Did Tim Murray destroy our rebuild?

[slip]

Agree. I was just listing who Darcy drafted that are on the team. I hated Darcy and felt he was fired 4 years too late.

I hear you. Your post just got me thinking about Regier's actual drafting ability, or lack thereof.

 

[dotcommunism]

Letting Sekera go was also a huge mistake. Look at the Oilers without Sekera. Jame always brought out how good of a dman he was, and I believe he was right. Sekera was/is a legit top 2 dman when he isn't injured.

Should be noted that dumping Sekera was a Regier move.

 

[Chainshot]

Should be noted that dumping Sekera was a Regier move.

And it should be viewed as one of the tankiest of tank moves of the tank.

 

[Derg12]

Murray was the final nail in the coffin. This franchise was dead-man walking since July 1, 2007.

 

[Sabre the Win]

What offense? He refuses to pass the puck out of our own zone. He sucks

Well when you base your ideology off of one season where we are the worst of the worst and throw away every season prior to the current one then there is no talking logic or reason to you.

I can't help you but please stop watching the Sabres this year and step away from the ledge. You are only hurting yourself.

 

[Aladyyn]

Murray said in an interview that he wanted to build us like the Kings. I guess “models” matter as much as the GM uses them as motivation to make roster decisions.

I mean, being the best possession team in the league every year is a good thing to strive for.

 

[Icicle]

Well when you base your ideology off of one season where we are the worst of the worst and throw away every season prior to the current one then there is no talking logic or reason to you.

I can't help you but please stop watching the Sabres this year and step away from the ledge. You are only hurting yourself.

I watch every game. Risto throws possession away more than anyone I’ve ever watched. And it’s not because he’s pressured. He’s lazy

 

[slip]

And it should be viewed as one of the tankiest of tank moves of the tank.

"Hey Terrance, remember that idea when I said we could get to hockey heaven via the Ville Leino Express? Hold my beer, sir, while I now explain to you the virtues of trading Andrej Sekera for a second rounder and the logic of how in order to get to heaven, one must first pass through tank hell."

 

[DJN21]

"Hey Terrance, remember that idea when I said we could get to hockey heaven via the Ville Leino Express? Hold my beer, sir, while I now explain to you the virtues of trading Andrej Sekera for a second rounder and the logic of how in order to get to heaven, one must first pass through tank hell."

Oh christ I had forgotten about leino lol...goddamit. I can remember like it was yesterday grilling in the backyard on a beautiful sunny day praying brad Richards would surprise me and choose buffalo and instead the news came down...Ville Leino for our much needed center solution....

 

[Cuphead]

John Rigas.

john rigas led to the golisano era, where the team fell apart. when pegula bought the team, he (we) thought it just needed a coat of paint, and maybe some new carpets. but in reality the foundation was crumbling.

you cant blame golisano, he did what he said he would. keep the team in buffalo, until a real owner could take over. he cut costs in coaches, trainers, facilities, scouting, he just kept them above water.

pegula should have came in and knocked the house down. instead he tried to shore up the team, and ride it out. in hindsight, that was wrong.

none of murrays trades are particularly egregious.

 

[Clock]

I wasn't a fan of the Lehner or Kane trades (or that Kane was still on the team after all of his drama), but "destroying" the rebuild? No.

 

[Moskau]

Find me a team that completely tore down a team the way Regier did that was competitive within 5 or 6 years. People need to stop looking at teams like Toronto or even New Jersery. Those teams kept a large portion of their rosters and re-tooled. I'm talking about a complete tear down. Columbus may be the closest thing and look how long that took them. Having a (good) coach for more than a few months would also go a long way.

If this team is terrible in 2020 then yes Murray destroyed the rebuild. Until then have some patience.

 

[Buff15Sabres]

No he didn't destroy the rebuild.

He completely obliterated it.

 

[Snippit]

Find me a team that completely tore down a team the way Regier did that was competitive within 5 or 6 years. People need to stop looking at teams like Toronto or even New Jersery. Those teams kept a large portion of their rosters and re-tooled. I'm talking about a complete tear down. Columbus may be the closest thing and look how long that took them. Having a (good) coach for more than a few months would also go a long way.

If this team is terrible in 2020 then yes Murray destroyed the rebuild. Until then have some patience.

This makes no sense.

Murray used valuable assets to accelerate the rebuild - he wanted to speed up the process of the typical rebuild. The idea of waiting til 2020 to evaluate him (5 years after he made his main moves - more than the length of Kane's contract and most of ROR's) is flat out ridiculous, considering he intended this team to be good right now.

 

[Moskau]

This makes no sense.

