With less than a week to go to the 2022 NHL Trade Deadline, one of the most common talking points has been how the lack of salary cap space has kept early negotiations to a minimum.
The Sabres head to the deadline with a handful of pending UFAs who will make decent bargain rentals for contending teams. But the real value Buffalo has at the deadline is their salary cap space.
As of this writing, CapFriendly shows the Sabres with over $55 million in space, the most in the NHL by $10 million. CapFriendly projects them to end the year with $13 million in space. That puts the Sabres in a perfect position to leverage that cap space to acquire useful assets at the deadline, something that Kevyn Adams recently said he hopes to do.
Buffalo isn’t the only team with space to broker a deal and the rumor mill doesn’t indicate that Monday will chock full of deals. Taking advantage of their cap space may be easier said than done, but there should be at least a handful of big contracts moving which would allow the Sabres to serve as a broker.
We are bathing in the good vibes surrounding the Sabres this week as we discuss how things have seemingly started to gel for the team and its young core. We discuss the impressive win over the Maple Leafs in the Heritage Classic, touch on the impressive impact that the likes of Alex Tuch and Jeff Skinner have on the club and look ahead to next week’s deadline.
Our deadline discussion focuses on players the Sabres could attempt to target as acquisitions at the deadline, in hopes of finding another key piece to help build this new core around.
The trade deadline is two weeks away and we spend this week’s episode discussing where Buffalo’s pending UFAs could go and how the Sabres can leverage this year’s deadline into even more draft capital for the club. We also touch on Kevyn Adams’ public statements about the Sabres ability to weaponize their cap space at the deadline.
Also on the show is a quick chat about the returns of Sam Reinhart, Jack Eichel and Sunday’s Heritage Classic.
The last few months haven’t been kind to the Sabres. Injuries have plagued the roster as losses keep stacking up. They’re flirting with winning only 10 of their last 50 games and another lost season has fans wondering when the reinforcements might arrive.
Unlike previous seasons, the Sabres prospect pipeline is a bit richer these days. Meaning there’s more than just one or two prospects worth looking forward to seeing. Jack Quinn was just returned to Rochester after recovering from injury. He joins JJ Peterka, who is steaming along at a point per game pace and Ukko Pekka Luukkonen, who is working back from an injury of his own. Mattias Samuelsson and Peyton Krebs are already in Buffalo and there’s an opportunity for Ryan Johnson, Devon Levi and Owen Power to arrive once their respective NCAA seasons wrap up.
Some of Buffalo’s Buffalo’s CHL prospects could even see action in Rochester on ATOs when their seasons end.
There ought to be space on the Sabres roster for some of those prospects to fill out after the trade deadline. There could be upwards of four-to-six openings depending on how many deals the Sabres swing and who they move on from. Thanks to the later start to the NHL season, NCAA prospects can play in far more games than they would under normal circumstances, which is a great sign for the ability of Johnson, Levi and Power to impact the Sabres lineup.
Exactly when those three could arrive is still up in the air. A few well-placed losses could get the trio to Buffalo sooner, which is what this rooting guide is for.
The hockey world has reacted to the war in Ukraine, as Russia and Belarus have been suspended from international play by the IIHF and the 2023 World Junior Championships have been removed from Russia as well. Additional hockey-related sanctions have been placed on the two countries and we discuss the fallout that will come from the actions taken by both sides, from a hockey perspective. We also discuss the new initiatives being take by the Sabres in an effort to re-engage with their season ticket holders and fanbase as a whole. With a new VP of Ticketing, steps are being taken to open new avenues to connect with the fanbase and get butts back in the seats.
Eric makes his triumphant return to the show to reflect on the humble beginnings of the podcast, what’s unfolded over the last 10 years for the show, the Sabres and his career with the Nashville Predators. We talk about a host of NHL and hockey topics, including the fan engagement that’s been cultivated in Nashville and some of the big events Eric has experienced with the Preds.
The Sabres will have some work to do in order to reach the cap floor for the 2022-23 season. That will mean some creative moves will need to be made via free agency and the trade market in the coming weeks and months in order to hit the minimum salary cap figure. We run down a list for forwards, defensemen and goaltenders who the Sabres could target to not only fill their cap void, but to help push the team closer to competitiveness for the coming season.
The battle over what should occupy Buffalo’s waterfront has been roaring for the better part of two decades, as the early aughts brought us Bass Pro, an evolving vision for Canalside and eventually to where we are now. Which is, to say, not too far off from where we started.
