The Buffalo F*cking Sabres

"NOW YOU'RE GOING TO LOSE TO COLUMBUS?! THIS IS GETTING RIDICULOUS!!"

"That's it sabres. We're done. Between squandering your 3-1 lead against Pittsburgh, losing to Ottawa and now your inability to beat the 2nd worse team in the nhl, WITH A BACKUP GOALIE IN has pushed me too far"

"Dear Buffalo, If you do not beat a "ward-less" hurricanes, I will never cheer for you again. Sincerely Draper"

"Awesome Sabres, lose to Carolina twice in a week. You guys are the best!"

These are some of the Facebook status updates that have been posted by my buddy, and longtime Sabres fan, Drapes. Because he was so upset, and because I am lazy, I let him write a post for the blog so he could vent his frustrations about the Sabres recent play.

Before the rant however there are 3 critical facts you need to know about Drapes as a sports fan, 1) his favorite baseball team is the Atlanta Braves 2) his favorite basketball team is the Toronto Raptors and 3) he likes the CFL.

What do these 3 facts tell us about Drapes?

He is a glutton for punishment and enjoys the crappier things in life. Imagine watching your team win 5 NL Pennants and only 1 World Series? Or having your favorite hockey team lose the Stanley Cup on the worst no call in NHL history. Or worse yet having to watch the CFL. Its a hard life and one that seems to have finally broken his spirits.

Here is a desperate rant by a desperate man:

Now I have been a Buffalo Sabres fan for 11 years at this point. So I have followed them through crappy season after crappy season and still my faith has not shaken.

I watched them turn a President’s Trophy season into a disappointing loss in the Conference Finals to the Carolina Hurricanes, and still my faith was not shaken.

I even watched Sabres management take a Stanley Cup contending team and throw it away by losing not just Daniel Briere OR Chris Drury, a pill that would have been hard to swallow on its own, but instead, losing both Briere AND Drury.

And yet STILL my faith was not shaken.

This season however, I see my faith and my pride wavering as the Sabres are successfully turning what looked to be a great season, into the most frustrating season of my 11 year history with the team.

Now there is really no difference in talent this year as there has been in Buffalo for the last 2 non playoff seasons, so I had little hopes for a decent showing this season. But for some reason the Sabres started the season hot and have had a controlling lead in the Northeast Division since about the 2^nd week of the season.

At one point, we were so far ahead that not only were we in contention to take the conference lead, but we were the only team in the Northeast division to even be in a playoff spot.

So I am sitting at home thinking “wow, what an impressive showing”. But oh wait, I knew things couldn’t be that easy.

Cue the streaking Senators.

The Senators, for some reason unknown to me or anybody else, were able to turn themselves from a team that was struggling to get out of the basement of the conference, to a team that is suddenly being toted as a contender. They went on a ridiculous 12 game winning streak pulling themselves ever closer to the Buffalo Sabres in the Northeast Division standings.

My issue with the Sabres is not doing them doing poorly. That I can handle. My issue is the way they play with my emotions through their inconsistent play.

For instance, this season; no more than a month ago I was excited because my Sabres were in the midst of a 7 game winning streak. However in the last 10 games they are 3-5-2 and have just fallen to 5^th place in the conference. 2 of those losses have come to the Carolina Hurricanes, who don’t even have Cam Ward, and a 4-0 loss to the Columbus Blue Jackets! And yet Saturday night they can somehow come out and win against the San Jose Sharks.

And inconsistency doesn’t just exist at the standings level, it is even a factor during their games. I often watch the Sabres throw away leads to lose games. I was watching the Sabres/Pens game last week with a friend of mine who is a Pens fan, and going into the 3^rd period the score was 3-1 Sabres. Needless to say I did a little bit of gloating. Then comes the Sidney Crosby hat trick and a 5-4 Sabres loss.

Now don’t get me wrong, I still love the Buffalo Sabres, and I probably always will, but I don’t know how much longer my heart can handle the ups and downs of their inconsistent games and standings. Smarten up, and give Miller some support up front, he can’t do it all.

Now Ryan Miller is off to play for team USA in the Olympics which will surely fatigue him even more. The Sabres are a team in trouble right now and I don't see things getting better for them. I could personally care less about the Sabres. If anything their continued struggles provide me with endless entertainment as I get to see the frustrations and emotion of a normally calm man boil to the surface via Facebook.

For now it seems as if there is no end in sight for Drapes' agony and even though he is wavering at the moment I know that come next year he will still be a Sabres fan and will still defend them to the death.

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