I could’ve done without the agonizing breaks between games of the Stanley Cup Final, but it’s worked out in a way. Playing game seven on Monday sets up a sprint to Thursday’s draft and the opening of free agency on July 1 In between, Fanatics launched their new on-ice jerseys with the Kings and Ducks dropping their new designs for 2024-25. The end of this week could be a whirlwind of action as teams play catchup on trades and signings now that the Cup has been awarded.
The Sabres will be among those clubs as they are expected to buy out Jeff Skinner when the buyout window officially opens. The buyout will give the Sabres an additional $7.5 million in cap space and the onus will fall on Kevyn Adams to use that space wisely. As previously discussed, there are some financial hurdles to clear with Skinner’s buyout. Even with the cap expected to rise, the three added years of dead cap eats up the approximate salary of a bottom six player. There’s also the larger cap hit in year three to contend with. In order to extract full value from this decision, the Sabres need to cash in on the cap and roster space created by the buyout. That means finding established NHL talent to acquire this offseason in order to tangibly improve the roster and break the playoff drought. They can seek players with term, but this buyout also opens the door for a rental acquisition. Adams has the most space to play with this summer, he has to use it to his advantage. The Sabres can lean on their pipeline when the dead cap stings the most, but they can’t use a buyout on Skinner and not use the cap savings to improve the roster.
Now, for your questions:
JSymon86 – What would you consider a successful off-season for Adams?
He has to improve the forward group. Even before the Skinner buyout, we knew he was going to be chasing at least one center, probably one who can shoulder some defensive responsibility. With the added flexibility the buyout provides, I feel like he almost needs to make two really notable forward acquisitions. The first being a quality center to slot in behind Tage Thompson and Dylan Cozens and the second being an impactful winger. He doesn’t need to sign Steven Stamkos or anything crazy, but a winger who can comfortably slot in somewhere in the team’s top nine feels like a greater necessity post-Skinner. I’m not sure how they want to spend their assets, but Pavel Buchnevich strikes me as a pretty decent use of that newly created space.
I’ll be curious to see what Adams has in mind on defense. I’d prefer if they could find another top four talent who would allow Mattias Samuelsson to play fewer minutes, but I’m not sure that’s what they have in mind. I’m not quite as concerned with how they add to the blueline given the personnel they already have in place. There is potential for upwards of four new forwards to be in the opening night lineup and I feel like Adams needs two of them to be impactful additions. So that’s how I’m going to score the offseason. If Adams can push the right button on two notable forward acquisitions, I think he’ll be in decent shape.
Gasparlemarc – DEFCON level if Adams holds and picks at #11?
This first requires us to know what the current DEFCON (or BUFFCON?) level is entering an offseason with a 13-year playoff drought. I might argue they’re at two or one already, but that wouldn’t be as fun.
I’m not overly concerned if Adams makes his pick at 11 on Friday night. They have a fairly plentiful collection of assets they can use in a trade, so I don’t feel that they’re duty bound to move the pick. I’d prefer if they did, since they could at least theoretically use the pick in one trade and ship out a prospect in another. But I’ll put it at a nice, comfy DEFCON 3.
Not dealing the pick puts the onus on Adams to use one of his prospects in a deal, it also could mean he didn’t make a trade of note ahead of the draft, which could set off some alarm bells since the draft has become one of the main swap meets on the NHL calendar. However, the prospect they pick at 11 could be useful to their longer term plans as he wouldn’t be a realistic option for the Sabres until 2026 at the earliest. Having that player on his ELC in 2026 could be very useful as the Skinner buyout will toll $2.44 million against the cap and JJ Peterka and Jack Quinn (among others) will be playing on extensions. So there is some utility in using this pick, especially if the right player, hello Tij Iginla or Konsta Helenius, is there. But I’d certainly like to hear Gary Bettman announce it was moved from the podium at the Sphere.
JimBobv2 – How many players that Lindy has coached previously do you expect them to add this offseason?
Good question. There’s a handful I’d like them to add. If John Marino is available I think he’d be a perfect addition for the Sabres. He still has term, fits the aging curve of their core and would help balance the top four. I like Radek Faksa as a potential bottom six center addition and there’s a handful of others who would be worthwhile to pursue (looking at you, Jesper Bratt). But I’m not expecting anyone to be prioritized as Adams gets to work this week. Let’s put the over/under at 1.5 to be safe.
Lazytown716 – Who’s Lindy gonna help the most? In a similar way that Donnie helped Tage or Dahlin.
I’ve seen a lot of people say Cozens will benefit most from Ruff’s guidance and I think he’s a pretty good candidate. I’d toss Owen Power in there as well. He’s done so many things well over the past two years despite catching some flak for not being heavy enough,he may blow up regardless of the head coach, but I’d consider him as a strong candidate as well. But my first pick is Jack Quinn. If he can play a full season without any sort of significant injury, I’d expect him to progress significantly under Ruff. He’s shown the ability to be a two-way force and if Ruff can push the right buttons, I think they’ll have a budding star on their hands with Quinn.
C_hellwig12 – In honor of draft week, what’s the worst Sabres draft since 2000?
This question rules and there are quite a few good classes to pick from. The very nature of drafting in the NHL means you’re going to have far more misses than hits. Virtually every model drops off a cliff after pick 20 and in most cases the chances of picking an NHL regular in the third round are just marginally higher than finding an NHL regular in a later round.
Understanding the high probability of missing on picks means that simply flagging a draft class with one player who became an NHL regular isn’t reason enough to call a draft class the worst one. For example, the 2018 draft class is fairly forgettable. Matej Pekar didn’t progress beyond the minor leagues and the team’s investment on the blueline later in the draft didn’t pan out as Linus Cronholm, Miska Kukkonen and William Worge-Kreu never got a contract. But the Sabres also selected Rasmus Dahlin and Mattias Samuelsson in that draft. Those two picks alone make 2018 a perfectly fine class. The 2002 class is my honorable mention, just barely missing the cut as the bulk of the success of this class came for teams that weren’t the Buffalo Sabres. Keith Ballard (11th overall) played 600 NHL games and the Sabres nailed their 8th round pick with Dennis Wideman, though he didn’t play a single one of his 815 NHL games in Buffalo. Dan Paille carved out a 500 game career, making this a pretty strong class even though the Sabres saw little benefit from it.
In honor of the Summer Olympics, I have selected three drafts to the medal stand.
2000 – A tough look here as Artem Kryukov (15th overall) never came to North America and didn’t even have too many impressive pre-draft seasons to hang your hat on. None of Buffalo’s picks came to fruition in this draft, save for their pick at 220 in the seventh round, a center out of Portland named Paul Gaustad. Gaustad turned into a quality center for the Sabres, paying off on that late selection and keeping this draft class from being a total dud.
2011 – Narrowly edged out for the title, the 2011 class doesn’t have the volume of picks needed to take the title of worst draft class. The Sabres only made six picks in this draft, and most of them were forgettable. They got some contributions in Rochester from Dan Catenacci and Nathan Lieuwen, but the pair only played 19 NHL games, with little true impact on the organization. Joel Armia was a fine first round pick, though he only played one game in a Sabres sweater prior to being traded to Winnipeg.
2010 – Mark Pysyk had two separate stops in Buffalo and scored one of the strangest, but memorable goals in franchise history. His five season tenure in Buffalo is all the Sabres got from this draft, striking out on the eight picks that followed Pysyk. That’s a bleak result and takes home the title of worst Sabres draft of the 21st century.
Two in the Box 