You can choose to stick your head in the sand with hope and prayers that things work out or you can look at things for what they are because this team is following the same "plan" they've been down the last almost 15 years. They want to retool on the fly adding "depth" instead of taking their lumps for a season or two and obtaining high end talent. We know how retools on the fly end, they've been doing it for over a decade now. They'll be first round fodder for the teams that choose to build correctly soon enough. But I sincerely wish your hopes and prayers that this team turns into a contender by doing the same things they've done previously all the best.
There’s no stick your head in the sand here. Simple fact is none of us have any control over what happens anyway - we don’t run the team. I just don’t see how incessantly complaining nonstop about every decision to which none of us have 0 input is beneficial. That doesn’t mean agreeing or being on board with everything, so sticking your “head in the sand” doesn’t really apply when you have 0 influence. You either follow the decisions, because you're a fan, and hope they're the right ones, or endlessly complain about the same things over and over. The outcome from a team perspective is exactly the same. It's also ok to acknowledge the team is being stupid and still hope that things work out, but everybody here speaks as if they're completely brain dead and unless they do everything 100% in accordance to the viewpoint of this board, that they're total morons and don't know how to build a winning team - because many of us have clearly built winning, professional organizations.
The reality is that we, as fans (myself included), assume that a series of (correct decisions - read: aligned with *my* point of view) directly leads to a championship. Nobody actually acknowledges that luck plays a
huge part in this and that most GMs are more or less the same (outliers not withstanding). "Excellent" GMs have never won, and "terrible" GMs have won the same. Same for coaches.
So swinging wildly to one extreme or another of fandom just seems fruitless.
A simple example: Flyers had the No.1 ranked prospect pool during Hextall's tenure. How has that worked out now that they are mostly 'developed?' Buffalo has had the number 1 prospect pool for years, but their two best Cs are still players they traded for. And their top picks put up numbers and lead them nowhere.
They resigned Seeler 5 days before the trade deadline, Briere didn't want to even consider trading him. He wasn't even willing to wait until after the trade deadline to see what he could have gotten.
I think this is where a lot of issue stem from, IMO of the TDL. People are assuming that Nick Seeler, a dude (who is severely dimished in this thread personally) is suddenly going to garner a 'high value asset' at the TDL. You can believe that if you wish, but I would have guessed if a high value asset was offered, he'd be gone.
But you're not talking about a guy who's worth a 4th or a 5th and suddenly grabs a 1st because it's the TDL. You may get a bit more (4th to 3rd) but it's fans dreaming on what the values of players actually are.
Maybe, just maybe, DB saw that he's not going to get much and that waiting wouldn't be worth it. Or not. I don't know.
I do know, that this board assumes he's an idiot and never bothered to check. That's sorta the default - 'they're stupid and don't know anything.' And that's the part I find a little frustrating. It could be true, but we can't do anything about it. We'll find out anyway, in time.
