Ice Bowl Puts the "Desperation" in Desperation Hockey

Man, Buffalo, why so crazy? If you didn't want my family at the Ice Bowl you could have just said so, you know. Now I, like many poor WNYers, will be left out in the cold (or rather in the warm) this coming New Years Day when the Sabres play the Penguins at Ralph Wilson Stadium. I'm plenty depressed about this, because the timing for this game is perfect: three weeks after my 21st birthday (hello, tailgating!), and six days before I leave to spend six months in Europe (goodbye, hockey!). And the circumstances surrounding the selling of the tickets certainly doesn't help matters. I mean, why should Toronto fans (both of hockey and of baseball[?!?]) get to see this game, and not me? I realize it's a momentous, once-in-a-lifetime sort of thing that all sports fans, not just those of the participating teams, can enjoy, but why reserve tickets for them? Let them buy them (or not be able to buy them) just like everybody else. And then there are the people who picked up 15 extra tickets, expecting to make a huge profit off of them, which they undoubtedly will. I mean, good for them if they enjoy getting back the hard-earned money they spent on hockey tickets by gouging fellow fans for their hard-earned money, but there really should have been some kind of volume limit on tickets.

BUT there is a big bright side to this, and that bright side is, Buffalo, that we rule. We sold over 40,000 tickets to a game over three months from now in ten minutes. Those tickets were selling, as Heidi Klum would say, "like bagels." Really, really delicious bagels. Sure, some of those tickets were going to Toronto fans and scalpers, but judging by the sheer amount of whining from the locals I've been hearing (and heartily participating in), those factors only influenced when the tickets sold out (and probably not by very much), not if they would sell out. Thanks to us, the Sabres are now like the Backstreet Boys circa 1998, and that's awesome, right? I mean, they were practically bigger than Jesus! Seriously, as bummed as I am by my lack of ticket situation, I'm really happy and proud to know that Buffalo loves hockey this much. (Oh, and Jerry Sullivan, do you want to tell us now how unready the fans are for the season to start?)

In other news, Maxim Afinogenov is a devious Russian. The mystery surrounding Max's play and benching in the playoffs has finally been cleared up as Lindy explained that he smacked his head on the concrete while partaking in the team's soccer warm-up during the first round. This answers some questions for me, as I had been wondering if he maybe came back from his wrist injury too soon. But no, he was just showing off his sweet bicycle-kicking skills. Or perhaps slipping on a banana peel. Silly, silly Max. For his part, he's sure he has no idea what everyone's talking about. "Injury? What do you mean injury? Look, I am fine, I will show you. I will do a back flip!" Max, maybe next year you should wear a helmet during those soccer games.

In the News: Derek Roy Got Hella Paid

Despite the fact that I still haven't written about Vanek's mega-contract (I'm clearly not committed to being the best non-professional Sabres blogger I can be. What would Ryan Miller think?), I feel the need to go on record and say I'm really psyched about keeping Roy in town for the next six years. The $24 million price tag is a little less than ideal, but given the current state of the market, it's hardly unreasonable. (The fact that a four million dollar cap hit for a player like Roy isn't unreasonable is thoroughly disturbing, but that's a different blog post [which will probably never happen {sorry, Ryan!}]) In any case, I'm just relieved that we didn't have to suffer through arbitration, where it's entirely possible Roy could've come out with a comparable award, but over a two year period instead of six. My feeling is, it may seem like a lot of money for him as of now, but I'm fairly confident that midway through the contract it'll at least be a fair deal, if not a steal. He's shown tons of potential over the past couple of seasons, both as an offensive play-maker, and as a defensive center, and I think he can only get better. He's also a good penalty killer, which, let's be honest, isn't exactly something the Sabres can let walk out the door right now. Sure, he's small, and league-wide he's known more for his diving and whining than his point-scoring, but he's scrappy, and he still has time to grow up. 24 isn't exactly 14, but it's not 34 either, and on a team looking for players to step up (What? The Sabres have recently lost leadership? Really?), I feel pretty good about Derek's chances to be one of those guys. He may not get a letter, but with his big fat contract, he's still got a lot to prove. And as a 5'9", 186-pound guy trying to make it in the NHL, I like to think he's had plenty of practice at proving himself.

