BillsFan4

Makes the Kane trade better and the ROR trade that much worse. lol

I guess he is leaving to focus on his nascar team or something like that I don’t think so. It was, but I thought he kind of set the record straight in that article on the Athletic a while back. I just meant that this should officially put it to bed.

I am just listening to the interview now. They are talking about Phil Kessel.

https://wgr550.radio.com/media/audio-channel/05-21-winnipeg-jets-head-coach-paul-maurice-howard-and-jeremy-ralph-krueger Paul Maurice on WGR talking about Ralph Krueger. He was an assistant on Ralph Krueger’s team Europe, and iirc they worked together with carolina too. Maurice - - incredible presence in the locker room - what’s most interesting to him is that when he travels around to other cities and runs into one of the guys from the World Cup team, their first question is “hey have you talked to Ralph?”. Says he made such an impression on not just the players, but the equipment guys, the medical guys, media members etc etc. He just gives off this incredible energy, and it goes from 5am to midnight. - He’s just wired differently than other guys. Energy level is off the charts. - Ralph does leadership consulting and leadership forums in his spare time. Excellent public speaker, which Maurice says is very important with hockey players. They are easy to lose, but that’s not a problem with Ralph. Says there are times during the year when you really need to grab the players attention, and that’s never a problem with Ralph. - this is the right time for Ralph’s personality to be in the game, with players personalities today. He’s a real “connector”. When Maurice started in NHL, players took care of themselves. No cell phones, soclai media etc. Now it’s much different. Players need a lot more 1 on 1 attention, and Ralph is great at that. He has a great ability to connect with people. - feels the ability to connect with players may be the most important aspect of NHL coaching these days. Times have changed. Players and coaches used to be separated. to push a player hard these days, Maurice says there has to be a deeper connection than just player/coach relationship. Need to have a connection and the players need to understand you care. That’s something he learned from Ralph - connecting with everyone, not just players, and making them feel included in, and important to, what the team is doing (sounds just like McDermott). - but he’s not soft. He has no problem holding room accountable. He can really let it fly when he needs to. Has a good balance between the 2. - coached his Swiss teams to be very quick on the puck, and very detailed without being too constricted in the way they play. I didn’t do the last 5 minutes because I really think it’s worth a listen for yourselves. Maurice tells some stories and goes into details that I felt wouldn’t be accurately conveyed by me. Definitely some good stuff around the 9 minute mark. If you only listen to part of the interview, I would start at 9 minutes. Maurice sounded very impressed by Krueger and talks about multiple things he’s learned from him. Paul Maurice is one of the most respected coaches in the NHL. It’s cool to hear him talking about learning from Krueger.

I really hope they give Gase control of the 53. It’ll limit most of the better GM candidates from even getting permission to interview (iirc it’s not viewed as a true promotion if they don’t have control of the 53 man roster). I actually feel a bit a bit bad for Jets fans. But it’s also a fun story to follow. lol

Thanks guys. Glad it sounds like it was his choice. As I said, I’m sad to see Kelso go. But I think Wood will be good at this, especially with all the insight he has into this current Bills organization and how McBeane do things. His articles on The Athletic have been really good. So I expect more of the same.

They must not be too concerned with Morse if they’re not having Long play center. Who the heck is playing C though? If Bodine and Morse are both injured, who else is left besides Long?

Yeah I’m bummed he’s leaving. But happy E. Wood is here. wonder if he chose to leave or what?

Was just coming to post this. Pretty cool! Very happy E. Wood is back in the Bills organization! Plus We can fully put to bed that there were any hard feeling over his whole retirement press conference debacle.

I thought Kesler was a typo. Figured he meant Kessel or someone. LOL if he actually said Kesler. Ryan Kesler is most likely out for the entire 2019-20 season already, and may be done playing all together. https://www.latimes.com/sports/ducks/la-sp-ryan-kesler-ducks-surgery-20190513-story.html And he’s owed almost $7M a year for 3 more years. I loved Kesler back in the day, but he hasn’t been the same player for years now between the back and hip injuries, and may in fact be completely done. Plus he has a no trade clause and loves Anaheim. Nobody is trading for Kesler unless it’s as a cap dump after he’s on permanent LTIR.

Chris Brown saying it looks like Beasley and Morse had hernia surgeries. Says Russel Bodine is still recovering from his shoulder surgery, so now Spencer Long is the starting center. Wucks. I really wanted to see Josh build chemistry with Morse. Hopefully he’s not out too long here.

Does this add 2 years into his current deal, making it 3 years total that the Bills have him under contract?

He definitely fits the type of character/personality the Bills look for. Great teammate, great in the community, very passionate about football, always has an upbeat attitude. IMO He would definitely fit the new culture here perfectly. But I am not sure if the Bills will have interest now. If this happened before the draft I think they’d probably have jumped quicker than now. But I hope they do at least bring him in for a visit (if he’s interested). He’s not what he used to be on the field, but he’s still one of my favorite personalities in football.

Marrone tried him there and it didn’t last long. I believe he threw a bit of a temper tantrum because he was coming up on his next contract and wanted to be paid as a left tackle, not a RT. So maybe he didn’t give it his all? I don’t know. But I remember that he didn’t last long on the right side and reported were that he really struggled.

https://www.newyorkjets.com/video/adam-gase-rookie-orientation-press-conference-5-10 Looka like Gase figured out a way to hide those crazy eyes of his.... lol

I’m guessing his uncle’s relationship with frank Reich is a huge reason why he got this 1 more chance. He needs to be a total choir boy with Indy. Chris Ballard won’t tolerate anything from Kelly. He’s a big “character” guy, like Beane. If he doesn't do well both on and off the field, I agree, this is probably it for Kelly. He does have a chance to start rehabbing his image though. If he does that and flashes his talent on the field, someone could take a shot on him again if he doesn’t stick in Indy. We will see, I guess. I am not sure if Chad is capable of being as well behaved as he’s going to need to be to stick in Indy.

https://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2019/05/20/colts-sign-quarterback-chad-kelly/ Colts finally signed Chad

Starting a new Sabres thread. The old one was getting long. Edit - here is a link to the Sabres 2019/20 schedule: https://www.nhl.com/sabres/schedule/2020-03-01/ET

It must be nice to own a business where no matter how terribly you run it (year after year after year), you just keep making cash hand over fist...

Once again thanks for doing this stevewin. It’s a good read every time. Appreciate the effort it takes to do this for us.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/nhl/2016/09/28/ralph-krueger-world-cup-southampton-football-club/91240876/ Another good article on Krueger from a few years ago.

Love all the info @john wawrow. Thanks for sharing!

Fellow coaches expect Krueger to thrive, adjust with Sabres https://nhl.nbcsports.com/2019/05/16/fellow-coaches-expect-krueger-to-thrive-adjust-with-sabres/comment-page-1/#comment-609047