Posts Tagged ‘Derek Roy’
Thoughts on an Amazing Regular Season
Wednesday, April 6th, 2011 12:23 pm
As the 2010-2011 campaign heads into it's final two games, I find it impossible to call this season anything other than the greatest regular season in recent memory, at least it has been in my nearly two-decades long run of following this team. When I say "greatest," I think you all know what I mean. This has nothing to do with wins and losses, although those certainly play a role, it has to do with the ride, with the storylines, with characters revealing themselves as something we thought they would never be, with heroic characters entering the stage at exactly the right time, the time when we needed them most. Consider the following: -The team started the season 3-9-2 and found itself not only at the bottom of the standings, but at the bottom of ESPN.com's power rankings. I remember the line after the teams position was "Oh-No-Buff-a-lo."
Not a Moment Too Soon
Wednesday, December 1st, 2010 5:02 pm
Which leads us to the current stale team at HSBC Arena. Now Pegula hasn't met with the other NHL owners (presumably next week), and an announcement isn't expected til near New Year's at the earliest. There will be plenty of time to speculate what's going to happen personnel-wise once the keys to the owner's box are handed over. But one thing is for certain: if the change in attitude makes winning paramount, that will likely clash directly with Darcy Regier. The inability to trade prospects, the habit of holding onto players who we all know will never become what the organization hoped they will, the consistent overvaluing of the players on the ice in trade negotiations, the inability to understand the term "addition by subtraction," of being loyal to the wrong guys and disloyal to the wrong guys needs to stop. Claiming Tim Connolly is a top 20 center in the NHL, that needs to stop. Crying at the end of the season about wanting to bring a cup to Buffalo then making Rob Niedermayer your big addition, that cannot stand. Drew Stafford should have made his KHL debut long ago, along with Patrick Lalime. Tim Connolly...okay let me espouse on Connolly:
The Reasonable Argument for ‘Shooooooot,’ and Other Observations
Wednesday, December 9th, 2009 9:21 pm
Far too often these challenges result in a simple turnover in the offensive zone or a drop pass to no one. Couple this with our defensemen's penchant for playing incredibly far up on the rush, and suddenly the teams bad habit of giving up more than a couple odd man rushes a game seems to make sense. Myers, certainly the defenseman with the best nose for the puck (but still learning what to do when he actually has the puck) has been a repeat offender this season, attempting numerous drop passes in the neutral zone which more than once have resulted in Miller finding the puck behind him. These mental lapses are not the result of poor play or taking a night off- though those certainly exacerbate the situation- but simply a predictable result of gambling one too many times.