NHL Preview: Buffalo Sabres

Part two of our thirty part series previewing the NHL season focuses on the Buffalo Sabres.

The Sabres were content to stand pat for the most part during this offseason, which was probably a wise choice, given that in '06 they took the eventual Stanley Cup Champions to seven games in the Conference Championship Game. They are, arguably, the favorites to win the Prince of Wales Eastern Conference in '07.

But a lack of player personnel moves in the offseason has not equaled a lack of activity in Buffalo. In what, if true, is arguably one of the most important moves of the summer by any team, the Sabres decided that this wasn't nearly fierce enough. In order to give themselves more competitive advantage, the Sabres have made sure that teams making the trek to upstate New York will now be faced with this under their skates at center ice. So far, the only complaints about the new logo have come from the engineers in charge of maintaing the ice surface, whose job it is to scrape the players' vomit off of the ice. Oh, and also this little website.

Seriously though. What the hell is wrong with the people who do graphic design for the NHL? As bad as the new Sabres logo (affectionately refered to as the Buffa-Slug) is, it probably isn't even the worst idea for a uniform redesign that we've seen. Remember the Islanders' Fisherman? Or the Canucks' V (For victory, by the way. NOT for Vancouver)?

Let's face it, when it comes to truly awful uniform design , the NHL is lightyears ahead of other major pro sports leagues. For every Seattle Seahawk you show me, I'll counter with the inaugural Washington Capitals. Think the Oregon Ducks look particularly bad? Well... okay, so the Nike-designed Oregon unis pretty much take the cake. But the point is, the NHL trots out some really heinous uniforms.

Of course, that said, when the NHL gets it right, a hockey sweater pretty much kicks every other kind of uniform's ass.

Oh, right... the Sabres. Ummm... I'm going to say they finish the season atop the conference and advance to the Stanley Cup Finals.

For all your Buffalo Sabres blogging needs, check out Sabre Rattling.

Red Carpet Wrap-Up

Overall, I was 3 for 8 in my predictions for the night. Glad to see AO add another Calder-themed award to the franchise's '06 trophy case. Only real surprise was Jagr winning the Lester B. Pearson Award. Maybe I'm biased because of his time here in Washington, but it seems to me that, if anything, the results of the Pearson and the Hart would have been reversed. I can see idiot sportswriters dismissing Joe Thornton because he didn't play an entire season with the same team (seriously, I actually read that somewhere), while fawning over Jagr's resurgence in the media capital of the world. But Jagr being voted MVP by the rest of the NHLPA, but not by the Hockey Writers' Association? I don't get it. (I also don't get why the NHL needs two seperate MVP awards) (or two seperate goaltending awards for that matter) (but that is neither here nor there).

EDIT: I totally didn't notice this, as I didn't actually watch the awards ceremony, but Olie Kolzig won the King Clancy Trophy. That made my night. Olie Kolzig, in his time with the Capitals, has been a perfect model of everything a professional athlete should be, and I only hope that the Capitals can put a much more important piece of silver hardware in his hands before he retires. Of all the Caps greats who retired Cup-less because of Washington's sustained mediocrity, I think he deserves it the most.

EDIT #2: Technically, Rod Langway won a Cup at the beginning of his career when he was in Montreal. I've never been one to let facts get in the way, though.

EDIT #3 (Last one, I promise): Just wanted to point out this excellent Caps-centric recap of awards night.