Sabres Regular Season Awards: The Norris

by Jcksn22 on Apr 12, 2011 7:31 PM EDT

As the regular season ends, it is time to give out regular season awards to members of the Blue and Gold. I decided to take the Selke, Hart, Calder, and Norris, awards and poll DBTB'ers on who (among the Sabres players) Should have won them. I will try to do one a day or two a day, so that all the major awards are covered. We will continue with the Norris Trophy for defenceman of the year. The last two polls were pretty much forgone conclusions, this one is not so sure.The Sabres blueline as a whole had a good offensive season, with a lot of scoring, (Balanced of course) coming from the D-Corps.

Tyler Myers: Myers followed up his Calder Trophy campaign with a dreadful start to the season. He had 4 goals and 3 assists in the first two months of the season and had a pretty abysmal +/-. He seemed to find his stride midseason and managed 10 goals and 27 helpers. #57 also stepped up his defensive play and managed to get his +/- to an even 0 as the season ended. He led all Sabres defencemen in points. Myers also impressed with his physical game registering about 20 more hits this year than last, with 107 total.

Jordan Leopold: Leopold spent his first few months in a Sabres uniform impressing a lot of people. The former Flame, Panther, and Penguin, seemed to play well when the Sabres sucked, and suck when the Sabres played well. He scored the vast majority of his points before Leo finished with 13 goals and 35 points. The offensive production from him was a huge upside but he finished with a team low -13 +/-.

Andrej Sekara: The offensively minded blueliner put together a career year with 26 assists and 3 goals. Sekara had periods of time where he played downright amazing, calling to mind a 5 game point streak that included 10 points. Andrej's defensive play left something to be desired at time, yet he still finished with a +11.

Steve Montador: Montador put together a solid season as a Sabre with 26 points. He led the team with a +16 and ran away with the blocked shots lead, playing goalie for a total of 138 shots. Led all defencemen in PIM. Like just about every blueliner, he seemed to go hot and cold. Kinda looks like Will Ferrel too.

Mike Weber: Weber is the last D-man I will include here, cause everyone else is a scrub. Weber had a good opening year for the Sabres. Weber has unremarkable offensive ability, he scored 17 points over the span of 58 games, but his reliability and physicality is impressive enough to warrant consideration for the Norris. He made 158 hits in only 58 games, and also seemed to play especially well when Enroth was in net.

Poll

Who was the Sabres Most Outstanding Defenceman this Season?

Tyler Myers

33 votes

Jordan Leopold

20 votes

Andrej Sekara

12 votes

Steve Montador

13 votes

Mike Weber

11 votes

89 votes | Poll has closed

This is a fanpost written by a member of the community, it doesn't necessarily express the views or opinions of Die by the Blade

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Comments

Gotta go Myers...

When he started playing well… so did the team.

Weber was 2nd in my voting. Hes a +22 in games with Buffalo over the last 3 years. Not too shabby.

Lets Go Buff a lo!!!

by bflo on Apr 12, 2011 7:38 PM EDT reply actions

Agreed, if Myers can step it up in the post season, that would be great,

eh?
Drinking the Pegul-Aid since 2011

by Jcksn22 on Apr 12, 2011 8:39 PM EDT up reply actions

Weber

Consistent throughout. I would have voted Monty but after his his injury he trailed off a bit.
Weber played like a beast the entire season and gave us EXACTLY what we needed on the back end. As much as Myers and Leopold and even Sekera did on the offensive tip, Weber was the one who steadied them all and allowed those guys to take the risks that gave them those points.

by JSCoope on Apr 12, 2011 9:07 PM EDT reply actions

Sekera

Sekera (and Butler in the 2nd half) have really developed nicely and should be staples on our blue line for a long time.

Myers struggled and then recovered but has yet to regain his dominance that he displayed last season.
Weber has been solid and very impressive in his rookie season, and very physical which was lacking before. If he could stop taking the occasional dumb penalty I would vote him for this award.

Montador and Leopold have been hit-or-miss this year. When they are good they are very good, and when they are bad they are very bad. Morissonn has been downright scary, I can’t even talk about him.

Gragnani, not to be ignored, has shown much promise the last few weeks.

by lassathrax on Apr 12, 2011 9:19 PM EDT reply actions

Myers.

Weber would get my second place vote with Sekera third.
I really hope to see a Myers/Weber pairing in the near future; could be a monster pairing.

Save Jenrry Mejia!

by Ogre39666 on Apr 12, 2011 10:38 PM EDT reply actions

MONTYYYY!!!

For the start of the season, he was great. He slowed down a little as the season went on, but he led in two of the most important defensive categories: blocked shots and +/-.
And don’t forget he was basically signed as an enforcer to replace Petey.

The "new" Buffalo Sabres are here! With Superman Pegula handing out the funds, they can do anything and everything!

by sabresfan96 on Apr 13, 2011 3:58 PM EDT reply actions

Sekera/Myers have a tie from me, theyve both been outstanding, obviously myers had a rough beginning of the year, but so did everyone else.

Leopold has been good, Montador good, BUT OH MY GOSH WEBER HAS BEEN A GREAT DEFENCEMAN FOR US. I voted for sekera cause i LOVE watching him with the puck, our defense has picked up guys.

by FgallosJAGS on Apr 13, 2011 8:13 PM EDT reply actions