I have to say the best part of this deal, for me, is what it says about where the front office's heads are. Since July 1st they've been imploring fans to stick with them, promising that losing Drury and Briere would seem worth it, once it allowed us to lock up our young talent long term. I, for one, believed them from the beginning, but Roy's contract, as well as Vanek's (even though it wasn't exactly what they had in mind) shows that they're not afraid to put their money where their mouth is. And now they're saying they're going to be working on extending Brian Campbell's contract during the season? I like where this is headed.

I listened to Schopp and the Bulldog this afternoon, and I had a couple of thoughts. Since I haven't quite reached the stage of hockey desperation where I'm willing to call in to the local sports station and risk making a fool of myself, I'm just going to purge all those thoughts here. Because what is a blog, really, if not a place to dump all the thoughts no one else wants to/should have to listen to? First of all, there was a lot of talk about Roy's status with the Buffalo fan base. The gist was that so far this off-season the Sabres have lost two huge fan-favorites, and in return they've signed, long term, two players with big "buts" attached. As in, "Vanek's awesome, but he doesn't always go hard," or "Roy's alright, but what a diver!" I thought it was pretty telling that the last time I looked at the list of the top-selling jerseys, I noticed Roy's was in the top ten. Derek Roy, the third line center making less than $700,000, and not exactly known on a national scale, had a top-ten selling jersey. On the one hand this could just mean that Buffalo is so disgustingly obsessed with Slug merchandise that they'll buy anything (possible), but on some level, they have to love this guy, right? Another thing that was revisited over and over again, is how much trouble Derek is going to have managing the pressure of this contract without Chris Drury helping him out. Oh God, cue the eyeroll. Look, I know this contract is a big responsibility, and that Roy doesn't have the most disciplined reputation, but Drury was not this team's mother. I heard it a lot in the aftermath of the Vanek deal, too. "We're paying him how much? And Drury isn't around to remind him not to take a shift off? We're doooooomed!" I'm not saying Drury's famed leadership skills aren't valuable, but this team isn't just going to suddenly fall apart because he's not there to keep their shit together for them. They knew how to play hockey long before he came along, and I'm willing to bet they'll continue to do so long after he's gone. Honestly, people, Vanek and Roy are big boys. They can clean their rooms and brush their teeth all on their own (hear that, Andrew Peters?), and they'll learn to deal with living up to big bucks. You know why? Because that's their job. And if they happen to need help, well, that's what Lindy Ruff is for.

In other news, my sister has finally finished reading the new Harry Potter book, so updates will probably be pretty infrequent (more infrequent than usual, if you can believe it) over the next couple of days while I get my crack at it. I'm sorry, but a girl's got to have her priorities, and in my book Harry Potter > hockey off-season. (I hope that didn't offend anyone who's a huge fan of the off-season.)

In The News: SI.com

The idiocy is spreading. Since I'm fed up with what the Buffalo News has to, uh, "offer," I've been cruising the internets periodically looking for hockey tidbits. (Hey, I'm ridding myself of addiction one step at a time. If hockey news were nicotine, I would be in the second-patch stage right now.) Yesterday I landed on this, and I remembered why I vowed to quit in the first place. That's right, some genius is trying to say that the Rangers and the Flyers et al. stockpiling players is something to rejoice, no matter who you are. Apparently I've been thinking about the free agent situation all wrong, because this is a win for everyone involved: big market fans get to watch their teams succeed, small market fans get to continue hating the big markets with renewed passion, and the NHL gets more popular because "It's the presence of teams that are as rich in tradition as they are in talent that makes a sport compelling." And, honestly, who's not happy with that? Um, maybe fans who would rather watch their own "traditionless" teams do well than hate on other teams? Listen, I love a good rivalry. I'll admit hating the Senators made the playoffs more fun. But that's about hockey. This is about business, and "You have more money than me! That's not fair!" That kind of bitterness isn't fun for anyone. As for the whole popularity angle, it's no coincidence that I found my inner monologue screaming "I DON'T CARE!" after every paragraph. I don't care if Toronto is a more "marketable" team than Buffalo. I don't care if the Stanley Cup Final was beaten in the ratings by televised snail races. I literally could not care less if people like hockey or not. Especially if Cup after Cup for the Rangers and Red Wings is the only way to win them over. Yuck. By the by, this guy (I almost feel bad for not taking the time to jump tabs and look up his name, but I really don't care) cements his douchebag status by linking to a Bucky Gleason article. I'm not surprised to find they run in packs.

