rookie to say something like this...
but i suppose, someone like Krueger, who has coached about 30 years, can be a rookie...in something.

Krueger is a rookie coach for the Sabres. He has coached the Sabres for 69 games which is one year. Besides that he coached 49 games with the Oilers in 2012-13. That's his entire NHL resume as a head coach.

Not sure what you're getting at with 30 years of coaching but it's not hockey. Soccer isn't hockey, obviously. Btw, coming here as a guest to insult a regular is rude, especially when you're wrong.