Just replacing Ruff won't be enough for me

Yesterday, Schopp and The Bulldog were talking about what the problem is with the Sabres.

Schopp said that we would be excited about next season merely if the Sabres were to replace Lindy Ruff with Peter Laviolette who won the Stanley Cup with the Carolina Hurricanes.

Here is my response to that line of thinking:

I think Mike’s take on the people at the Sabres slacking because everyone feels like they have “Jobs for Life” was dead on.

And to me, it all starts with Golisano. Coming out of the lockout, Golisano was visible at the games and in the media. But, after the honeymoon ended, the Drury & Briere debacle occurred, and the fans and media got ticked off, Golisano seemed to disappear.

Add in Larry Quinn’s statement a few weeks ago that Ruff and Regier would be back even if they missed the playoffs “because that’s not how we do things here” and the biggest issue with the Sabres is that from ownership on down there is not the sense of urgency present that the fans and media would like to see from their team.

To me, replacing Ruff with Laviolette wouldn’t be enough to get me revved up for next year. I think this roster is really flawed and the spike from a new voice would get drowned out over the course of the year.

Management (Golisano, Quinn, and Regier) need a sense of urgency with regards to remaking the team (coaching staff and players) this offseason. There needs to be concrete moves made that show that finishing 10^th in back to back years (along with missing the playoffs in 5 of the last 7 seasons) is not good enough.

And to me, bringing back 80 to 90% of the players and changing the coach is not enough.

They need a new voice PLUS they need to remove 3 or 4 “Core” players and replace them with some real war horse veterans, preferably ones with Stanley Cup rings on their fingers.

And if we are talking head coaches for a Buffalo team, I would hope they would go more blue collar than Laviolette. He may need some seasoning, but Bob Boughner has been coaching in Major Junior. I could see Bob being a coach that Buffalo would love to move forward with