Taro T

Actually, it would have made him the 2nd highest paid player, but would have had him paid comparably with 5 others on the team. About 60% of the season was done at the time he was traded, so the Sabres would only have been picking up the excess salary for 40% of the sesaon. The Sabres revenues for the season were well ahead of projections by that time, so the Sabres knew that they could afford him at that time as well. Considering he is an UFA at the end of the season and Darcy did not negotiate the contract he has, I doubt highly that his salary would have caused friction in the dressing room. There is no way he would have been sitting in the press box had Buffalo picked him up. He is better defensively than Campbell and still can play the powerplay and he also is much better than Kalinin was playing at the time. He quite likely would have been paired with McKee, so the Sabres would have had 2 very solid top pairs, and Teppo w/ Campbell / Kalinin would also be considered to be a top 2 pairing but probably would have gotten slightly less 5 on 5 time to help keep Teppo strong for the playoffs and to limit the potential for problems in the Sabres end due to the "#6" guy. It would have given the Sabres a SOLID 7th D man (either Kalinin or Campbell) and then IF you lose 2 D-men (as the Sabres have now done) you are putting Rory in at that point as the 6th D-man, not the 5th. Chicago picked up a mid level prospect for Spacek and they already have Khabibulin, so it is doubtful that the Sabres would have given up Marty to get Spacek at that time. As I posted, I didn't have a problem with the Sabres not trading Marty for Spacek, my problem was with not trading a mid level prospect for Spacek.

Spacek was the one player that got traded (in January, not at the deadline) that I wanted to see in a Sabres uniform. He is an UFA but is not making a TON of money ($2.25 MM) and was picked up for a prospect. I'm certain that Darcy thought Chicago would hold out longer in swinging a deal for him as IMO they didn't get very much for him. Rumors were that Buffalo could have gotten him (or Staios) from Edmonton for Marty. Darcy didn't want to make that trade. I'm not overly critical about him not pulling the trigger w/ Edmonton but was definitely bummed out when I saw how little Chicago got for him. If the Sabres can get past Carolina tomorrow night, it likely will be moot, as the Sabres should have Teppo back before the end of the Series and I like Buffalo's odds of winning 1 out of 3 vs Carolina. The Sabres should be able to win tomorrow if they skate the way they did last night, even if the Sabres are missing 3 D.

Sorry to hear about your aunt. Next time you are in the Ra-cha-cha region you can hear the game on 950. They cut away from the game IMMEDIATELY afterwards and proceed into the Left Wing's version of Michael Savage (Randi Rhodes (SP?)), but you can at least pick up the broadcast better when/if GR fades.

Mair didn't play because Ruff wanted to put the Roy-Drury-Grier line back together and in order to do that he needed someone to center Kotalik and Max. Mair is a right wing, Novotny a center. Thus Novotny got the call. Also, Pyatt has been playing well in the playoffs and has not earned a benching. Realistically, those are the only 2 guys that skated that Mair would have been put in for. I'd rather hold Mair out a little longer and let him have some more healing time for that concussion he had, so that he's available IF the Sabres REALLY need him to go in; rather than rush him back and have him go woozy on a hit that normally wouldn't cause any problems.

But didn't somebody post that the game was in Tennessee??? Oh, nevermind.

Braden to Bus Driver: Hey, Walt. What are you doing? Bus Driver: Making it look MEAN!!!

Yeah, you've gotta love the internet. 4 idiots or 20 (or whatever, I truly doubt there were more than a handful or someone more mainstream would have picked up this story) cause problems, and there were probably that many (or more - remember there were 4 times as many Canes fans at the 1st game, it just sounded like there were more Sabres fans) idiot Canes fans there as well cause problems, but because 2 people start threads about them, there are soon MANY threads regarding this "problem". Heck it was on "CBS Sportsline" so it must have been a massive problem , yeah, in a respond to the article thread underneath. Good heavens, it sounds like the arena was a bloodbath. Don't get me wrong, I'm not excusing the idiots. Just it sounds to me like this "problem" is being wildly blown out of proportion.