Much of the progress we’ve seen has come in spite of the hucksters who weasel their way into any project of merit whose developer isn’t formidable enough to shoo them away. Other opportunities have been outright lost due to the pervasive obstructionists that seeps into much of the public discourse in the city. The Aud has been gone for over 10 years and we still have the empty pit to show for it.
That hasn’t kept Buffalo’s resident carnival barkers, the Campaign for Greater Buffalo, from concocting silly plans for projects he has no stake in. The group’s latest venture is a suspension bridge meant to connect the Inner and Outer Harbors. It’s a terrific idea until you see the route chosen by the group for their million-dollar deathtrap.
Protracted preservation battles have become something of a cottage industry in these parts. In fact, you might just call it an industry for some.
The latest battle has centered around the Great Northern grain elevator after the building’s northern wall collapsed. The usual players have taken sides for and against demolition after it was announced Archer Daniels Midland planned to bring the building down.
News has been mostly good for those hoping to save the structure as they won another favorable ruling in court this week. Doug Jemal has also expressed interest in buying the structure in order to preserve it. What exactly his plans would be are unknown, but if there’s a developer in the area capable of actually saving the building, it would be Jemal.
Tim Tielman came out from under his bridge to get his obligatory quotes in The Buffalo News while other developers such as Rocco Termini and Paul Ciminelli have voiced their support in saving the structure. It’s a good sign for those who hope to keep the elevator intact that Jemal has shown the propensity to hit the ground running with projects he takes on. Something that the preservation community in Western New York has not done.
Whether or not that means the structure should be saved, I’m not sure. I think there are just as many good reasons to keep it as there are reasons to bring it down.
While the official announcement was somehow scooped by the team’s online store, the Sabres unveiled the jerseys they’ll be wearing for the Heritage Classic on Thursday morning.
via NHL on Twitter
The cream-based jerseys are a first in the team’s history of uniforms and overall, it’s a sharp uniform, although maybe a little on the safe side.
I suspected the Sabres would sport some sort of a “fauxback” for this game given the only truly historic jersey set they have to draw upon is already the basis for their home and away uniform. The cream base helps these lean in hard on the fauxback style and helps differentiate it from the 50th anniversary jerseys (which obviously weren’t throwbacks), the 40th anniversary jerseys and even the 2018 Winter Classic uniform which was at least tangentially throwback inspired.
The thicker striping pattern on the sleeves and hem are a great addition as it gives a more bold look than the thinner stripes seen on the 40th alternates or even the team’s home and away set. Ditto for the white trimmed pants stripe, which is something they should be adopting full time. The return of the bumblebee sock striping is going to fly under the radar but might be one of the coolest features of this uniform.
Adding felt to the crest is a nice touch – it certainly made the 2018 Winter Classic crest feel awesome – the rest of the logo remains unaltered. It’s a fine choice given the direction they went.
I don’t care much about the felt names and numbers. One, because I think it’s a concept that’s been overdone on these fauxback type jerseys. Two, because doing the blue on blue makes the unique stitching on felt numbers invisible. I don’t think the stitching pattern is anything special to begin with (hated it on the 40th alternates), but if you’re going to incorporate a design style, you might as well take full advantage. Lastly, there have been screenshots of disclaimers on the Shop One Buffalo site which indicate that the felt lettering probably won’t be available for the jerseys fans purchase. So it’s a purely cosmetic addition which will be difficult, if not impossible to discern on the ice and offers no added benefit to fans who purchase the jersey.
If there’s anything to critique about these jerseys, it’s that they are a bit on the safe side. While Toronto’s jerseys haven’t been released as of this post being written, it looks as if they’ll pull from an old Toronto Arenas uniform design. The Sabres have had quite a few issues embracing not only their history, but the history of hockey in Buffalo as a whole. This could have been a great opportunity to draw on a uniform design of one of Buffalo Bisons teams of the past. Instead, we got a fairly standard fauxback Sabres jersey. A good jersey, mind you. But not quite as adventurous as it could have been.
The jerseys themselves look great in the promotional images that have been shared. I think they’re going to look terrific on the ice as the design of the pants and the sock striping is going to really tie this all together. We won’t have to wait all that long to see them, either. We’re just about three weeks away from the Heritage Classic and I think it’s a safe bet that we’ll see these at KeyBank Center for the team’s throwback night on March 25.
Two in the Box 