Shocking: Lindy Ruff isn’t a good coach, and the owner is the problem in Buffalo

Buff15Sabres

Registered User
Mar 23, 2017
379
436
I became a bit of a Sabres fan back in the Briere/Drury days. I'd really like for them to be good again.

Maybe Kevyn Adams is the wrong GM again. But you can't fire the GM every 2 or 3 years, or no plan ever gets implemented. And they've gone through a number of coaches with similar results. The only coach I think was a real dud was Ralph Kreuger. Ruff is a bit of a dinosaur, but he's also had a great history in Buffalo.

Can Sabres fans enlighten me a bit on the Pegula situation. I always hear that they meddle in the process, or that Adams is just a yes man. But what meddling/forced-decisions have actually happened? Aside from the Eichel drama, that was poorly handled by everyone involved, I don't know of anything Terry Pegula has done to interfere.

You're probably never going to get a GM to go on the record saying "The owner forced me to make that bad move", but there's been a few bad decisions that owner interference seems highly likely.

1) Trading Ryan O'Reilly for scraps a few hours before he was due to be paid a $7 million bonus

2) Jeff Skinner 8x10 full NMC contract

In addition to meddling, he's also been quite cheap since covid hit in 2020. Fired almost the entire scouting department and we're routinely at the bottom of the league in terms of salary cap. Two different seasons we had to acquire a guy on LTIRetirement just to hit the cap floor.
 
  • Like
Reactions: banks

Yatzhee

Registered User
Aug 5, 2010
8,883
2,365
Lindy had taken teams to the playoffs, teams without star players, but made star players, the 05 to.07 Sabres for example.
Lindy's not the issue.

The owner however, ya, he's a HUGE problem. The one constant through it all.
 

5 Minute Major

Sabres Fan
Sponsor
Dec 4, 2010
7,503
4,650
Vestal, NY
Lindy Ruff is a good coach. A week ago the team was in 3rd place and playing their best hockey since the last time Ruff was in Buffalo. (Not saying a lot but still true none the less)

At some point the focus has to be on how the franchise is being ran into the ground by Terry Pegula.
 

Miri

Lavinengefahr!
Aug 13, 2013
2,005
807
Slovakia
I've seen teams come back from 5-0 as well.

It happens, although rare.
Yes, and that team was…. avalanche😛
In 1999 against Florida.

You're probably never going to get a GM to go on the record saying "The owner forced me to make that bad move", but there's been a few bad decisions that owner interference seems highly likely.

1) Trading Ryan O'Reilly for scraps a few hours before he was due to be paid a $7 million bonus

2) Jeff Skinner 8x10 full NMC contract

In addition to meddling, he's also been quite cheap since covid hit in 2020. Fired almost the entire scouting department and we're routinely at the bottom of the league in terms of salary cap. Two different seasons we had to acquire a guy on LTIRetirement just to hit the cap floor.
Wasnt one of those scraps Tage Thompson?
 

Ad

Upcoming events

Ad

Ad