What went wrong for the Sabres

As a fan, it was easy to hope for the 8th and final playoff spot even if it meant a quick 1st round exit. When you really look at this year's Sabres team, you can point to a number of reasons they didn't make the playoffs. I'm picking the defenseman. The #1 reason the Sabres couldn't get to the Stanley Cup last season was because they were not good enough defensively. They did nothing to change that in the off season. With Teppo out (and I realize they didn't expect this until right before training camp), Nathan Paetsch made the line-up as the 7th "D". I'm fine with him there. Toni Lydman and Henrik Tallinder have been absolutely horrible this season (I'm hoping it was just an off year). Spacek and Campbell proved to be the best pair, and then they were forced to trade away Campbell. Dmitri Kalinin has been horrible for most of his career, with the exception of the start of the '06 playoffs. Then you add a very average stay at home defenseman in Nolan Pratt. It was a recipe for disaster in a season where you needed Ryan Miller to play 76 games. Miller was very average this season, and never stole a game for the team. His play, with a bad defensive group in front of him was often times the difference this year. By the end of the season, Miller appeared mentally exhausted. Andrej Sekera and Mike Weber did what they needed to do in the roles they were given, and looked pretty good given how bad the rest of the defenseman were playing. The problem now is what will they do to get better next year. As a fan you should have a problem with this being your 6: Lydman-Tallinder, Spacek-Paetsch, Sekera-Weber. Pratt and Kalinin are unrestricted, and one has to wonder if Teppo will retire. They need to go out and get some veteran "D". If they go into next season with Sekera, Weber and Paetsch in their starting line-up, they will be in the same situation... watching the post season on TV!