fire bucky gleason

You'll see one of the blogs I link is Fire Joe Morgan. It's hilarious, if sometimes insightful, baseball commentary on baseball commentary. The premise is, basically, calling out Joe Morgan for being a lazy, uninformed baseball analyst. So, in a similar vein, my brother and I have begun doing the same with Bucky Gleason. Gleason writes for the Buffalo News, and generally does so without a trace of actual journalism. In a way, it's kind of impressive. But just as deserving of criticism. Unfortunately, it's not limited to just him. So as part of an ongoing feature here I'll be calling out various sportwriters with whom I disagree. Enjoy, or not.

Today's Bucky Gleason of the Day is Mike Harrington.

Remember this: For a team desperate for help after back-to-back 10th-place finishes, it’s a virtual certainty that not one player the Sabres pick this weekend will play for them next season.

Which means we should really just kind of take this weekend to enjoy a little offseason attention for the Sabres, I assume. Yes?

The Sabres need help. Fast. There’s never been as much pressure on Regier and coach Lindy Ruff as there is now. Regier is on the clock starting this weekend. And I’m not talking about draft picks.

Wait, I thought this column was about the draft? No, maybe? Hmm.

Appearing Monday on WGR Radio, Regier nearly made me drive off the road when he said the team was “still on the upswing.”

The upswing? The upswing?

Remind me to head for cover when we approach the downswing.

You want a downswing? How about five straight years as one of the worst two teams in the league. That'd be pretty awful, right? I'd say so. Five years of no playoffs, not just two. And it wouldn't be missing the playoffs by a grand total of six points in two years. It would be falling colossally short of the playoffs. I can't even imagine the complaints we'd have to hear if that happened.

Then there’s injuries. The Sabres didn’t make the playoffs last season because they weren’t good enough when it counted. Again.

Sabres missed by two points. That's one win. Are you honestly trying to say having Ryan Miller available for the thirteen games he was out with an injury would not have resulted in at least one additional win? Perhaps two or three. That sounds like a playoff team that got bit by the injury bug.

Enough about Ryan Miller. Enough about Tim Connolly. Let him play a full season and then we’ll decide how much of a difference he makes.

Healthy, he's a point a game player. I'd say that's a pretty big difference. I mean, it's not like there aren't other players whose effectiveness is questionable based on injury histories, right?

Regier said he didn’t want to throw out injuries, particularly Miller’s, as an excuse, and then he threw them out as an excuse. The Red Wings aren’t ruing how they lost the Stanley Cup because Pavel Datsuyk was hurt. They just said the Penguins were better.

I'm calling shenanigans. The Red Wings couldn't use Datsyuk as an excuse because they went up 2-0 without him, and then when he came back and the series was tied 2-2, Detroit plastered Pittsburgh 5-0. Then lost the last two games with Datsyuk in the lineup. So, yeah, Datsyuk's injury isn't an excuse for them. He was out for four games, the first two of which Detroit won. As for Miller, again, Buffalo finished two points out of the playoffs. And he was gone for thirteen games. During which Buffalo went 4-7-2. Again, we're only looking for two points. You're saying having Millsy ready to go for those thirteen games the Sabres wouldn't go 5-6-2? Or even 6-6-1. Especially since, once they got him back, they went 6-2-1. But hey, we're just ruing our lousy luck and not addressing our GLARING PROBLEMS. Or, whatever.

As for the draft itself, the Sabres have picked defensemen in the first round the last three years. I’m assuming a forward is coming with No. 13 this time. And hopefully a big one. No one under 6-foot need apply.

Oh yeah! I completely forgot! This was an article about the NHL draft! Don't worry, you were still able to take another shot at Darcy. So it's all good. Also, this is hockey, so you're not hoping they don't pick a "defenseman," you're hoping they don't pick a "defenceman."

But that’s all for down the road. Starting today, Regier had better be doing something for this season.

He's shown a somewhat unique ability (judging by the Flyers and Rangers typical strategy anyways) to not try and mortgage the next three years for one run. We've got great building blocks, which need to be augmented by perhaps a new defenceman and a new forward. All we're looking for is two points. We can get that without digging ourselves into salary cap hell for half the next decade.