The Athletic Hockey Show - How to fix the Buffalo Sabres

Episode Date: August 4, 2025

Over the next four shows, Sean Gentille and Sean McIndoe ask beat writers from four NHL cities how to fix their teams. From perennial rebuilds to quick fixes, our guys are on the case. Sean McIndoe kicks the project off with perhaps the toughest team in the league to fix, the Buffalo Sabres. Matt Fairburn joins Sean to discuss the seemingly never ending rebuild in Buffalo, and if the Sabres have a shot of ending their 14 year playoff drought this year.We want to hear from you! Please fill out our listener survey: https://forms.gle/CDbF51vAPngm2ZYS6Host: Sean McIndoeWith: Matthew FairburnExecutive Producer: Chris FlanneryProducer: Jeff Domet Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is the Athletic Hockey Show. Welcome to the Athletic Hockey Show summer edition. I'm Sean McIndoo, and over the next couple of weeks, Gentilly and I, along with some of our top B writers, we're going to look at some problem teams in the NHL, and we're going to try to fix them. And I will give you a peek behind the curtain here. I don't know exactly what order.

these are going to come out in. But this is the first one that I've recorded. And let's just say producer Jeff does not believe in easing in or starting off with the simple ones. We're going right to the depths. We're going to fix the Buffalo Sabres today. And we begin with Matt Fairburn. Matt, is this going to be the shortest podcast of all time or the longest? It could be either one, right?

I mean, yeah, you said it there. It's like... I feel like there's a short answer on fixing the Buffalo Sabres. There are a couple short answers. And then there are times where I'm writing various stories and think this could be a book, right? Trying to figure out how this team got here and how to get out of it. It's what a way to spend a beautiful summer day, right? Trying to fix one of the team of the longest playoff drought in the history of the league.

14 years and counting. No playoffs. for the Buffalo Sabres, which I was actually surprised to learn. It was not is not the record in all of sports. The New York Jets are currently tied with the Sabres for active streak. So that's good. Not even the longest playoff drought in the history of Buffalo, because the bills had a 17-year playoff drought that ended just seven years ago.

So where are we complaining about? Right. This is fantastic. The Buffalo Bills are a fascinating piece of this because the Buffalo Bills are two things that you need to know about them. They have been a significant success story in recent years. Haven't won a Super Bowl, but have come very close and are near the top of the rankings heading into this new season as far as teams likely to win. And they are owned by Terry Pagula.

I put two and two together, and that tells me Terry Pagula is a fantastic sports owner. Now, I'm just, as I think that, I'm just going to take a big sip of water here, and I'm going to dive into a story that you wrote earlier in the summer. Terry Pagula's ownership, Kevin Adams Rise, and the hamster wheel of the Sabres record playoff drought, which I think is the definitive guide to what is happening at the top of the Sabres organization. And I think that's where we have to start. we will talk about the roster, we will talk about moves that could be made in segment two. But in the first segment, I guess here's the question I'm going to ask,

and then I'm going to back away and let you run with it. Is there any point to this exercise, or can the Sabres win with Terry Pagula and Kevin Adams in charge? I think they can win to a certain point. I mean, half the league makes the playoffs. So you would think that they can get into the dance at some point. You know, there have been some pretty bad teams that have gotten into the NHL playoffs. But it feels like the longer this goes on, the more hopeless a lot of fans are feeling about the overall direction of the team. And it's interesting because I've been on the beat for three seasons.

This will be year four. And when I started, there was a lot of optimism about Kevin Adams and what he was doing and a lot of good feelings. feeling about it. But when you go back to the whole process of how he got into that job, the fact that they did not run a search, that he did not have an extensive hockey operations resume. In fact, he had pretty much no hockey operations resume. The bar was really low, and he was clearing it in those first few years. But as it's gotten to the difficult part of building this team, he has made a lot of missteps and the fact that so little action has been taken by Terry Pagula to, you know, either fire Kevin Adams and replace him with a more seasoned general manager or surround him. You know,

they've done a little bit of that this offseason where Yarmal Kekelainen and Eric Stahl have been added to the front office in minor roles, right? Kekelanid is a senior advisor, which is different everywhere. And it feels like a pretty major role here because Kevin Adams needs that type of advisor. Eric Stahl is more of a special assistant. So still some voices around him, but it's about the urgency to win, right? The coaching staff is coming back untouched.