In other news:


David Beckham knows nothing says "I'm a slag-faced whore who left all my fans behind and turned my back on everything they believe in for boatloads of money" like the number 23.

In other, other news, today is my kid brother's eighteenth birthday. I feel old.

In the News: Bucky Gleason Needs to be Slapped

Okay, there's been overwhelming amounts of Sabres news out there lately, but nothing I particularly wanted to touch on. Can you blame me? Most of it revolves around what's quickly becoming a he-said, she-said blame game over the loss of the two co-captains, and all roads lead back to Darcy Regier. Drury and Briere are gone? Blame Darcy. Zubrus signs with the Devils? Blame Darcy. Numminen re-signs for the same money he did last off-season? Blame Darcy. We didn't win the Cup last year? All Darcy's doing. Your garbage disposal is clogged? That damn Darcy stuck his spoon down there again!

Somewhere, the forgotten Tom Donahoe is going, all Jan Brady: "Darcy, Darcy, Darcy!"

The only thing close to positive press that the Sabres have been getting in Buffalo (aside from the coverage of the Numminen signing--which I view as good news, even if the pricetag's a little high, and it means Paetsch staying in the 7th spot) was an editorial yesterday by Allen Wilson, which boiled down to little more than "Buffalonians, you may talk tough with all your promises of rallies and boycotts, but at heart, you're all just gluttons for punishment. So you'll gladly dig into whatever shit Regier ends up serving you next season, whether you like it or not." Not exactly heartwarming stuff.

And then came this morning, when Bucky Gleason decided to plumb new depths of putridity in journalism. He took a perfectly lovely story about Todd Marchant bringing the Cup he won in Anaheim back to WNY to celebrate, and twisted it to fit his latest favorite game of taking a dump on Sabres management. If you read the front page of the story, you'd hardly know it was written by Gleason at all, since it's a relatively unbiased and sentimental recount of all the various ways players have used the Cup in their alloted 24 hours, and a recap of the journey Marchant took to get his day with Stanley.

But turn to the second page, and you'll find Bucky picks up on his own cues, and takes it upon himself to gripe irrationally about Darcy Regier. Because, you know, no one else in Buffalo is doing that job adequately enough already. Apparently Bucky's strategy is just to throw every bit of blame he can think of at management and see what sticks. It's true that they let Drury and Briere slip through their fingers, but we have yet to see whether that's as big of a mistake as everyone is claiming. My prediction: No. The rest of the accusations Bucky flings at Darcy range from the merely uncorroborated (losing McKee, Dumont, and Grier was such a huge blow that we had to suffer through a 113-point, President's Trophy season) to the absurd (Darcy should have forgone signing Numminen in favor of bringing up Sekera--a kid from Rochester whose name I've never even heard before).

The fact that all of this criticism is framed around Marchant's Cup-winning tale just serves Bucky's greater purpose of showing how Anaheim does everything right and Buffalo does everything wrong. I don't want to take anything away from the Ducks, because they certainly deserved their championship, but they win one Cup and all of the sudden they're the be-all, end-all of organizations? Give me a break. Obviously Burke is a very capable GM, but just because Regier has a different style doesn't make him incompetent. If the recipe for a Stanley Cup were as simple as taking a proactive approach to player signings, I think people smarter than Bucky Gleason would have figured it out a long time ago. Some might say that more important than putting the right players together is making sure those players show up to play every night. But, then, such people would be claiming that Drury and Briere are capable of doing wrong, wouldn't they? And we can't have that. They're on the fast track to canonization.