Murray used valuable assets to accelerate the rebuild - he wanted to speed up the process of the typical rebuild. The idea of waiting til 2020 to evaluate him (5 years after he made his main moves - more than the length of Kane's contract and most of ROR's) is flat out ridiculous, considering he intended this team to be good right now.

Rebuilds of this magnitude take 5+ seasons. If the Sabres are still terrible after guys like Nylander, Guhle, Asplund etc graduate then you can say Murray destroyed up the rebuild. But the likely reality is the Sabres would be just as terrible if he didn't make any trades. If Murray made absolutely no moves people would be saying the same thing so it's almost as if there's an agenda.

 

[Snippit]

Rebuilds of this magnitude take 5+ seasons. If the Sabres are still terrible after guys like Nylander, Guhle, Asplund etc graduate then you can say Murray destroyed up the rebuild. But the likely reality is the Sabres would be just as terrible if he didn't make any trades. If Murray made absolutely no moves people would be saying the same thing so it's almost as if there's an agenda.

I agree that rebuilds of this magnitude take a long time.

Which is exactly why trying to accelerate the rebuild was so incredibly stupid. We wasted a ton of assets and now our timeline is out of whack.

There's no agenda - a lot of people here were big Murray fans. But we are literally witnessing the consequences of his bad moves.

Not to mention the fact that Nylander is not looking good at all when we all thought we were getting Sergachev, who's tearing it up.

 

[Buffaloed]

Complete and utter nonsense. There is only one person who is responsible for the Sabres' failure to build a winning organization and his name is Terry Pegula.

We lived in fear of losing our teams for years then made a deal with the devil to keep them. In exchange we got the worst owner in professional sports. Terry Pegula will rewrite the record books for losing.

 

[valet]

We lived in fear of losing our teams for years then made a deal with the devil to keep them. In exchange we got the worst owner in professional sports. Terry Pegula will rewrite the record books for losing.

I see what you mean. Pegula needs to know his place better.

I think it's a bit extreme to say he'll rewrite the books for losing though.

To me, between both the Bills and Sabres, it looks like he is learning from his mistakes.

Not trying to be too apologistic because I think he's been too involved. But don't forget, he was a rookie too, at a much more significant position of power.

 

[OkimLom]

I agree that rebuilds of this magnitude take a long time.

Which is exactly why trying to accelerate the rebuild was so incredibly stupid. We wasted a ton of assets and now our timeline is out of whack.

There's no agenda - a lot of people here were big Murray fans. But we are literally witnessing the consequences of his bad moves.

Not to mention the fact that Nylander is not looking good at all when we all thought we were getting Sergachev, who's tearing it up.

Let's say June 26th Murray came away from the Draft with just Eichel, the Myers/Stafford/Bogo/Kane, the ROR and Lehner deals never happened(though there would be a Stafford move since he was a UFA to be). Bylsma is our head coach. Who is in our lineup for Buffalo that could take the pressure off of Eichel as being the go to center? If we're stripping Buffalo of the accelerated rebuild pieces, we still have the 1st round picks we received, who is ready to be in the league 2 years after being drafted in 2015? What players do we have that are allowing these young guys to come in and become secondary scoring pieces?

As for the rebuild portion of this team; there were always 4 key points in rebuilding this franchise:

1. Get High quality players through the draft to become your core pieces. Done with drafting Grigorenko, Girgensons, Risto, Zadorov, Reinhart and Eichel.

2. Rebuild this roster so that we can become competitive and these young guys can ride the coat tails of the vets so they can learn to win. To do so, you need high character and/or quality vets on this team to teach them to be professionals(See: Legwand, ROR, Bogo, Gionta, Gorges, Moulson, Kane). IMO, I didn't see any sort of plan from Darcy to do this part or any evidence he was thinking about this part. Tim had this in mind and made moves to make this so. Botts followed this rule as well with the roster moves of getting Scandella, Pominville, Pouilet. You could do this by being patient and hoping guys become available via free agency and overpay (and screw yourself in the future with horrible contracts) for them to entice them to come here, or over pay in assets(like draft picks or prospects). IMO, I think Tim, focused a lot of his energy and time on this part before he was going to focus on the next key point.

3. Rebuild the Prospect pool. This team had nothing in the pipeline after years of being stripped of resources(Thanks Golisano) for drafting purposes. This prospect pool needed to be rebuilt itself. Tim tried to do that with his picks that he had. Botts seems to follow the same idea. Tim focused on more LONGER term projects in his drafting style(longer to develop, leads to rounded out professionals who can then learn the professional habits in the AHL, and then could then be brought up, Botts, remains to be seen how his drafting style is but seeing as he wants guys to learn in the AHL seems to have a similar idea. The difference between the two guys seem to be the level of focus they have on Rochester. Tim seemed to want to focus on having guys develop their skills AWAY from Rochester so HIS guys were not ready yet to be in the AHL. He didn't make it seem like Rochester was a priority yet(I believe we all can fault him on that judgement). Botts cares about Rochester and shows it.

