Roster Speculation part XXII

[Zman5778]

Our #1 D cant handle the workload, yet.

This is a FAR, FAR different thing than saying "The Sabres are a bad hockey team when Risto is on the ice".

Far different.

 

[Sabre Dance]

This is a FAR, FAR different thing than saying "The Sabres are a bad hockey team when Risto is on the ice".

Far different.

I don't really know what the difference is. 42% GF and 45% CF is bad.

 

[Der Jaeger]

Analytics gone bad.

Example: Using CF and GF to evaluate a 21 year old defenseman playing #1D minutes and role with Josh Gorges as his partner, no other defensive pairing to do heavy lifting, while the forwards don't sort themselves out into roles until half way through the season.

I'll hold any opinion of Ristolainen's growth until the end of this season. He'll likely have Kulikov as his partner and forwards are fairly established in proper roles at the start of the season.

 

[Sabre Dance]

Analytics gone bad.

Example: Using CF and GF to evaluate a 21 year old defenseman playing #1D minutes and role with Josh Gorges as his partner, no other defensive pairing to do heavy lifting, while the forwards don't sort themselves out into roles until half way through the season.

I'll hold any opinion of Ristolainen's growth until the end of this season. He'll likely have Kulikov as his partner and forwards are fairly established in proper roles at the start of the season.

I believe I said the team was bad, not Ristolainen. A better Ristolainen will make the players on the ice with him better. I don't believe Ristolainen has reached his potential yet. He needs to be better to handle that work load.

CF is a team stat IMO.

 

[Der Jaeger]

I believe I said the team was bad, not Ristolainen. A better Ristolainen will make the players on the ice with him better. I don't believe Ristolainen has reached his potential yet. He needs to be better to handle that work load.

CF is a team stat IMO.

You want to tell me its because of his work load? Go ahead, I would agree. Dont tell me its wrong. The Sabres are a bad hockey team when Risto is on the ice. He cant handle top competition yet, but thats a #1's job.

His development makes the defense better.

You should stop now before the hole gets too deep.

 

[Sabre Dance]

You should stop now before the hole gets too deep.

"The Sabres are a bad hockey team when Ristolainen is on the ice."

There is nothing wrong about what I said. Do you think they were a good hockey team when he was on the ice last year? At the start of last season they were.

 

[Der Jaeger]

"The Sabres are a bad hockey team when Ristolainen is on the ice."

There is nothing wrong about what I said. Do you think they were a good hockey team when he was on the ice last year? At the start of last season they were.

Is your only proof GF and CF?

 

[Beerz]

"The Sabres are a bad hockey team when Ristolainen is on the ice."

There is nothing wrong about what I said. Do you think they were a good hockey team when he was on the ice last year? At the start of last season they were.

This is such a stupid and disingenuous statement. In the grand scheme of things the Sabres were not a good hockey team at all last year because we were young and had some major holes.

The team would have been worse if Risto wasn't playing.


You have a knack of throwing out hyperbolic and even flat out wrong inflammatory statements and then trying to walk them back.

 

[Sabre Dance]

This is such a stupid and disingenuous statement. In the grand scheme of things the Sabres were not a good hockey team at all last year because we were young and had some major holes.

The team would have been worse if Risto wasn't playing.


You have a knack of throwing out hyperbolic and even flat out wrong inflammatory statements and then trying to walk them back.

I dont know if people are trying to tell me the team was good when Risto was on the ice or not?

 

[Beerz]

I dont know if people are trying to tell me the team was good when Risto was on the ice or not?

Because you're looking for a definite answer...which there isn't one. At times yes..at other times no...Some of those no times had nothing to do with Risto..same can be said of some of those yes times.

That's what happens when you try to boil **** down using your goofy numbers.

Most reasonable people who spent a fair amount of time watching the Sabres play would tell you the Sabres would have been a far worse team without Risto.

 

[Der Jaeger]

Because you're looking for a definite answer...which there isn't one. At times yes..at other times no...Some of those no times had nothing to do with Risto..same can be said of some of those yes times.

That's what happens when you try to boil **** down using your goofy numbers.

Most reasonable people who spent a fair amount of time watching the Sabres play would tell you the Sabres would have been a far worse team without Risto.

Exactly. It's context. Ristolainen was used as a #1 defender all year logging tons of ice time with an unsuitable partner in Gorges. The Sabres didn't have a truly reliable second pair that could take some of the tough minutes away consistently. O'Reilly did all the heavy defensive lifting for the forwards, even after the Foligno-Larsson-Gionta line became a thing.

The team, overall, didn't play well until over halfway through the season. By that time, Ristolainen looked fried from the usage over the first half. Same thing for O'Reilly.

So, yeah, Ristolainen's CF and GF look bad. In light of his usage, competition, the rest of the team, and how the season went, it's not surprising. Takes absolutely nothing away from the player.

 

[Sabre Dance]

Because you're looking for a definite answer...which there isn't one. At times yes..at other times no...Some of those no times had nothing to do with Risto..same can be said of some of those yes times.

That's what happens when you try to boil **** down using your goofy numbers.