So who is the authority Bucky uses to prove a free-agent-happy GM is the key to winning? Todd Marchant's dad. That's right, a player's father. Now, I'm sure he knows more than a thing or two about hockey, and he may even get to experience the business side of it a little through his son, but I'm willing to bet even he opened the paper this morning, saw Bucky's declaration of "Peter Marchant For General Manager," and said, "What a headcase."

Bucky, no matter what you say, Darcy deserves his job. It's the fact that you remain employed that never ceases to amaze me.

In the News: Buffalo News and LGS

It's been a couple of banner days (no pun intended) in the front page sports news department lately. Yesterday, Buffalo News' Bucky Gleason took a crack at playing GM for a day, and figured out a way to solve all of Buffalo's problems. Well, the ones related to hockey, anyway. He found a way to keep Drury, Briere, and Vanek in town while staying under a budget of $44 million. Larry Quinn has already stated that the Sabres' actual budget will be more than that, but no one knows by how much. We only know that they won't be pushing the cap, which has yet to be set. (Dear NHL: Please get on this.) Of course, in Bucky's plan this meant saying goodbye to some other players, namely Afinogenov, Spacek, Numminen, and Zubrus. Except for Spacek, I would really like to hold on to all of those guys, but if it means keeping Drury, Briere, and Vanek, I'd be willing to let them go. The plan also involves bringing a substantial number of players up out of Rochester, which I'm not too keen on. Sure, we did that last year, only bringing in Spacek from outside the organization, but I wouldn't count on it for a second straight season. I'd be really afraid of injuries, especially given our history the past two seasons. On the other hand, Paetsch in the top 6 defensemen! I agree 100%! Other than that, it's a pretty sound plan which incorporates fair contracts for all the players. Of course, it will never ever happen. But it gave me something to pretend about for a little while.

Today there was a breakdown of the Sabres' RFAs on the front page, along with some decidedly no-news news about the draft. As if we don't have enough of a headache already with trying to keep the top two UFAs in the league, we need to be reminded that we could also lose the top RFA in Vanek. Apparently, the hands-off approach toward other teams' RFAs has gone out of style, and now poaching everyone else's young talent is the name of the game. I'm still confident that the Sabres will match any offer (within reason--at some point the draft pick compensation gets pretty lucrative) made to Vanek. But we're almost assuredly going to need to pay more than we wanted to for him. I pray the rest of the league keeps thinking Derek Roy sucks and doesn't make him any offers. I know I yell at the guy a lot, but I still want him here. The rest of the RFAs--Paille, Paetsch, Peters--I'm not worried about. I don't think anyone else particularly wants them, and they'll be cheap to keep. As far as the draft goes, the Sabres don't have any first round picks, though we have the first pick of the second round. Still, any of the players drafted won't be seen in Buffalo for another 3-5 years. See? No-news news.

Then, I swung over to LetsGoSabres.com, my other Sabres news source. They reported the same news about the RFAs, that the Sabres had made qualifying offers to Vanek, Roy, Paille, Peters, and Paetsch. The process is underway, there. And then I read this:

"Two independent sources have told LGS this week that it appears more than likely that Chris Drury's days in Buffalo are over. Both sources believe Drury is looking to test the open market. And according to both sources, there is very strong reason to believe that the center will most likely wind up on the Pacific Coast where his offseason home is located."

And part of my soul died. It's real now. Drury's going to leave, and I don't know if I can handle it. I guess I had just assumed, throughout the season, that if only one of our co-captains were going to be around next season, it would be Chris. So I gently and gradually phased my love for Danny out, getting ready for him to be gone. And now I'm having to make this quick emotional turn-around. It's nuts. What's even worse is that it's looking more and more like Drury doesn't want to stay. That it's not a question of money, he just doesn't want to be in Buffalo anymore. And... Ouch. That hurts. I can't even put into words how that makes me feel as a fan, without sounding really really pathetic. But it's like, that's not "just business," that's betrayal.

