Roster Thread (2023-2024 Season)

[elchud]

They must think Bryson still has some upside. He can skate so he has that going for him. Stillman is what he is. RJ may be ready for a mid season call up so keeping Bryson shouldn't be that relevant. Unless injuries.

Losing any of Dahlin/Power/Sammy for a significant period of time would be really bad. Stillman vs. Bryson would be negligible in the grand scheme of things in such a situation.

Bloom for Stillman turned out to be an overpay. It is what it is. If we would have *made the playoffs* last season, the trade would have been brilliant as that was the only move that was made. Cray cray.

 

[Mattilaus]

Sabres 5on5 goal differential with Dahlin and/or Power on the ice: +15
Sabres 5on5 goal differential with neither Dahlin or Power on the ice: -22

If our 3rd pairing can tread water that's going to be massive improvement to our D. Don't underestimate it.

Can you let me know where you got these numbers? I am interested to see what they look like for other teams. Not asking you to do the work for me, just curious and want to give them a look.

 

[Aladyyn]

Can you let me know where you got these numbers? I am interested to see what they look like for other teams. Not asking you to do the work for me, just curious and want to give them a look.

naturalstattrick.com line tool

 

[elchud]

No like breaking up Skinny TT Tuch and Sammy Dahlin.

NO LIKE

I hope it all works out, just like I hope the goaltending works out. And I hope we don't have anymore significant injuries. And I hope Clifton can play an effective 20 minutes a night. And I hope Krebs keeps the bone headed plays to a minimum. And I hope Joker and VO get their games going what with contract year and all. And I hope our PK is much better and I hope we are top 10 PP like we should be given the talent.

Can't wait for the season to start!!!

 

[joshjull]

 

[Chainshot]

No surprise.

 

[joshjull]

It’s not Stillman/Bryson. I think it’s the low hanging fruit to complain about based in fear that we didn’t go get anybody to shore up the blue line, didn’t get a goalie, and didn’t replace any assistant coaches.
This roster has a heavy weight of expectation. There’s a lot of fear we got our hopes up last year only to add a 13th year to the drought.

It's nothing more than complaining to complain. Something a few posters seem to love doing for whatever reason.

They did bring in people to improve the defense. If you wanted better that's fine but that's a different discussion.

 

[old kummelweck]

Roster is still one or two players heavy, is it not? Unless someone has been moved to IR that was not on there yesterday.

 

[Chainshot]

Roster is still one or two players heavy, is it not? Unless someone has been moved to IR that was not on there yesterday.

Savoie's on IR.

 

[Jacob582]

Quinn too

 

[sabres4ever]

Home opener, Donnie best have this team fired up and exploding out of the gate.

 

[Djp]

The only thing Bryson has over Stillman is that Jacob is a better skater. I’ve never been a fan of him, but whatever. I won’t lose sleep over it.

Arent Bryson and Mitts party house roommates?

I'm convinced my sentence was meant to continue the discussion.

I can accept that there are moves by Adams that end up looking like poor judgement. Signing Bryson to that contract might fall into that category depending on what happens this season. Same with the Lyubushkin signing. Trading for Stillman.

The Stillman trade was about adding depth because Bryson wasn't capable last season. I was making the point that Pegula is allowing him to spend to improve depth. They are paying over $3M to defensemen in the AHL.

they had no idea of roster moves made this summer.

bryson played well the season before but wasn’t doing as well last year. Playing injured??? Dealing with post Covid stuff?

I don’t understand how Stillman cost us Bloom and not 7th round, guys like that end up on waivers, which is what happened. This all looks damn weird.

Bloom was probably not going to return a 3rd in a trade. It’s no different than moving a prospect for a rental. Would you say the same if he traded him for a UFA that walked? Probably not if you liked the player.

And not for nothing but if Bryson does draw in and struggles in the first 30 days after Stillman clears, they can always waive him down to Rochester and recall Stillman without incident.

yep…Bryson looks like he’s the back to back game player for EJ assuming no injuries.

Roster is still one or two players heavy, is it not? Unless someone has been moved to IR that was not on there yesterday.

since Savoie hadn’t played he can go on IR…which he did do.

 

[VaporTrail]

No like breaking up Skinny TT Tuch and Sammy Dahlin.

