Taro T

If anything, I'd expect to see them gain a team before losing one considering all 4 finalists were European this year.

Unfortunately, me thinks you're right about that.

They played everyone at least once and had home and homes with 3 teams in the Western Conference under the prior system. (They just played home or road vs 12 teams.) They played 6 vs in division rivals and 4 vs the other teams in conference. Personally, I'd rather see them keep the 8 games per season vs teams in division (lets face it, it's more fun to go to a TO game than a TB game) but drop the in conference schedule to a h&h and have h&h's with the west as well. (Or at least drop it to 3 in conf and h&h with 1/2 of the west.) Heck, as it stands now, if I miss this year's Calgary game it'll be 2009 before I get a chance to see Phaneuf play in person unless the Sabres meet them in the Finals.

Of all the things MM did or didn't do, I still think that running Rusty Jones out of town ranks up there with Wade running Bruce DeHaven out and hiring idiot boy on the stupidity scale of what not to do as a head coach. I was really hoping that Marv would find a way to bring Rusty back.

W/ the "new" NHL, they increased the emphasis on division rivals (8 games in division like back in the mid-'80's, vs 6 games pre-lockout). To accomodate that, they went to playing 1 home game vs each team from 1 opposite conference division, 1 road game vs another division's teams, and skipping the 3rd division. Sabres skipped the worst division in hockey last year (St. Louis, Chicago, Columbus, Detroit, & Nashville) and are on the road against them this year. So Buffalo will travel to LA, Dallas, SJ, Phoenix, and Anaheim next year but don't play them at all this season.

Question for you, AJ (or any of the other 4 soccer nuts ). Do you know if the guy who missed the kick for France would have been in the shootout had Zidane been available?

So now you've deleted yet ANOTHER Honda Fit thread? (Referring to the one you started ~1 hour ago, in case there was question as to which one this post was in reference to. ) What is that, like 7? Does anybody know what the record for most deleted threads by one poster regarding one subject is? This has to be close to a record. Doesn't it?

You can't build anything that's foolPROOF. Foolresistant is possible, but a determined fool will defeat the best of engineering/design in almost all cases.

I responded back to your similar questions over on TSR.

This is a great move. My only qualm with it is, why didn't Darcy pick him up last year when he could have been obtained from Chicago for a minor leaguer or at the deadline from Edmonton for Biron? Oh well, water under the bridge. It still is a very good pickup. It looks like the Sabres will be expecting Kalinin to pick up the physical role on the D as there isn't a Jay McKee-type player in the Sabres top 6. Of course, McKee was more about blocking shots and getting position on people this past season than laying guys out. But it would still be nice to think that the Sabres had someone on the blueline who can and will play physical when necessary.

Rory, Janik, and a handful of other older Ra-cha-cha boys are the only UFA's left in Buffalo's system. The Sabres made qualifying offers to all RFA's in system other than Leighton and McMorrow. So in order for them to lose anyone else this off-season a team would have to make an offer that the Sabres aren't willing to match and also be willing to lose up to 4 1st rounders for that player. The Sabres have far more leverage with the RFA's than they did with the UFA's (with whom they had absolutely no leverage). Most of the RFA's will qualify for arbitration. Any that want to go that route must file for it by 5:00 PM tomorrow.

I was trying to cut the guy some slack because Carolina was the team that kept an injury depleted Sabres team out of the Finals. You are correct about those other teams not doing anything to substantially improve either. Until Florida gets a real goalie, they should be added into that mix as well.

How exactly did Carolina take a step forward?

But he only signed with Buffalo because the Sabres paid 2x more than anybody else that wanted him because nobody wants to play in Buffalo and the team stinks and they will be lucky to finish 12th and, and, and ....

Close, he's the team president. It makes sense that it was the Blues to make the IMO very overly generous offer to him, because Davidson clearly was a fan of McKee's and had stated that he expected McKee to be courted by several teams.

Happy B-day. Hope what's left of it is a good one.

I've thought that it would make an excellent CC ever since the Mmarena went up.

Where in Heaven's name is God going to find a lawyer? The other guy's got a lot of them though.

As long as it's not the police blotter they're showing up on, more power to them.

I wouldn't have made that trade either, but my guess is they knew they could not get Luongo to sign long term and felt that IF getting out of Vancouver could get the punk's game back, it was a worthwile trade. If the punk doesn't come around, there is probably somebody else out there (Bobby Clarke?) that thinks he could get the punk's game back. So Florida will likely get something in return in worst case.

He may or may not be losing it, but you did in fact post what he claims you did.

That IS catchy. Surely the other reports of his demise are greatly exaggerated. Too bad it sounds like it will be a long while before you can sneak a keyboard under the door for him.

So they were serious when they started advertising their new XPS systems as the "nemesis"?

God forbid Government do anything efficiently. The law says they can take 45 days. Darn it, I want them drinking coffee for the next 2 weeks and sitting on their hands. How dare they perform a function in only 2/3's the allotted time. Translated: thank you for bothering me, now go f' off.

Of course, after the elections are over, then you can't get anything done because you have a "lame duck" Congress even though 90+% of them are likely coming back. Then in '07, you don't have to get anything done because there is no urgency as the sitting Congress critters have 2 years to get stuff done and you really don't want to rush things. Then in '08, you can't get anything done because it's an election year and no Congress critter wants to take a stand on an issue. I forget, when does the cycle end?