But I'm getting ahead of myself, here. Once everything's final and official, then I can start bitching about it, I guess. Until then, all I can do is wait. Wait, and go crazy.

In the News: Buffalo News

Somewhere between the early '90s and now, I've gone from rebelling against my ardent sports-fan parents by stomping around my house chanting, creatively, "Nail the Bills to the ground!" during football games, to reaching reflexively for the sports section of the paper every morning, looking for hockey news. This is a habit that has turned more than one promising Frosted Flakes-filled breakfast sour with disappointment in the past week. Since the Buffalo News ran the photo of Scott Neidermayer hoisting the Stanley Cup, there has been nothing but 50-word blurbs entitled "Red Wings re-sign Chelios" and "Pyatt to stay in Vancouver" in the NHL corner for days on end. There was even one rough morning where the existence of hockey went unrecognized completely. So imagine my delight when, this morning, I pulled out the sports section and found not one, but two (!) stories about the Sabres on the front page. Neither one was the story I'd been waiting for (namely the one in which Ryan Miller sticks to his passive-aggressive guns and reassures the world at large that he's oh-so-happy for his Cup-winning baby brother), but they did bring up some other interesting points and worries.

The main headline states that this coming season the Sabres will look to enter "goal-prevention mode", and turn their backs on their high-scoring ways. Darcy Regier and Lindy Ruff are both quoted in the article saying, effectively, that the Sabres will have to stop counting on goals to win them games and work on playing the other side of the puck if they want to advance beyond the Eastern Conference Final. This is somewhat troubling to me. First of all, if they think they can build a defensive-minded team without stifling some of their explosive young talent, or making some serious roster re-arrangements, they're nuts. And secondly, are they really trying to say that it was lack of "goal-prevention" that lost them a shot at the Cup, when Ryan Miller was consistently ten times better than any other Sabre on the ice during the Ottawa series? I'm not saying that the goaltender should be the be-all, end-all of keeping the other team off the scoreboard (and somewhere, Ryan is nodding vigorously), but surely, when a goalie stands on his head and your team still can't take advantage of it, the problem is offensive and not defensive play. It seems to me like Ruff and Regier are trying to cover up the fact that the explosive, 308-goal-scoring Sabres fell asleep in the post season, by saying that a team capable of scoring 308 goals in the regular season is not built to win the Stanley Cup. Little bit of a cop-out, I feel.

On the bright side, they did mention that special teams is a concern of priority (good to know they're not blind and deaf), and that the Sabres could potentially get a specialist added to the coaching staff. I think I speak for all of Buffalo when I say "Yes, please!" Ruff still claims special teams is an "easy correction," which baffles me. If it's so easy, Lindy, why didn't you correct it, say, 1,000 agonizing power plays ago? But then it was reiterated that both coach and GM took substantial paycuts in renewing their contracts with the Sabres and for that (even though I've just spent the past two paragraphs hating on them) I have to love them and thank them. They built this team from the ground up, and it just wouldn't be the same without them.

The second front-page article is a commentary by Bob DiCesare about how the administration is really dragging its feet in trying to re-sign Drury and Briere. And, seriously, what is up with that? Do we not want them? Does our new "defensive strategy" frown on guys who score goals? Did they both suffer career-ending injuries on the golf course that I don't know about? Get with the program, Darcy. You're costing me valuable sleep time here. Also, DiCesare agrees with me that the policy the Sabres have of not starting contract negotiations until the end of the season is idiotic. If they had just signed Briere to a multi-year deal before the '06 playoffs like he wanted, we would have Danny locked away for about $5 mil. and we'd only have to deal with Chris right now. But instead I have to deal with a co-captian ulcer.

Still, I can't help but have faith that everything will turn out okay. I was similarly doom-and-gloom about the future of the Sabres last off season, and it really couldn't have turned out better. Sure, I was very blue (get it?) when Jay McKee left, and at points over the season I found myself longing for J.P. Dumont's scoring and Mike Grier's toughness, but the truth is that by the end of October, I had fallen head over heels in love with this 2006-2007 team. Here's hoping they can work that magic again.