NO LIKE

I hope it all works out, just like I hope the goaltending works out. And I hope we don't have anymore significant injuries. And I hope Clifton can play an effective 20 minutes a night. And I hope Krebs keeps the bone headed plays to a minimum. And I hope Joker and VO get their games going what with contract year and all. And I hope our PK is much better and I hope we are top 10 PP like we should be given the talent.

Can't wait for the season to start!!!

Granato is breaking up Skinner, Thompson, Tuch ??? Where did you see this ?

 

[NotABadPeriod]

Granato is breaking up Skinner, Thompson, Tuch ??? Where did you see this ?

In camp he had Skinner-Thompson-Benson and Greenway-Mitts-Tuch, but the last preseason game had Tuch on the top line. So we'll see what Granato does on Thursday.

 

[Dubi Doo]

Home opener, Donnie best have this team fired up and exploding out of the gate.

I hope so. Theyre going to play in a packed house. It could go a long way to bringing he fans back if they have light it up. The fans still seem to be weary of trusting the team to win. Last year, attendance rose, but I believe we still weren't close to sellouts.

 

[Deep Blue Metallic]

I hope so. Theyre going to play in a packed house. It could go a long way to bringing he fans back if they have light it up. The fans still seem to be weary of trusting the team to win. Last year, attendance rose, but I believe we still weren't close to sellouts.

The fans are hesitant. They're in "show me" mode.

Me too.

 

[Deep Blue Metallic]

In camp he had Skinner-Thompson-Benson and Greenway-Mitts-Tuch, but the last preseason game had Tuch on the top line. So we'll see what Granato does on Thursday.

Granato knows the top line works, and he can always revert to it when necessary. Benson's surprising camp gives him welcome flexibility in Quinn's absence.

I fully expect some shuffling in the top-9 to start the season. They have the option to add Savoie when he's ready, Quinn eventually, and Kulich or Rosen for a look as injuries occur.

When was the last time a Sabres' coach had so many top-9 options?

 

[joshjull]

I thought that at the end of last year. But we are still near the bottom of the league in spending, we brought in no help on defense or in net. We’re talking about 2-3 players tops. That’s it.

We’ve known since the 2021 offseason that the plan was to go with youth, not block it and build from within. A natural consequence of that approach is not spending a ton on payroll. At least not until that youth starts getting paid. Which is why I don’t understand this bizarre need for some to cling to conspiracy theories about Pegula meddling/being cheap.

They also did add 2 players (Clifton/Johnson) and arguably a 3rd if you count Benson.

 

[TehDoak]

We’ve known since the 2021 offseason that the plan was to go with youth, not block it and build from within. A natural consequence of that approach is not spending a ton on payroll. At least not until that youth starts getting paid. Which is why I don’t understand this bizarre need for some to cling to conspiracy theories about Pegula meddling/being cheap.

I really don't understand how the Pegulas literally coming out and saying "we want our team to be economic, efficient, and effective" and then spending so little on the team that they had to use cap loopholes to get to the floor and then calling them out for being cheap is a conspiracy theory. He's doing what the said he would do. He's being cheap.

As for the meddling talk...I mean, Adams wasn't hired for his resume. He doesn't have one. He has zero experience in management at any level of hockey. He was hired because he was loyal to the Pegulas. Of course, that doesn't mean the Pegulas are actively interfering in the front office, but it does mean that Kevyn won't tell him no if the Pegulas ask him to do anything, as evidenced by his role as an ax man in his first 12 hours as GM.

None of this is conspiracy theory, it's facts.

 

[HogtownSabresfan]

Why would I need to do that when I wasn't talking about it?

I'm talking about your obsessive need to bring up our available cap space in every discussion. Even when it's not relevant. It had nothing to do with picking Bryson over Stillman yesterday.

Now you're moving the goalposts a bit to complain about the additions of Clifton/E.Johnson. Thats fine if you don't like their additions and wish we used more cap space to get "better" ones. But that's also irrelevant to the decision yesterday of picking Bryson over Stillman.

I don't know because the cap is relevant to every decision in sports, even more in hockey with a hard cap. Live in some fantasy land where the Sabres being $9 M under cap doesn't impact the best team you put on ice. You want to tell me that's the reality and live with, I'll buy that. But don't run around and tell me that doesn't impact the lineup you can ice.