4. Have ALL facets of the Organization follow a set of standards from the very bottom to the big club. This entails that there was a chain of communication from Buffalo to Rochester and lower levels. Players would be taught the same system so it would be as seamless as possible. The quicker the players catch on, the more likely they would play faster and would be more confident in each other, as it would become 2nd nature to them. Standards would be set, and the expectations throughout the franchise would be well known by future players. What's important in this aspect is the coaching hires, and their ability to communicate, teach, and hold the players accountable on and off the ice. This part is very important to have, and one would think THIS would mean that a veteran coach would need to be hired to help the young players gain knowledge and experience in the league. Then if Buffalo needed to change their coach, they would have mature and well-taught players that would have standards from the higher ups of what is expected professionally from them. The only thing that would change is the system of the game itself, but the basic understanding and skills would be there to be used in that new system. The effort, because of the accountability would be there as well.

I believe these are very important, and key points to any team rebuilding. What ruins these rebuilds is impatience, poor coaching, poor quality of players, and ownership not setting standards for a team. I think we have a decent collection of talent. Not world beaters or superstars, but guys who can, when working together, create a competitive team. We have seen it in the past, when these guys work together, they are a decent team. Vegas is doing pretty good for a group of guys who are just good enough to play in the league. With that said, there are a few players Buffalo has acquired that have not worked out, but that comes with every team in the league and at the end of the day is the easiest part of fixing a "broken rebuild". However, I believe Buffalo has failed in the patience department(firing 2 GMs and 3 coaches in just under 5 years), the coaching department(Rolston - Horrible, Nolan - decent effort, building a system lacked, Bylsma - lack of communication on his end, poor system utilization, no accountability), and the standards for this organization(Terry holds responsibility for this).


Sorry for the Wall of text.

 

[1972]

One thing being over looked. Had Murray been patient instead of trying the accelerate the rebuild we are most definitely getting a better prospect then Nylander in 2016, could have been another top 4 pick.

 

[Snippit]

I also want to say that Tyler Myers is a quality top 4 defenceman at the moment

 

[Buffaloed]

When you get past all the doom and gloom, the Sabres are only a great goalie away from being respectable.

 

[Dreakon13]

Well hell man, since everyone that comes to Buffalo is instantly garbage, why field a team at all? Fold the franchise, and have a dispersal draft so these guys can actually live up to their potential.

In hopes that it isn't that way forever?

 

[Push Dr Tracksuit]

He built an outdated team and neglected the defense. He was trying to win in 2010.

ya, I'll side here, I won't fault a GM for making moves, but I'll certainly fault him for building a roster that was better suited to play the Bruins than the Penguins

Oh, I'll keep banging the defense drum until there isn't a person left that says BPA.

 

[ek93]

Most competitive teams in the NHL are currently reaping the harvest from shrewd 2nd, 3rd, and 4th round picks taken 3-4 years ago. The guys you mention above have brought next to nothing to the big club. How much more competitive would we be if one of those wingers was on pace to score 25 goals, or if Ulmark was called up and performed lights out? Where is that defenseman taken in the 2nd round working his way through the pipeline and ready to step into a bottom pairing or even a top 4 role? (sorry Jake, you suck). That's the thing with Regier and his scouts: I don't care how many picks you give these guys, they were awful at finding NHL caliber talent after the first round (and even that round presented challenges, most recently thinking Girgensons and Grigorenko could solve our center problem).

Couldn't have said it better myself. Don't forget about good ole Joel Armia in the first round as well.

I have hated our drafts for as long as I can remember, and it doesn't really matter who our GM is. Nobody outside of our recent first round picks has done anything of any importance. Bailey is not special, Baptiste is not special, you can go on and on. Hell even today, Nylander over Sergachev makes me mad whenever I think about it, and we haven't even really seen Nylander yet.

Almost every other team in the league can find decent hockey players outside of the first round except us. Just go on hockeydb.com and look at our draft history. It's truly astounding. Some of the guys we've taken in the 2nd-4th rounds are truly incredible. Eric Cornel, Vaclav Karabacek, Brycen Martin, Justin Kea, Dan Catenacci, Colin Jacobs, Jerome Leduc, Matt Mackenzie, etc. The list of horrible players we draft just goes on and on. Where's our Jake Guentzel or Brayden Point in the 3rd round? Oh yeah we don't draft small talented players because they don't fit our "model".