General Hockey Talk - Injuries, signings, factoids + other news from around the league

wprager wrote:Tim Murray and Dan Bylsma gone in Buffalo.  

wowowowah!!!

What a rookie move firing the GM before the draft! Unless his successor comes internally.

I mean, we did the same thing with mukler but the succession had been in the works I believe for a while.

This just reads of a reactionary firing.

Are they making Echeil the new GM now also?

tim1_2 wrote:

wprager wrote:Tim Murray and Dan Bylsma gone in Buffalo.  

This coming after the reports surfaced that Eichel wouldn't resign there if Bylsma was the coach. I'm guessing Tim Murray wouldn't get rid of Bylsma, so the owner canned 'em both just to avoid further awkwardness.  I wonder if Tim winds up back here as an assistant (probably not).  

From the time we saw Tim in Buffalo the thing I liked about him is he's not afraid to make a move. But neither is Dorion at this point.

Im not sure this is the type or org to let him come back after he poached a couple of our scouts in Buffalo. I could be wrong.

wprager wrote:Tim Murray and Dan Bylsma gone in Buffalo.  

Because of Eichel for Bylsma I think, they didn't see eye to eye. Murray, you'd need to see better results.

Murray is, basically, fired for not winning the lottery. I got the vibe that he didn't want Eichel, but it's not like he could have traded the pick and gotten anything of remotely similar value.

wprager wrote:Murray is, basically, fired for not winning the lottery.  I got the vibe that he didn't want Eichel, but it's not like he could have traded the pick and gotten anything of remotely similar value.  

I also got the vibe he didn't have much interest in Eichel, but there's other things he's done that raised eyebrows...like the Lehner and Kane trades, for starters.

Lehner is going to be their #1 for many years, as long as he can keep healthy. Kane actually looks like he's finally maturing a little. On the ice he's been very good.

Also the results were horrendous. Owners don't wait for years for a rebuild anymore, especially not with marquee players like Eichel, ROR and Lehner. Not good enough.

That said, I don't see why they didn't wait until after this season to reassess.

They had a lot of injuries to contend with, though. Not really the coach's or GM's fault.

wprager wrote:They had a lot of injuries to contend with, though.  Not really the coach's or GM's fault.

The coach has won something like 68 out of 165 games. Tank or not, that's the record.

PTFlea wrote:Also the results were horrendous.  Owners don't wait for years for a rebuild anymore, especially not with marquee players like Eichel, ROR and Lehner.  Not good enough.

 You sure about that list? In what universe is Lehner on the same page as Eichel?

tim1_2 wrote:

wprager wrote:Tim Murray and Dan Bylsma gone in Buffalo.  

This coming after the reports surfaced that Eichel wouldn't resign there if Bylsma was the coach. I'm guessing Tim Murray wouldn't get rid of Bylsma, so the owner canned 'em both just to avoid further awkwardness.  I wonder if Tim winds up back here as an assistant (probably not).  

I'd be shocked if he ended up back here. Unless we swap Lee for Murray (which doesn't make much sense, IMO), I don't see it happening. The only other way would be if a team wanted Lee for a GM position, or if he wanted to move on before he gets leapfrogged by Alfie. Either way, I haven't seen his name pop up (ever) in GM searches.

Yeah, to me this speaks of owner jumping the gun. This team hasn't had enough time to fully rebuild. This is a decision that should have came next year or the one after. Since when can owners expect a full rebuild to take less than 3 years? That's a joke.

You can point to tades like Kane or to an extent Lehner as to why it didn't work out but they weren't disasters and could still be valuable. There was maybe some laps in judgement on whether Kane could prove to mature but they got a fairly good return for Myers.
Plus they got ROR for a bag of pucks (well not really) and that was a huge win.

Maybe Timmy jumped the gun and started adding players via trade a year or two early to become competitive and not Pegula is looking at Toronto and asking why aren't they in the playoffs.
Sorry there Pegula but it's not that easy. But hey! Start the musical chair game. That always does wonders for a franchise.

spader wrote:

PTFlea wrote:Also the results were horrendous.  Owners don't wait for years for a rebuild anymore, especially not with marquee players like Eichel, ROR and Lehner.  Not good enough.

 You sure about that list? In what universe is Lehner on the same page as Eichel?