Actually, that is the funny thing about this one. The "family atmosphere" part of it. I have never had a problem taking my children to a hockey game in Buffalo. I would never take my kids to a game at the Ralph, well not for a few more years anyhow. IF the Sabres get past the Canes, I will have my kids there for Game 1. As X asked, I am curious as to how the Sabres fans in attendance behaved last night. I haven't heard any complaints about them yet. My guess is, the combination of this being a weeknight game (less chance of a 4,000 strong several hour long tailgate party) and the Canes winning would reduce the likelihood that anyone caused problems. My guess is, again not having been there, that ALL the Sabres fans at Game 1 were loud many had been tailgating and that ticked some Carolina fans off. The fact that there were a few handful that approached the game as a Bills game rather than a Sabres game probably made it seem like there were more bad apples than there were. I've also seen it mentioned that several Canes fans entered the game after tailgating for a while before the game as well and that several came in with chips on their shoulders due to the "poor way they were treated by management". Add that to the mix and you have a recipe for disaster. As I mentioned elsewhere, I have never seen the fans of the WINNING team start fights. I've seen some go over board on taunting, to incite fights, but 80%+ of the fights at stadiums / rinks that I have seen have been the result of fans cheering on the losing team getting frustrated that the #@$!#$@! over there won't shut up when his #@$@ team is getting lucky against our incredible team. Nearly all the rest occurred because that #@$@!$@! over there cheering on those lucky jerks spilled beer on me / my wife / sister / whatever and he'll pay @#$@!% for that.

Sorry you had a bad experience. One question, why didn't you get an usher to help you get the guy who was swearing in front of your kid to leave or at least stop swearing? Should you ever be in that situation again, you might want to consider it. Also, I have been to many Sabres - Loafs games, and while most of the fans are as other Carolinians describe them, there are a few bad apples in that bunch as well. I don't tar the entire Loaf fan base on my experience with a few of them. I'm sorry that your experience was such that you now view the Sabres fans as lower than Filly fans. As for the fights, I wasn't there so I can't comment much, but I am assuming the fights weren't between Sabres fans. Could there be any possibility that the fights were started by Carolina fans that were frustrated at seeing their team lose in a building that was cheering as loudly for the Sabres as it was for the Canes? I have never seen a fight get started by a fan cheering for the winning team. If Sabres fans were "taunting" the Canes fans, then it's their bad and I would not be shocked to hear there was some of that, but from what I have heard / read there was a fair amount of violence started by frustrated Caniacs. As for people throwing stuff at cars, that's stupid and it sounds like security took care of it. Lastly, it appears that fans of both teams and regions want to "talk smack". We've gotten quite a few of the blizzard, failing economy, Irish, Polish, Italian, etc., etc. jokes through the years and again in this playoff year. Most of us have developed a thick skin to deal with it. From everything I can tell, your region is doing pretty well. I would suggest you learn to laugh at jokes that you believe are ignorant (bunch of red neck, NASCAR loving, Mayberry residents, etc., etc.) or better yet, just laugh at the people telling the jokes. That's what most of us do.

Yeah, racism is why he isn't in the league. It has NOTHING TO DO WITH TURNING DOWN 2 OFFERS TO HEAD COACH!!! He claims to have been shut out for 3 seasons, but during that time he had turned down an offer from the Sabres to be HC and one from the Bolts. (IIRC, he also received an offer from the Isles to be an assistant.) The reason he is out of the NHL is because he is a pompous dolt that didn't accept opportunities presented to him. It has nothing to do with racism, although I do realize that he has experienced racism.

Typically JD is good (not RJ great, but good), but I think he may have been on medication for the flu or something because he was having a hard time keeping straight which team he was referring to last night. Doc corrected him once and then let the rest of them slide.

Fixed it right after I posted.

How many 1-1 series did you find in the NFL? Those must have been brutal playoffs that year!