All these assistant coaches that have been here, some of them five years, some of them four years. They're here again and under because they're under contract. Kevin Adams has another year on his contract, so he's back for year six. and it's not that he's done, it's not that every move he makes is a bad move or that the Sabres don't have some things going for them from a roster standpoint. But I think this is a good place to start the conversation about fixing the Buffalo Sabres because a big part of what is broken is the relationship and the trust between the team and the fans. The building has been not even close to full a lot of nights.

They've been down near the bottom of the league in attendance, which doesn't help. the team, right? You'd like to have a little bit of a home ice advantage, but you also can't blame the fans because this is a team that has been out of the playoffs for so long. And they've gotten to a point where everything Kevin Adams says or does, the fans just reflexively think is either not going to work or it's not the right move. And so there's a lack of trust there. And there's a lack of trust in Pagula, I think, to pour the necessary resources into all levels of this. You know, they have five million in cap space left right now, this will be the closest they are to the cap in Kevin Adams' tenure as general manager. They have been significantly under the cap every year. So the spending on and off

the ice is always under the spotlight here with fans. And it's created a mix that is just, it's become a little bit toxic between the fan base and the team at times. Yeah, really, you mentioned on the ice and that can be a catch 22, right? When you're a bad team, you say, well, what do you want us to do? Throw money at guys to just clog up the roster? Maybe or maybe not, but off the ice as well, right? It's been very bare bones. And to go back to Kevin Adams, so he is hired in 2020.

Prior to him, Gula comes in. It's the Darcy regime. Then it's Tim. Well, then you've got the whole weird Pat Laf on tape. thing that happened. Then we go to Tim Murray, then Jason Botterill, and then Kevin Adams comes in. As you say, with no hockey ops experience. Now, he had been on the business side. And obviously, this guy played in the NHL. So this isn't somebody who's just waltzing in off a golf course into this job, but an unusual path, I think we would say. And look, I'll just say it. A lot of us,

at the time he was hired, looked at this and went, oh, this is just the Pagoolis picking against. that they like. Somebody from the organization that they like and that puts up with them and that's it. This isn't going out and hiring the best guy. This is hiring a yes man, I think would be the uncharitable way to put it. And you get into that a little bit in the piece where Terry Bagula says, like we didn't feel like we were being listened to by the other GMs, which scares me if I'm a, if I'm a Buffalo Sabres fan.

Because why does the owner feel like he needs to be listened to by the GMs? But is Kevin Adams pushed back to some extent on that in the PC you wrote where you sat down with him for an hour. Is it fair to Kevin Adams to look at this and go, you know what? Maybe the buck stops here, but the buck has nowhere to go because this guy is just there because the Pukula is like him and they can deal with them. And that's his main qualification. And that's as far as it goes. I think there's some of that. You know, I think it's hard when you're Kevin Adams and you got the job the way that you did to have the same.

I'm sure he disagrees with Terry Pagula on some things. And I'm sure he can talk him into some things. But it's hard to have the same level of authority. You brought up the bills at the beginning. And I covered Sean McDermott and Brandon Bean when they took over at one bill's drive. And they had a certain cachet and a certain presence about them that gave them. the authority and the respect around the league. They had credibility to come in and say,

this is how it needs to be done. This is the role we need you to play. This is how we need to do it, what it needs to look like, how we need to spend. And they really change the culture of that building. I don't think when you have as close a relationship as Kevin Adams and Terry Pagula do,

