The Brad Boyes Era Begins in Buffalo

02/28/2011

Our brains are on fire with the feeling to kill / And it won't go away until our dreams are fulfilled / There is only one thing on our minds / Don't try running away, cause you're the one we will find

The Yachtsman

This is what I want from Darcy in his first day as an unshackled GM during the Pegula Era. I can just see him and Lindy blasting "Kill 'Em All" down at 1 HSBC, debating the merits of Jason Newstead vs. Cliff Burton, and headhunting for new talent with a vengeance.

(WARNING: I listen to music when I write, and iTunes decided to shuffle me into a Metallica bender for some reason, so this post may be filled with incandescent metal, or it may be filled with the whinings of a wealthy Scandinavian douchebag who ruined the best band of the 80's by turning them all into ovulating kittens. BUT I DIGRESS!)

'Sick! I get to play with Tim Connolly!'

The book on Boyes is that he's a streaky sniper who is responsible at both ends of the ice. Nick Mendola compared him to Jason Pominville, and the word around the interwebs is that it's a solid pickup for a 2nd-round pick. I'm 'meh' with it, considering we need a defenseman more than we need a winger. I know everyone in Buffalo wants to see the Sabres go deep in the playoffs, but I'd rather see youth this year combined with some trimming of roster fat. I stick with my original idea: dump Stafford & Connolly for the highest price you can get and start to rebuild. Play Adam & Byron more than they realistically should, bring in a decent DMan (even if they're in a contract year), and regroup. More to come from the Apologist later today. Meantime, enjoy this:

Comments

Matty Dubs

03/02/2011 12:10

Congrats on getting the band back together.

Personally, I like the Brad Boyes deal. The sabres being the group of emotionally retarded bitches that they are (gotta love 'em!), I think it's a good strategy to keep the locker room intact and send a message of top-down belief in the players. It seems that suddenly these players are motivated to play for an owner who clearly just wants to win, and you can already see that the team generally gets that there will be a more logical system of rewarding effort and holding shit players accountable. As much as Tim Connolly flakes out on a regular basis, he's the type of personality that might just need a kick in the balls to wake his ass up. Let's hope so, at least.
To trade him would have been seen (at least in the locker room) as punishing him for play that occurred within a culture of profit, as opposed to a culture of winning. I gotta respect Pegula for encouraging that new culture across the board now (and recent results have, in a small sample size, confirmed that there is some good effect here).

That all said, if D. Roy is close to 100% at some point during the playoffs, I could see an underperforming Connolly benched as soon as the centerman spot has a little more depth.