What Is the Sabres' Downfall?

First and foremost, what happened? 

The withdrawal of Chris Drury and Daniel Briere (mostly Drury) just dismantled the Buffalo Sabres. Alright, Briere was there for a couple years and made things happen, but when he went to Philadelphia, he became nothing.

Face it, he is 5 feet 10 inches and 180 pounds. He played a total of 29 games this past 2008-2009 season and even five for the Phantoms, the farm team of the Flyers.  Working hard can only go so far to when you hang back door just waiting for the easy goal.

Try having him go against big bad Dion or Chara! Lights out, its done bud. 

Now losing Chris Drury was the biggest downfall. Remember the goal with 7.8 seconds left in the playoffs against the New York Rangers in game five? Yeah, that is a guy you can count on at almost any time.

In his entire career, he as never missed more than 11 games. That's both reliability and skill in the same person.

I would like to add that losing Brian Campbell was a huge let down because of his offensive minded playing and some bone crushing hits.  Does R.J. Umberger ring a bell? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3Gvfr9GUC0.

Back to the Sabres.  I like Lindy Ruff.  He is a fine coach, and it can't be just his fault for the team's production.  I'm sure if he had the opportunity he would put on a pair of skates and get his nose dirty, but he cant do that. He can only teach the players the plays they can execute during games. 

Now, I have looked at some of the players playing and Dominic Moore, Andrej Sekera, and even Matt Ellis have not flown over well with me. 

After signing his huge contract, Jason Pominville has been the biggest disappointment I have seen. I would like to say he is a great player, but everything that needed to be done was not being accomplished by him. 

One person I like is Jaroslav Spacek. I am a defenseman like him, and I really like his style of play. He is a great person to form a team around. 

Well, now I am ranting and I haven't covered much at all, but those are my thoughts. Later tonight or tomorrow I will go more in depth and do different sports teams.