that it lends itself to the same type of dynamic. I think it becomes, even when you're pushing back, you know, and you're coming from the business side, right? All those moves they made in 2020, firing all those scouts, those assistant coaches, the, you know, people working in Rochester, like, that was made through a business lens because that was the lens that Kevin Adams was coming from. He was the senior vice president of business administration coming over to the hockey side and looking at things from a business first standpoint. And so you end up, at what point do you turn to

hockey, right? Was it one, two years into Kevin Adams' tenure where it's like, okay, now we're on stable financial footing again and we can start thinking about how to build this team, which, again, Kevin Adams had no experience doing? So is he a yes man? That might be too strong, but does he have the credibility to really command and know what it looks like and be able to tell Terry Pagula? Terry Pagula has not liked that version of leadership. right the people who come in and tell them this is how it's done this is what it looks like he especially on the hockey side i think because he sees himself a little bit more as a hockey person right he was a hockey fan coached his son all these things he's not a football guy

is my perception from the outside which means he just lets the football guys do what they need to do and it's different he still sits in scouting meetings sometimes on the football side but I think there's a different, you know, context to it. You think of him as just the owner who's interested, right, and curious. And to an extent, that's what it is on the hockey side, but it's hard to separate the fact that he doesn't have a Brandon Bean who has, you know, all these staff underneath him who have gone on to become general managers elsewhere. It's not as if that's what the Buffalo Sabres have here.

You know, if they now have Yarmalkechalainen, who I think gives them a little bit of credibility, but it's it's such a messy mix and I think to be fair to Kevin Adams it does become difficult to assign some blame right it's like you have spent so far beneath the salary cap in some of these seasons was that an edict right was that a directive from ownership to get things in the green before you start spending to the cap but there's also the point that you're going to be on a lot of no trade lists free agents are not going to want to come to your team. And so you're stuck in a weird position. It might be, it probably is the hardest general manager job in the NHS. And they have. I think that's fair. Yeah. And I think they have, you could argue, I don't even know if it, I think it's just sort of objectively looking at his resume. They have the least qualified general manager in the hardest general manager job in the sport. And that is a is a really tough mix. It's a,

bad mix. I did like the Yarmow hire. I'm a Yarmow guy when he was in Columbus, partly because I liked trades and he was a guy who made some moves. Does it feel like he's had impact or, you know, have you guys had access to him? Have, you know, where are Sabres fans on that? Has that moved the needle at all? Or was it window dressing? It moved the needle, I think, with the fan base because, you know, when we talk about how to fix the sabers and I bring up that, you know, there are times I go into a press conference with Kevin Adams and you leave thinking he didn't say anything and people on Twitter are going crazy because everything he says people don't like. And so when they hired Yarmokekelein and there was some hope from the fan base that this was a voice of reason, right? Another voice in there who could, who has some experience, who to your point has made some bold moves, who could maybe, you know, shift Kevin Adams thinking. in some ways and maybe get in the ear of Terry Pagula and influence him a little bit. And I think it's moved the needle a little bit in that way. They did, we have not had access to him.

I've asked to speak to him, but have not been, you know, that hasn't been set up yet. But he did a brief interview with the radio, you know, the state run radio, Sabres daily radio show. But he was also featured a lot in their team released behind the scenes for the draft and the pre-agency. They do a lot of these. They're very well produced, but people are getting a little bit tired of the cast of characters in them. But he was heavily featured in that. You could see that his voice was something that Kevin Adams was respecting in the process. And he had, they made a point to feature him in that.

So I do think I look at him as a really strong possibility to be the next general manager here. One way or the other, if this goes well, you know, Terry Pagula can bump Kevin Adams into a president type of role. You know, they can do the Ron Francis move in Seattle and bump them up and Jason Botterall slid into that chair. I could see that happening with Kekeleinen. And if it goes poorly, I could see the same thing. Just, you know, another reason to move Kevin Adams out and put Keckleinen in. It's the first time since I've been covering this team where I've actually looked at the front office and saw an interim candidate that could replace Kevin Adams. And that's maybe a needle-moving type of change for how Terry Pagula is operating this front office. Well, breaking news,

the Sabres have cleared out everyone in the front office and the new GM of the team is Matt Fairburn. And in our next section, he is going to go through the roster and he's going to make a bunch of moves that are going to turn this team back into a playoff team or not. We'll find out, but that'll be next on the athletic hockey show. Welcome back. We are fixing the Buffalo Sabres. I'm Sean McEnue. I am with Matt Fairburn.

