Weekend thoughts

There was a report in the Edmonton Journal that the Sabres are very unhappy with Drew Stafford and Tim Connolly’s performances in the playoffs and are now desperate to trade the duo. That’s all fine and dandy. However, I want to say this: I know most fans would consider trading Connolly an addition by subtraction type of a deal. Meaning, they wouldn’t care what we got in return, because Tinny Tim would be gone from our lives. I don’t exactly agree with that notion. Well, actually I do, but it’s for different reasons.

Lets just say the Sabres trade Connolly and don’t get equal value for him. Like they trade him for a prospect and a draft pick. I’m totally fine with getting guys that you have to wait a year to take off. However, I think it would behove the Sabres to take whatever money is left over from the Connolly deal and use it towards signing or trading for another player.

Look, I’m only saying that because the Sabres have always been known to be a little shady when it comes to money. The hire-ups may be thinking that the fans venom for Connolly and Stafford may be so lethal that people won’t care what they get for them as long as they are gone. They could just deal them for nothing and look at it as a way to save on costs. Hey, crazier things have happened with this franchise in trying to save money.

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If I were to bet dollars to donuts on which UFA the Sabres are going to re-sign, I’m going to say Mike Grier. Grier is a valuable chip for the Sabres and judging by their roster, they don’t exactly have many guys that can replace his leadership qualities. There’s no reason why Grier shouldn’t return to the Sabres next year. He far and away exceeded his contract requirements and looked to have left off where he was four years ago with the club. Plus, he wouldn’t cost as much as Toni Lydman and Henrik Tallinder.

As for the defensemen, man, if you were tell me in October that I wouldn’t want Lydman or Tallinder to leave the team, I’d have said that Quinn and Regier must have contaminated my water with a shill-antidote. Both guys rebounded nicely after having a couple of subpar years with the team. I really think it’s important for the Sabres to sign one of these two guys. The defense played rather nicely last year and losing 2/6th’s of your blue line wouldn’t be a good hockey move.

Personally, I’d go with Tallinder. I think Tallinder had the better year of the two. I just thought Lydman had some inconsistency and turnover issues this year. Yes, Lydman played well against the Bruins in the playoffs, but he was also benched a couple of times this year. Also, you have to give good grades to Tallinder for helping/teaching Tyler Myers. Yes, you’d be stupid to think that Hank didn’t play an important role in the development of the rookie phenom.

Here’s the bottom line: One of these guys has to stay with the club. The Sabres can’t afford going into next year with Steve Montador being the number 2 defenseman. Sorry, but excluding the playoffs, Montador was below average this year. To think that the Sabres defensemen could be Myers, Montador, Andrej Sekera, Chris Butler, Mike Weber and Craig Rivet (Who may not be ready for the start of the season) for next year, kind of scares me. This is no time for the Sabres to try and have a baptism by fire with their blue line.

If the Sabres elect to have Tallinder and Lydman walk away without signing anyone of equal value, then that system they have been raving about will be in full effect. BTW, that system I’m talking about is when salaries start going up and there’s always the cheap youth option that you can throw on the ice.

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-I don’t know about you, but I’m all about having Brian Brohm start for the Bills next year. I’m leading the campaign for Brohm 2010. I mean you gotta belief in something for the Bills this year. As far as I’m concerned, we haven’t seen what this kid has to offer in the pro game. Hey, the guy is a former 2nd round pick that has only started one NFL game. At one point, Brohm was thought to be going first overall in the draft. OK, most of my excitement towards having him start is due to not wanting to endure another season of Fitzpatrick and Edwards-

-I haven’t really spoken about this, but I’m really excited that Nick Mendola has come on over to the other side. Mendola just started his new show this week on WECK, slated for 7-10pm (Unless there’s a Yanks game on). It’s also the only live sports show in Buffalo airing at that specific time. Mendola is like on the Mount Rushmore of idolized writers in the blogger community. I’ve never really heard Nick on the air, mainly because he was a producer at WGR. However, I’ve always enjoyed his writings on WGR.com and his Immediate Reactions column he has up after Bills games is a must read. Speaking of WGR, I’ve also gotten a big kick out of seeing Mike Schopp and The Bulldog all of a sudden start writing weekly columns on the WGR site. I’m sure their writing interest started to peak (OK, more like they were told to write) when Mendola left the station-

-So let me get this straight: The real reason Ben Roethlisberger is a jerk to women is because he suffers from some sort of dementia from his motorcycle accident? That was one of the reasons SI.com gave in regarding Big Ben’s lack of knowing when women don’t want to see his, um, Big Ben. Well, I guess you can add that excuse to the growing list of reasons guys come on too strongly to girls. Thanks, Ben. I’ll be sure to use the head trauma line when a girl tells me to get lost at a bar-

-I don’t know about you guys, but I’ve lost interest in the NHL playoffs. I’ve said it before and you may consider it to be blasphemy on my end, but I’m a Buffalo Sabres fan, not a hockey fan. Once the Sabres season ends, my hockey viewing habits consist of watching Barry Melrose on Sportscenter and watching bits here and there-

-Speaking of Sportscenter, are we going to have live back-to-back-to-back reports of Lawrence Taylor, Tiger Woods and Ben Roethlisiberger? God, how I hate tabloid journalism. Sorry, but I just don’t care!!!-