 

[Old Navy Goat]

So next year will you feel better when they run the same team back with significantly less cap space due to the Dahlin and Power contracts?

I mean shit, I'd have fired the entire front office after they rang up cap teams with last place finishes. I guess you'd prefer the Botts or Murray approach of saddling the team with overpaid vets with zero upside instead of running an exciting young team poised to make that next leap

 

[HogtownSabresfan]

I really don't understand how the Pegulas literally coming out and saying "we want our team to be economic, efficient, and effective" and then spending so little on the team that they had to use cap loopholes to get to the floor and then calling them out for being cheap is a conspiracy theory. He's doing what the said he would do. He's being cheap.

As for the meddling talk...I mean, Adams wasn't hired for his resume. He doesn't have one. He has zero experience in management at any level of hockey. He was hired because he was loyal to the Pegulas. Of course, that doesn't mean the Pegulas are actively interfering in the front office, but it does mean that Kevyn won't tell him no if the Pegulas ask him to do anything, as evidenced by his role as an ax man in his first 12 hours as GM.

None of this is conspiracy theory, it's facts.

All true. And Pegula doesn't want to spend to cap, he owns the team. You're take is fair and honest. Trying to pretend not spending has no impact and we are just saving money for the future is disingenuous. BTW, people can call Pegula out for all his fan boy comments when he bought the team. That's legit.

 

[Sabresfansince1980]

The cap space/ownership influence argument is neither here nor there to me. The team is being built the right way...the way it should have been the moment Eichel was drafted. I don't care how much influence comes from learning from those mistakes, vs KA taking a simple route, vs Pegula tightening his spending. FCS, be happy that the team is going hard in the right direction.

 

[SnuggaRUDE]

Sabres 5on5 goal differential with Dahlin and/or Power on the ice: +15
Sabres 5on5 goal differential with neither Dahlin or Power on the ice: -22

If our 3rd pairing can tread water that's going to be massive improvement to our D. Don't underestimate it.

I'm not sure I came up with the same numbers:

5on5 with D a/o P:
MS + RD +8
HJ + OP 0
RD + OP +12
HJ + RD -3
MS + OP +3
KC + OP -3
IL + OP +1
KC + RD +1
RD + IL +3
LP + OP +4
JB + RD -9
JB + OP -7
CF + OP +3
CF + RD 0
RS + RD -2
RS + OP +1
RD + LP -1
JD + RD 0

+12 when Dahlin or Power were on the ice. I also had -24 when neither were on the ice.
-4 differential when only one of them were on the ice; mostly fueled by Bryson's combined -16.

Bryson was -25 across all skaters (there's a discrepency on natural stat tricks data with him for pairs and for individual. I wonder if maybe he was on ice for a goal against with 3 D).

I'm not sure why they didn't go more often with Dahlin / Jokiharju & Power / Sameulsson split. Those pairings each had 60%+ xGF in >100 minutes 5v5.

TLDR Bryson had a very poor season 5v5, his xGF is also struggled except when on sheltered deployment with fringe partner.

It gets crazier when you look at 5v5 tied games.

Players had the following differentials while tied:
Dahlin +5
Power +3
Samuelsson +7
Jokiharju -2
Lyubushkin +6
Bryson -11 (in about 230 minutes)
Stillman +3
Clague +3
Fitzgerald -5 (less than 100 minutes)

 

[TehDoak]

The cap space/ownership influence argument is neither here nor there to me. The team is being built the right way...the way it should have been the moment Eichel was drafted. I don't care how much influence comes from learning from those mistakes, vs KA taking a simple route, vs Pegula tightening his spending. FCS, be happy that the team is going hard in the right direction.

You'll have to provide some evidence that the team is being built the right way, historically, specifically in terms of spending.

Going back as far back as capfriendly goes (2015), it's rare to see teams straddle the cap floor like the Sabres did. The Coyotes have a few times with them taking on LTIR deals. The only cup winner to be close to the bottom of the league of payroll is the Avalanche. And even when they were 'near' the bottom, they were clearing the cap floor by 8-10M.

I can't think of a team during the cap era that has gone from using loop holes to spend below the cap to cup champs.