All right. So first section we talked about the front office, Kevin Adams, Terry Pagula, specifically. The roster. Is this? Let me start with. this question, given how bad things have been over the years and how last, how disappointing last season must have been, not just because of how poorly the team was again, but because a team in the Montreal Canadians who were supposed to be behind the Sabres in line in the rebuild,

leapfrog passed them and went straight to the playoffs. Let me start with this question. Today, is this team even any better than they were at the end of last season's disastrous year? I think they are. And I understand that the J.J. Petirka trade being sort of the major move of the offseason, you probably, or there's a chance you lost the best player in that trade. There's a chance. I don't know that it's a guarantee, but I see a team that makes more sense than the one they had 12 months ago. And by that, I mean, they have last summer around this time, I was looking at the depth chart on defense, and it was full of lefties.

And it was like Henry Okie Haru and Connor Clifton on the right side. And you're trying to put together pairs wondering, how the hell is this going to work? Well, guess what? It didn't work. And, you know, now they have Michael Kesselring who can play with Owen Power. have Connor Timmons and Matia Samuelson who can play those third pair roles and kill penalties and they have Bowen Byram and Rasmus Dahlene up top. It makes sense. Josh Dohn and Justin Danforth, albeit potentially their bottom six players, Danforth almost definitely is,

Don maybe can move higher in the lineup, but guys that play both sides of the puck, guys that forecheck, you know, that this team. team really lacked a consistent forechecking presence, and the team defense was terrible, both from the defensemen and the forwards. So now they have moved out a high-scoring winger in Patyrka, but a guy who did not play a whole lot of defense and added some guys that can help them in that area. The question is that they're banking on, you know, they didn't do a whole lot else, right? They didn't really bolster the roster in other ways. They weren't able to replace Petrka's production in the top six. So now you're banking on, can Josh Norris stay healthy?

Can Zach Benson jump into that role at 20 years old? Can Yuri Kulik at 21 take a big step? Can Jack Quinn bounce back after a terrible season when he was supposed to, you know, be one of those players taking a leap? A lot of big question marks that they're facing. But I do like the additions of Don and Kesslering. I think there are two guys that really fit needs that this team had, and they moved out a player in Petirka who the point totals are flashy, but I think underneath the hood when you watched him closely, he still has a lot of room to improve his all-around game.

So there's a chance this is a better team than the one they had a year ago. the the blue line on paper looks good in Buffalo it has for a little while especially when you've got two number one overall picks back there but but it feels like they've got some pieces there goal tending who's to say can be tough we'll circle back to that but it's upfront that worries me when i'm looking at this team I had somebody the other day asked me, hey, do you know who the highest paid forward on the Buffalo Sabres is in terms of cap hit? And I will be honest.

I took about three or four guesses. I think two of them were Tage Thompson before I remember that Josh Norris is on this team. It is, you know, every year when the playoffs are here and we start talking about contenders, Dom and Shana do their thing

where they have like the chart of like, here's what a cup contending team looks like and they have these pieces and they have check marks for the teams that have them and the ones that, what do the sabres have that they can actually go forward? Does this team have a number one center? Does this team have, you know,

how many top six forwards are on this team? I don't feel like the number is six. And I guess what I would ask from the outside is both, you know, walk me through, where do those guys come from? both on the roster now and in the future, because this is a pipeline that Corrine and last summer had them 11th in the league,

which is pretty good, but also not where you want to be when you haven't made the playoffs in forever. And that was a list that included Owen Power because he was still under the age. It included JJ Peturga. So is the future bright? Is there somebody coming up through the system