Most reasonable people who spent a fair amount of time watching the Sabres play would tell you the Sabres would have been a far worse team without Risto.

Do I really sound like Im saying Risto is our problem? We use him like he is already a top 10 defenseman in the NHL. He is obviously not at a stage in his development to handle that for 82 games. I showed how the team is much better overall when Risto is playing at that level, which he was for about a quarter of the season to start. The Sabres were a top 12 corsi team when Risto was playing at that level.

ALL I am saying is if Risto develops into that player then our defense will be good.

The rest of the year Risto couldn't handle the workload. I think its fair to say overall they were a below average team when he was on the ice. I hope people understand that when he was on the ice it was vs top competition. Playing 25 minutes a night vs top competition is hard for anyone, Risto was doing it at 21 with little help. I believe he can develop into the type of player that carries a team defensively. I think he wants to be that player.

 

[Sabre the Win]

Risto still hasn't been signed do you think teams are throwing in offer sheets and or about to just to screw us?

Same with Girgensons. Maybe these players are trying to take us to the cleaners and they are just not worth that.

 

[NotABadPeriod]

Risto still hasn't been signed do you think teams are throwing in offer sheets and or about to just to screw us?

Same with Girgensons. Maybe these players are trying to take us to the cleaners and they are just not worth that.

No team is going to offer sheet either of those guys at this point. There's no amount that makes sense for another team that we wouldn't match.

 

[1972]

"The Sabres are a bad hockey team when Ristolainen is on the ice."

There is nothing wrong about what I said. Do you think they were a good hockey team when he was on the ice last year? At the start of last season they were.

Yawn

 

[Aapo]

"The Sabres were a bad hockey team even when Ristolainen was on the ice."

Fixed it for you.

 

[BuffaloKatanas]

Do I really sound like Im saying Risto is our problem? We use him like he is already a top 10 defenseman in the NHL. He is obviously not at a stage in his development to handle that for 82 games. I showed how the team is much better overall when Risto is playing at that level, which he was for about a quarter of the season to start. The Sabres were a top 12 corsi team when Risto was playing at that level.

ALL I am saying is if Risto develops into that player then our defense will be good.

The rest of the year Risto couldn't handle the workload. I think its fair to say overall they were a below average team when he was on the ice. I hope people understand that when he was on the ice it was vs top competition. Playing 25 minutes a night vs top competition is hard for anyone, Risto was doing it at 21 with little help. I believe he can develop into the type of player that carries a team defensively. I think he wants to be that player.

I'm just confused as to why you trying to connect Risto to the team being below average when he was on the ice. Like you said, the team was good when he was playing well in the beginning, but they tapered off when he couldn't handle the workload. Maybe (hopefully) he can do that for a full season. But what it sounds like is that bad team was good when Risto was playing well. When he wasn't as good, they played to their standard. I agree with the sentence that they were a below average team when he was on the ice, but I don't think him being on the ice influenced them being worse. If you took risto off the team for the beginning few games, the team would've been awful. You take him off at the end of the year and they would have been worse. Your sentence just makes it sound like risto was part of the problem.

 

[Ace]

I just want to be clear...the team was worse in the second half when he was playing...the half when they were a much better team...and he was still playing the hard minutes.

 

[Mit Yarrum]

The #1 problem with the Internet:

"So basically..."

 

[struckbyaparkedcar]

Aside from his run with Bogosian, Risto was not a good possession defenseman during the season. The team's run in the top half of shot attempts was because of score effects (a lot of early one-goal deficits) and playing Pysyk in the top four.

Additionally, the team can still leverage Rasmus as its #1D without exactly copying his role from last year. Either better teammates or a more tilted zone start ratio could really boost his numbers.

 

[Mit Yarrum]

We need a real #2 for Rasmus. Kulikov isn't an ideal #2 IMO, but he could fill the role better than anyone on this team. I think we'll see a better Risto next year.

 

[yahhockey]

Plus he's only 21(22 in oct) and three years into his nhl career. Generally it takes time to come in to your own as a defenceman. What are people's thoughts on seth jones although you would also have to consider if he was the second pairing un nashville and his quality of competition. It took Hedman a few years to figure things out. The only concern is how good Risto will become in a few years and less about a player that would see less ice time on most rosters.

 

[struckbyaparkedcar]

Switching up opportunity distribution is going to be the key moving forward.

Unless Risto is a top 20 dude next season, he's not going to succeed in his current role. None of this offseason's LHDs played those type of minutes to much aplomb save for Hamhuis, who had geographically excluded Buffalo. So our options are either: pay up for a legit #1D or shortlist shutdown guy (Hjalmarsson/Vlasic/Dumoulin/Tanev/etc), bank on exponential growth from the kid, or rethink deployment strategy.

 

[Sabre Dance]

Maybe If I say it this way. If Risto develops into a consistent #1 D our defense and team will be better.

IMO 2-4 can be arranged in almost any order when you have a true #1.

 

[1972]

We need a real #2 for Rasmus. Kulikov isn't an ideal #2 IMO, but he could fill the role better than anyone on this team. I think we'll see a better Risto next year.

What is a real No.2?