In the Eye on Hockey midseason awards posted on Tuesday (Look, right here!), I picked the Buffalo Sabres as the season's most disappointing team so far. They haven't been the worst, but based on their expectations, they have been thoroughly underwhelming.
One reason I cited for that was their lack of scoring. But their lack of stopping the other team from scoring -- a.k.a. Ryan Miller's job as the starting goaltender -- has been as much of a culprit. Like the Sabres as a team, he has high expectations and he's not meeting them.
And the people of Buffalo are letting him know it, if he reads the newspaper, that is.
Check out the latest comic from Buffalo News artist Adam Zyglis.
It's like whatever got to that goalie in that stupid McDonald's hockey ad has hit Miller or something. Staying on the advertisement train of though, I wonder how those ad gurus with the "be manly, drink Miller Lite" commercials feel about this.
I love the detail of putting Miller in the old slug sweater. Obviously that's his job to pay attention to detail, but still, it's great go get a visual reminder of how bad those jerseys were. Then again, if Miller were putting up the same numbers, I bet Buffalo would be more than happy to go back to the slug.
Entering the season, Miller seemed like a prime candidate for a bounceback season. The team in front of him was expected to be improved and he was mediocre -- by his standards -- last season for the Sabres by posting a 2.59 goals against and .916 save percentage.
This season he's on pace for his worst numbers since he played four games back in 2003-04. In 24 starts he is just 10-11-2 while sporting a 3.05 GAA and .901 save percentage.
My how long ago the Vancouver Olympics seem.
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