who's going to plug in here? Or are you just sitting here trying to make a plan for a team going and then dot dot dot somehow we'll find a number one center and everything else will fall into place well that's what got so weird about this team is that 12 months ago they had tage thompson and dylan cousins as they're one and two centers and dylan cousins coming off a down year but a lot of people would have said that that's pretty good well they get part way through the year and lindy ruff doesn't really like tage thompson at center he kind of likes him on the wing. And so he moves over there and it actually did help his production

quite a bit. And he moved Yuri Kulik from the wing to center and liked how that look. Cousins obviously gets traded out for Norris. They view Norris as a potential number one center. But again, we're talking about a guy who has not stayed healthy at all over the last, you know, few years. So that's quite a role of the dice. And really, you're talking about that Stanley Cup contender checklist. I think on a Stanley Cup contender, you'd prefer to have Norris as your number two center, right? You know, I don't think he would fit the profile of a number one center on a Stanley Cup contender. So what do you do? Do you put Thompson back at center?

Or do you lean on them on the wing? Do you let Yuri Kulik, you know, you can talk about the checklist of a Stanley Cup contender, but just look at playoff teams and many of them have a 21-year-old playing center in their top six. Probably not a lot. I think the devils have a relatively young center core in the top six, but those are, you know, pretty special players that they have. So the construction of the top six is definitely a major question mark and one that training camp is going to be fascinating to see how they put it together because they ended the season with Kulik playing with Thompson and Zach Benson. And it was, it worked. They played well together, but that's a 21-year-old and a 20-year-old playing with Tage Thompson.

That's a lot of heavy lifting for Tage Thompson. I like Zach Benson a lot. I like the season Yuri Kuliket. Are they ready to be the guys that are helping you replace all that production from the Turca, 27 goals last year, 28 the year before? Can Josh Norris chip in some of that and be better than Cousins was in the first half of the year before the trade? I would hope so because Cousins was really not very good before that trade. You do have Thompson and Alex Tuck. Those are really the leaders up front and the guys that are going to drive things for you.

And I think they're both really good players. I think Thompson should be on Team USA for the Olympics. And I think Alex Tuck probably deserves more consideration than he gets sometimes because of his all-around games. So these are two guys that you can really build around. But how you piece together the rest of it, I think is a legitimate conversation, right? Like, is Jason Zucker going to be a top six player for you? And he scored, you know, 20 plus goals last year. You know, as you, you know, like teams can plug and play certain guys.

You can get away with it with one or two spots, like a Benson, right? But I also look at Josh Done now as a candidate. And again, this is a guy that I think, you know, he had seven. goals last year, but can he take that leap? You're basically hoping some of these guys take a huge step. Jack Quinn maybe could take a step, but to your question about who's coming up in the pipeline, they're kind of already here. It's Kooli, it's Benson, Quinn to an extent. I mean, he's 23 now. Don is 23. So these aren't really prospects anymore. They have, I'll put it this way, they have nobody that was in Rochester that is ready to play on the NHL team next year and make that

type of a top six impact. Noah Oslo, Constell-Holinias, those guys could be that at some point, but they're not ready to do it next season. So it's Benson, it's Kulik, and it's a gamble, unless you can find another player between now and October. And the concerning thing is, as much as we talk about the Sabres as being this train wreck of an organization, the last four years, they have not drafted any better than ninth. It's bad in the NHL to be terrible. It's even worse to be stuck in the middle. And the Sabres feel like they're stuck in that lower part of the middle,

which is almost the worst case scenario. You mentioned when we get to training camp, you mentioned, you know, unless they can bring someone in, are they done? Is this the team that they're going to go into camp with? or is there a chance? We know there's not a, you know, we don't usually see a ton of blockbusters in August, but is there a chance that Kevin Adams and Yarmel, Keckleinen,

are maybe cooking something up? Are they open for business or is a feeling like this is a done deal? It feels like this is pretty close to the roster. They might have one more move if the right thing presents itself. It's hard for me to envision it because, so they have a little over $5 million in cap space. They still have to sign Devin Levi, which will take up. you know, a million or two somewhere in there. They have the room, you know, they would have to move somebody out.

