It's one of those, "In MY day, we did blah blah blah," grandpa moments.

In addition to being lighter and shooting at higher velocities, a composite stick gives you a more distinct feel of the puck on the blade.

Since wood is often used to dampen vibration, this makes perfect sense.

Composites are worth it. And if you are now complaining about the excessive penalties our "lazy" top 6 take, here's a list to show you that the Sabres are the 4th least penalized team in the NHL:

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Wheelhouse

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"Go out and run 'em."
- Lindy Ruff, 23 Feb. 2007

Wow!

I make an observation, and you do everything in your power to deride my viewpoint and insult me.

Get a grip. You seem to be full of positive information and authoritative insight which you're just itching to bombard us with, and we should be all to willing to accommodate your militant pollyannaism...

Forgive me for ever having been born thirty years before you...having played Hockey, and having eyes and an inquisitive brain.

And a Merry Fucking Christmas to you, too.

As for the "excessive penalties"? WTF?

Where do I succinctly blame our spoiled six for taking them? I don't. I stress that wooden sticks remain on the fucking ice and aren't waved around like flags...both you guys need to get a room.

Your mutual admiration and selective misinterpretation is laughable. And what the fuck good is all that extra "snap" and sensitivity in a composite good for if you can't fucking hit the fucking net, and can't pass worth a shit, anyhow?

Sheesh.

You said that using wooden sticks would cut down on the hack and grab penalties.

I was merely trying to point out that those penalties aren't an issue with this team.

And even if it were an issue, Jordano is right; you contradict yourself when you say that these are professionals and they should be able to handle a heavier stick, but go on to say that a heavier stick would cut down on the stick kind of penalties because they're heavier.

Sure, you didn't specifically say that the top 6 took those penalties, but I'm confused as to why'd you'd be addressing those penalties if they aren't an issue.

This argument about wood versus composites has been opened up before, and I know that you're a traditionalist, and have advocated for the return to wooden sticks.

I'm not out to get you ice. I'm trying to defend my points that you seem to try to pummel every time I post, due to my optimistic view of our skill players.

Passing isn't an issue with this team either. We're one of the best passing and puck moving teams in the league.

That's one of the things that we have going for us. Lindy's system gives them a whole set of fool proof puck control break outs to get them through the neutral zone and into the offensive zone, and we look great 5 on 5.

You seriously think they're just coughing up the puck every game?

Ice, if that were true, we wouldn't be winning games the way we are.

I just don't get it. I post something reasonable about our power play issues and you came storming in here and just blamed it entirely on the players again. Like there's absolutely NO CHANCE that coaching was the issue.

I'd hardly describe optimism as "militant pollyannaism." YOU are the one who replies to anything positive about our play in a derogatory holier than thou tone.

You didn't even bother getting back to my posts about the power play, in which I pointed out that these undisciplined, lazy, cocky top 6, were important pieces of the power play when it was lethal back in 2006, and it was coached by Scott Arniel.

If you want to be pessimistic, fine. But unless you're going to the arena every day to see them waltzing through practice, don't accuse them of being lazy and undisciplined. It's been pretty obvious by their play this season that lack of intensity is NOT an issue.

And I apologize if you took offense to my post. I was directing that first sentence at the whole idea of using wooden sticks, not you. Should have been more clear.

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Wheelhouse

So, um, yeah...our PP suxorz@@!@!

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I knew this thread was doomed from the start when I saw that PSP wrote a long piece on his opinion..

Im not surprised ice and daz couldn't resist to reply to it..

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Miller, Myers and Greir are sick, but not Jesus Christ..

KILL OTTAWA

And your post is designed to do what....ruffle more feathers? Get off it

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LOL what? How does my post ruffle more feathers?

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Miller, Myers and Greir are sick, but not Jesus Christ..

KILL OTTAWA

Yeesh, somebody is sensitive.

I stress that when wooden sticks were the only option, hooking was brutal. The sticks were everywhere except on the ice. Are we all forgetting Bobby Clarkes slash in the Summit Series? Now that looked like waving the stick around like a flag.

Just admit that your argument was wrong.

Merry Christmas boys.

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I am, you know I am. I am Canadian.
#1 Hockey Nation.

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Lord Stanley's Cup is what its all about.
Mr. Pegula, your destiny awaits you sir.

Hey PSP, name one guy on our team that can snipe more than 5 times a year. Name one. Don't say Roy, because he only has one sniping goal this year. Vanek has NONE, Pominville has 30 missed snipes, and MacArthur is a garbage man. Stafford has none, Kaleta has ONE...


Fuck.

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"Counting all the assholes in the room, I'm definitely not alone!" ~ Michael Poulsen, Volbeat, Still Standing.

A goal is a goal, doesn't matter if you 'sniped' the corner, or pinballed it in off 3 guys.

Oh I realize that and agree with you fully, but what happens when you CAN'T grind for goals? The playoffs will be like that, you will need some scoring talent to get through. It would be best if we received a sniper in a trade for one of our guys. I don't know what we can do or get. But when it comes time, we will need some different way to score. The defense will get harder.

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"Counting all the assholes in the room, I'm definitely not alone!" ~ Michael Poulsen, Volbeat, Still Standing.

I would put forth that in the playoffs, defense gets tighter, and grinding for goals becomes more common, and thusly a more valuable skill to have.

This is what we're doing here. It's called having a forum. We all agreed that sucking off the coach when it's good, and cutting off his balls when it's bad is wrong. We also agreed that if we all had the same opinion, then this would be pointless. We all agreed by signing up here that we would discuss each others opinions with respect. If someone respectfully agrees/disagrees to another's opinion, then we're accomplishing something. This ain't about optimist/pessimist, it's about OPINIONS. I appreciate PSP's time(and thought) he spent on his post, and agree with some of it. It's a shame you think some people just want to try to destroy other people's threads(posts). I'm certainly not here to waste my time or anyone elses.

I'm not going to doom and gloom over one loss, but we did have issues scoring on a ROOKIE goaltender. I know we have some key players out, but what happens if one of them (god forbid) incurs a season ending injury, or an injury in the playoffs that takes them out of a series? We need legitimate threats. Yes, threats - not one, but at least two players that can score goals and still understand and play to our system. Right now, we have a ton of players that can play to our system, but we're relying on odds to score goals, rather than skill. If you put 30 shots on net, one's probably gonna go in. We need to be better than that; we need people to take charge and score (similar to Vanek's wraparound last week).

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ah, but at what point does a slow start become a bad season. we keep saying "wait till it starts clicking"... well, the season is closing in on halfway through the season, and i think its clear the offense isnt up to snuff.

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Fortunately, as long as you're in the top 8, your offense could wait until April to start clicking.

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Wheelhouse

Awwwww, heck...Adam.

The Sabres could easily lose five games and find themselves in tenth place and out of the playoffs, in less than two weeks.

I'm not quite that optimistic. The truth bites hard.

Jus' sayin'.

Definitely possible.

But I don't see this team losing 5 games in a row. I think they've finally gotten to the point where they know they can't let that type of thing happen.

Also, if we've been able to maintain this type of positioning with the limited offense we've been producing, then we should be able to make it to the end of the season in playoff position.

And that's assuming that nothing about this team's game improves.

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Wheelhouse