A big part of why teams can only score on him from outside on deflected shots is that once a team sets up into the Sabres zone, that is all that the Sabres give the other team. The Sabres collapse back on the net far more than any other team that I have seen. The positives of that are the Sabres rarely let someone get a clean shot from in front of the net and oftentimes a blocked shot will bounce over to a spot where the Sabres can develop an odd man rush. The negative is that the puck stays inside the Sabres zone longer than we'd like to see as there is typically only 1 Sabres forward high challenging the D man with the puck. As the puck switches from D man to D man, the Sabres drop the now far side winger back low looking to block passing lanes and looking to pick up a deflected shot. When the other team is trying to cycle the puck low, the Sabres have an extra body in front of the net to prevent someone from walking in. They also typically have sticks and bodies in the way to prevent the pass over to the far side for the high percentage shot that the Sabres are so fond of trying to work. The Sabres typically give up, what, about 3 shots down low per game? The Sabres gave up far too many breakaways and odd man rushes last night, but I doubt that we will see many of those chances given up in the Mmarena tomorrow night or Friday. Also, there may be someone in the league that is better at stopping breakaways than Ryan, but if he is, it is just barely. Ryan's lateral movement and ability to block the entire bottom 1' of the net make him typically unbeatable on breakaways. The Sabres have played this style all season long and it has netted them 61 W's. As for the Sabres not throwing the puck at the net, that is also by design. Most teams still play with both the wingers fairly high to cover the point men. When the Sabres are skating hard and passing crisply, they can oftentimes get a passing lane open up to a high percentage shot. Unfortunately, when they are doing neither they will turn the puck over far too often, like last night.

He did not take the high road. He took the road of not getting fined. He followed it up with crying about Sabres dives. The SOB has the hockey world's all time greatest diver in Recchi and Stillman almost did a Triple Lindy when Jochen touched him. IF he is reduced to needing to try to play the diving card, the Sabres will win this series running away.

Yep.

Well, you can't really expect them to sell out the rink on a weeknight when most of the people who WANT to go to the game have to be back to work in Buffalo in the morning.

Call him by his proper name, Zdeno Chara. No wonder cavemen hate "normal" people, they get no respect. As for the idiot writer, if that ends up being the worst shot Buffalo, the Sabres, and the fans take, I can live with it. Everytime the Sabres or Bills are in the playoffs, some writer (or more accurately writers) feel the uncontrollable urge to take a dump on the city and the region.

They didn't change the definition, but they provided the linesmen the discretion to wave off icing if they felt the icing was due to a missed pass. The other rule change I haven't seen mentioned yet, is they went back to the "tag up" offsides. The main thing I see that doing is limiting the number of stoppages so the increased # of penalties called this season didn't translate into significantly longer running times for games.

Heh, heh, heh, silly little hamster.

Now, now, considering you have no possibility of passing on your silica gel improved genes on to a future generation, you should be looking for ways to improve your own standing within posterity. Poor typing will not look good to future generations. Simply becoming rude when someone suggests a way to improve your place in history will not improve your standing in the history books either.

Mr. Hamster, what the heck is wrong with you that you can't control your tail AFTER you have typed a word. You know, a lesser gerbil I could understand having his tail mess up words he has been spelling (flinging it here there and everywhere), but now that you have been injesting silica gel packs I would expect much better bodily control. I could see messing up occasionally on writing a period or semicolon, but why is it so hard to hit the spacebar without hitting extra characters? A gerbil would probably try to use his long tail to press the period button, and I could expect him to have this problem occassionally, but clearly would not have this extensive of a problem. It appears more of a case of you trying to use all 4 paws and getting your tail in the way when you use the back ones trying to hit the space bar. Ergo, you ARE A HAMSTER!!!!!

Ya know, if you'd take a laser beam to that tail of yours, you'd be a much better speller and correspondingly, people would take you much more seriously. Seeing as you've already had it once to the vital parts, it wouldn't seem that a second shot would be that bad.

I thought the goal of the chant was to give a boost to the Sabres. If the point is to piss off the locals, why not just wear caps that say "Junior drives a Subaru".