But after signing Byram, he felt like their big trade chip, right? And they were, they had a for sale sign on that. Pretty clear as day. Kevin Adams was like, yeah, we're open, you know, somebody gives us the right offer. We'll trade him. Which was, you know, not usually how you hear general managers talk about, about players. So he's coming back. And now I wonder, you know, you could trade Bowen by.

room, but then you're opening up a hole on defense that you have to figure out. You could also, the guy I look at, I keep looking at Pittsburgh because it feels like they're the only team that is in a true position to sell. And somebody like Brian Rust would probably solve some of the problems we're talking about in the top six, give you a proven veteran scorer, a great locker room guy. You know, this is a team that's been too young for too long. and if they could package the right future assets and, you know,

make the money work, he makes, you know, a little over five million bucks a year, I think for, uh, not too much longer. They could make that fit.

But then they'd be, you know, right up against the salary cap. Do they have, you know, that, do they have that clearance, right?

I think that continues to be a question when you're sitting there with five million dollars in a roster that is mostly, mostly all set. So they're seemingly banking on the team, you know, the sum being greater than the parts, which has not been the case here. It's almost been the opposite effect that they've had in recent years with all this talent that you see from the outside and they can't make it all fit together. This team fits together better. One more top six piece would be nice if you could move out. You'd have to move out a forward to do it.

So it feels like the roster is pretty close to what we're going to be looking at, if not the exact roster that we'll see when I show up to Key Bank Center for training camp in September. I keep thinking of that famous saying that hope without a plan is just a wish. Feels like we might be in wish mode a little bit on the Sabres. But in our last segment, we're going to see if we can come up with some moves that would help. Final thoughts on the Sabres coming up next. All right. So here we are the end of the show.

I don't know that we fix the Sabres. I don't know that we've given a lot of optimism to Sabers fans. I guess my question is give me the best case scenario. Give me the scenario that results in a year from now, us sitting around talking about the Sabres, not as Stanley Cup champions or anything like that. We're not going to get silly, but talking about them the same way that we would maybe talk about the Canadians

or the senators or a team that is over the hump now, what does this season look like, including any moves that happen, that gets us to that point where Sabres fans are saying, we actually do feel like we're in good hands now. Well, them feeling like they're in good hands would require changing the hands. And aside from that, I don't think people are going to feel good until they're in the playoffs. I can see the path.

Like, I can see how it can work out. It starts to me, you know, I brought up Brian Rust. A player like that, whether it's before the season or in season, you've got the room, being able to add a legitimate proven score. But internally, I think what the reason for optimism might be, they're going to have to be. they're going to have a real training camp this year. Last year they did the global series. So they really just got the NHL group together really quick. They were over in Germany.

It was a really funky start to the season, especially with a new coach who wanted to try to change the culture. They have a real training camp with real competition and real, you know, preparation for the season. And they don't have to spend the first two weeks of their season over. in Europe and then the next week reacclamating. Cage Thompson won a gold medal at World Championships, and I know World Championships is not the end-all-be-all.

It's not, you know, the Olympics or the four nations. But he got a chance to lead and to win. You need him to have a world-class season. You need Alex Tuck to be the same player he's been the last few years, especially last year when he played all 82. You need Rasmus Dahlene to stay healthy. He was banged up in the early part of the season. and he can be one of the five best defensemen in the league when he's healthy.

You need Owen Power to bounce back from an up and down season last year and give your top four, you know, those two anchors that you talked about. Can Kesselring be your answer, you know, in the top four next to Owen Power? That would be a massive help to him. And then somebody needs to emerge. I don't think when we talked about all these unknowns in the forward group, They don't all need to hit, right? Zach Benson, Kulik, Jack Quinn, Josh Norris, don't all need to hit for this to work.

