Brad Richards or not, Sabre fans have already won

As hockey writers outside of Buffalo continue to chime in and criticize the Sabres for the Robyn Regher and Christian Ehrhoff signings, forgive us if we just sit back and laugh.

Where were these "experts" last summer when the Sabres squabbled over what was, relatively speaking, pennies as they jettisoned Tim Kennedy and let two giant parts of their defense sign elsewhere while replacing them with cheaper options?

It sounds petty, it sounds childish, but the only conclusion is jealousy. What other reason can these scribes, both in the U.S and Canada have?

Canadian writers...well that one is obvious. While their beloved Maple Leafs have been less relevant than the Phoenix Coyotes over the last half-decade, their beloved Stanley Cup hasn't belonged to a Canadian team since Zach and A.C Slater were making Saved By The Bell.

Buffalo becoming the next Detroit as far as hockey is concerned is a phenomenal thing for the game and a phenomenal thing for Canadian teams in the Eastern Conference, yet they are up there crying foul and likening the Ehrhoff deal to last year's Ilya Kovalchuk debacle.

To liken the 10-year, $40 million deal the Sabres gave to Ehrhoff to the Devils' joke of a deal to Kovalchuk is not even apples and oranges...it's comparing apples and jackhammers.

First off, it's a 10-year deal to a guy who would be 39 when the contract expires. Ask Nik Lidstrom if 39 is too old for a defenseman in the NHL.

Kovalchuk's deal was 17 years to a guy who would be 44 at the end of the contract. You don't even have to mention the fact that the two deals are spearated by a $64 million gulf financially. How is this even a debate?

NHL.com's EJ Hradek (who does fantastic work) kept his criticism to the overwhelming high Sabre fans are on. He tweeted this after the Ehrhoff signing was made official: "Sorry Sabres fans, spending 40 million on a second pair D doesn't have me thinking Stanley Cup."

Fair enough, but this is about so much more than two above-average defensemen who will be terrific mentors to Tyler Myers and Marc-Andre Gragnani (and Brayden McNabb down the line).

This is about the rally in Niagara Square after the NHL gave Dallas a Stanley Cup. The one where John Rigas told the fans that he was going to "give us the tools to finish the job." He didn't.

This is about our old owner, Mr. Golisano, who deserves some credit for rescuing the franchise when it was at its lowest point. The excitement when Golisano bought the team was similar to how things felt initially when Terry Pegula bought the Sabres.

That good will towards Golisano quickly eroded under teams that didn't perform and because of penny-pinching decisions by the higher-ups in the organization that led to Darcy Regier becoming the whipping boy for angry fans.

We know the history, we live it and feel it every day. This city loves this team more than any other city in the United States loves their hockey team.

Those writers probably haven't been to a Sabres game in Tampa in mid-February when the St. Pete Times Forum becomes the home rink of the Sabres, filled with Sabre fans on vacation and displaced fans from Buffalo.

Games like the one when a puck went into the side of the net and counted as a goal, in the playoffs against Philadelphia were just assignments for those writers to write about. For Sabre fans, those games are entrenched in our memory and are fodder for our citywide inferiority complex when it comes to sports.

We have been disenchanted at times because of the bumbling of the stooges running the National Hockey League and by team owners who talked with tremendous fury about how the Sabres were going to win the cup, then didn't do what needed to be done to even put a playoff-caliber team on the ice.

Too many snake oil salesmen have come through our city and we've fallen for their talk of change every single time. And while Pegulamania has been present since the new regime's first day on the job, there has been an underlying despair that maybe we were going down THAT road again...we were going to fall into the same trap, Wile E. Coyote style.

Everything this organization has done since the Game 7 loss in Philly has proven that we have finally met the love of our life....and they love us too (they even bloggers...can you believe it!?!?).

Acquiring Regher and Ehrhoff are great hockey moves, but we should take pride that those guys could have said no, but didn't. Instead, Pegula, Ted Black and company became ambassadors for this city that we love, and got Regher and Ehrhoff to believe in what we have all bought into.