Lehner's good. I agree he's nowhere near Eichel, neither is ROR IMO, but he's a very solid starter for Barfallo.

PTFlea wrote:

spader wrote:

PTFlea wrote:Also the results were horrendous.  Owners don't wait for years for a rebuild anymore, especially not with marquee players like Eichel, ROR and Lehner.  Not good enough.

 You sure about that list? In what universe is Lehner on the same page as Eichel?

Lehner's good.  I agree he's nowhere near Eichel, neither is ROR IMO, but he's a very solid starter for Barfallo.

I honestly thought Buffalo was a year or two away from being top 3 in the division. They have some really interesting players in their lineup, a few prima donnas yes, but they could be a really good team with the right system. If Moulson, Okposo, and Kane have strong years they could make the playoffs next year. That said, they will probably try to move a few guys and be a leaner, younger team next year.

Kane could be a hit in Vegas if they decide to take a chance on him.

Flo The Action wrote:Yeah, to me this speaks of owner jumping the gun. This team hasn't had enough time to fully rebuild. This is a decision that should have came next year or the one after. Since when can owners expect a full rebuild to take less than 3 years? That's a joke.

You can point to tades like Kane or to an extent Lehner as to why it didn't work out but they weren't disasters and could still be valuable. There was maybe some laps in judgement on whether Kane could prove to mature but they got a fairly good return for Myers.
Plus they got ROR for a bag of pucks (well not really) and that was a huge win.

Maybe Timmy jumped the gun and started adding players via trade a year or two early to become competitive and not Pegula is looking at Toronto and asking why aren't they in the playoffs.
Sorry there Pegula but it's not that easy. But hey! Start the musical chair game. That always does wonders for a franchise.

They've had musical chairs for a while now. How many coaches have been there since Ruff got canned?

We also don't know what went on behind the scenes. It's totally possible (and plausible) that Pegula gave some specific targets (like improve possession stats by x amount or something) and GMTM and Bylsma failed to reach them. Of course, it's also possible that he's responding to Eichel's "request" or just acting impulsively. My point is that we don't know why or how this went down.

spader wrote:

Flo The Action wrote:Yeah, to me this speaks of owner jumping the gun. This team hasn't had enough time to fully rebuild. This is a decision that should have came next year or the one after. Since when can owners expect a full rebuild to take less than 3 years? That's a joke.

You can point to tades like Kane or to an extent Lehner as to why it didn't work out but they weren't disasters and could still be valuable. There was maybe some laps in judgement on whether Kane could prove to mature but they got a fairly good return for Myers.
Plus they got ROR for a bag of pucks (well not really) and that was a huge win.

Maybe Timmy jumped the gun and started adding players via trade a year or two early to become competitive and not Pegula is looking at Toronto and asking why aren't they in the playoffs.
Sorry there Pegula but it's not that easy. But hey! Start the musical chair game. That always does wonders for a franchise.

They've had musical chairs for a while now. How many coaches have been there since Ruff got canned?

We also don't know what went on behind the scenes. It's totally possible (and plausible) that Pegula gave some specific targets (like improve possession stats by x amount or something) and GMTM and Bylsma failed to reach them. Of course, it's also possible that he's responding to Eichel's "request" or just acting impulsively. My point is that we don't know why or how this went down.

Im not sure of what happened. But no matter how you slice it, it's hard to see a positive out of this. Besides I doubt it's the owner's job to dictate playing styles to the GM on how the coach should be. It's the owner's job to hire a GM in which he beleaves in the vision and that Gm's job to pick a coach who can deliver the vision of team style.

The owner did do what you would expect, and that's fire the whole damn lot. But before the draft? Before they get a chance to look over candidates? Usually you have someone in mind to do that. This reeks of reactionary.

It very well could be. And I didn't mean to suggest that he'd prescribe playing styles. But if I was an NHL owner, I'd definitely have targets. That might be something like, "Improve the power play" or something along those lines. Something easily measurable. I'd make damn sure that my GM had some specific targets to work with.

But ya, it definitely seems reactionary.

EDIT: A measurable goal could also be something like, "win more games than you did last year." That's something an owner could definitely ask for and expect from a GM and a coach. They regressed from 35 wins and 81 points to 33 wins and 78 points. That could be reason enough.