As long as Tage Thompson and Alex Tuck are who they are, you know, we didn't talk about Ryan McLeod much, but that's a guy that really solidified some things in their middle six last season. So they're going to be relying on good health, and certainly goaltending will need to be better. Alex Lyon comes in to be a 1B to Uco Peckalukinins 1A. if they play better team defense, if they're just a better team, you know, last year at times, it was like you're waiting for them to play together and for one another. And that moment against the devils is one that obviously a lot of people were talking about when Tage Thompson got hit, knocked out, and everybody stood around and watched.

And it's one moment that kind of sums up where they're at as just an immature group. So can another year and more maturity help all these guys push this thing over the finish line? I think that's the reason for optimism. But I understand the skepticism at the same time, right? So I think they can do it in part because of the two teams that you mentioned, Ottawa and Montreal. They just did it last season. And I think the Sabres are every bit right there with those teams. I know that might seem crazy, but they were better than Ottawa when they played head-to-head.

year. Montreal owned them last year, but just 12 months ago, we thought Buffalo was ahead of Montreal. And Montreal has been aggressive and done some really good things, but the Eastern Conference, I think, is open enough. They were in a playoff spot at Thanksgiving last year before they had that 13-game winless streak. If they can be just a more mature team and, you know, grind out more of these points, they've got a shot. But they're counting on, quite a few things breaking their way. I'll ask you one more question on a guy that we touched on but didn't talk a lot about. When you look at Buffalo Sabres history, Lindy Ruff has coached 101 playoff games.

He is not just the all-time leader. He is pretty close to being ahead of everyone else put together. You have to go down to Scotty Bowman and Floyd Smith. They're in the 30s. 101 playoff games coached by Lindy Rough for the Buffalo Sabres. Does he get to 102? Or is that a move that maybe has to happen before this team takes that next step? And could it happen this season, depending on how things are playing out?

I will say if it doesn't happen this season, it won't happen. This is the final season of his contract. And if it doesn't happen this season, I don't see it happening. I don't know. It's early, you know, we're still a little ways away from seeing this team on the ice. So it's hard for me to sit here and say they're going to make the playoffs. It's not the smart bet, but I do think they have a chance. And I think Lindy Ruff has a chance to coach another playoff game behind that bench this season.

But if he doesn't get it done this season, I don't think he gets it done at all because I don't know. And it's not necessarily there's any urgency to move on from Lindy Ruff. There definitely isn't from ownership. but he's not getting any younger. And he, I think, took last season extremely personally. And it's sort of a real mission for him to be the, you know, the topic of this show is like of real personal importance to Lindy Ruff. He wants to fix this team.

He wants to get it right. Will he do it? And if he can't do it this year, will he have it in a lot? will he have it in him to come back, you know, and keep trying because he is getting up there and he's, you know, coached a lot of games. He's worked a lot of years and he's got a hell of a tough job here trying to lead this team. And so it wore on him at times last season. And I think if he got there, it would be a chance for him to, you know, kind of step aside and get the next, you know, feel like he left it in good hand. So it's one of the fascinating storylines with this team this season.

I think the closest I can come to some optimism to end on here is I had Lindy Ruff when we did our writer survey as first coach fired for this season. And I think the last time I had Lindy Ruff targeted as a coach about to get fired was that year with the devils where he shocked everybody and the devil shocked everybody. and flipped it around. And I got to say, that was a devil's team. Nobody thought was capable of anything. And then suddenly they were in the playoffs

and we're all looking at them going, they've got all the pieces. This is fantastic. What a great organization. 14 years is a long time, but a lot of things can change in a year in terms of perception. Not a lot of change as far as the roster, but maybe that's what they need for the,

perception to change. Or maybe we're having this exact conversation next year. Either way, thank you very much, Matt. Thank you for listening to the Athletic Hockey Show. Next up, Chun Gentilly and Joshua are going to try to fix the Pittsburgh Penguins, perhaps by trading Brian Russ to the Buffalo Sabres. We'll find out. That's going to be on the next athletic hockey show. Thank you for listening, and we'll talk to you there.