Buffalo Sabres

Buffalo Sabres coverage. Related to the Sabres, their prospects and the minors.

Amerks (Sabres) Season Preview: Forward thinking

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Looking around the hockey world, there are plenty of players getting bumped off rosters due to the influx of skaters and goaltenders previously slated for the NHL. The effect will be felt across Europe and particularly at the AHL level.

While individual AHL teams will benefit from skaters on entry-level deals making their way down to the developmental league, the players who would have typically battled for one of the final roster spots are likely destined for other locations.

Rochester serves as a perfect example of this as a few tryout players and summer free agent signings have suddenly found themselves on a roster with a lot more talent than originally expected.

Marcus Foligno and Cody Hodgson were each expected to be in Buffalo to start the season with Luke Adam, Kevin Porter, Nick Tarnasky and Corey Tropp were all expected to at least push for a roster spot with the big club. Now, those six join 14 other forwards who now face a much more daunting task in making the AHL club.

Those who are most affected by the infusion of talent are; Riley Boychuk, Maxime Legault, Jonathan Parker, Frederick Roy and Jamie Wise. Boychuk and Parker each saw time in the ECHL last year, while Legault has stuck with the organization on AHL contracts over the past few years. Roy and Wise each made a positive impression at development camp, but are behind far more skaters than they would have been after their camp performances earlier in the summer. Continue reading →

Amerks (Sabres) Season Preview: The blueline

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The specter of past failures often loom large for NHL franchises. For example, the lack of defensive depth in the spring of 2006 prompted Darcy Regier to go on a drafting and free agent spree that stocked the Sabres cupboards with defensemen. Now the organization is reaping the rewards of that draft strategy.

However, as it pertains to the Americans for the upcoming season, the blueline is going to be awfully crowded. Rochester will enter camp with ten defensemen on their roster. Like with their goaltenders, at least one or two will be destined to spend some time in the Coast during the year.

Easy money on that player will be Corey Fienhage. The former third round pick hasn’t panned out at nearly every level since he was drafted by the Sabres and he even spent some time in Gwinnett last season. Nick Crawford could also be a candidate for the Coast depending on the performance of some of the rookies that are coming in this season. Drew Schiestel will also be in a sticky situation as he comes back to the organization after being loaned to Texas last season – a move that many interpreted as a death sentence for his time with the Sabres.

Get him a normal number.

Schiestel will be back for another year, but is looking up at a deep roster of defensemen who all saw serious time with the Amerks last year. Should Schiestel stay healthy over the season, he could certainly climb back up into the good graces with the coaching staff. After all, he was likely the first player who would have been called up last year had he not suffered additional injuries. The main hurdle Schiestel now needs to deal with will be the young prospects that will be playing in Rochester this season.

Mark Pysyk and Jerome Gauthier-Leduc are each entering their first professional season and will each bring plenty of mobility to a blueline that is already rich with physical defenders. Pysyk is a well-heralded prospect who fell to the Sabres in the first round of 2010. He is mobile, a right handed shot and is responsible at both ends of the ice. While he isn’t a straight ahead offensive dynamo, he certainly isn’t a stay-at-home stalwart, either. Pysyk plays a very balanced game and should get plenty of minutes in Rochester.

As for his fleet-footed 2010 draft mate. JGL is far more Gragnani than he is Campbell. JGL is a scoring machine and proved as much in his final year of junior. His defensive capabilities scare me, especially after seeing how useless Gragnani was in all but one playoff series during his Sabres career. Finding a way to develop a two-way game will likely be a key for JGL’s development.

A few mainstays for the Amerks blueline will be Alex Biega, Joe Finley and Matt MacKenzie. Biega, who wore a letter last season will continue to bring that sound two-way effort he has since his time at Harvard. Meanwhile MacKenzie will continue his development track that is basically one year ahead of Pysyk at this point. Continue reading →

Amerks (Sabres) Season Preview: Betweeen the pipes

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Buffalo Sabres training camp was supposed to have opened last Friday. Instead, Tyler Ennis agreed to hop over the pond to Switzerland, Christian Ehrhoff was beginning his stint back in Germany and other Sabres were pondering European deals as well.

While it doesn’t seem as if the Sabres will be starting up any time soon, the Amerks have been injected with some extra talent (from their parent club) and have a deep, overpopulated roster to sort through before the puck drops on the AHL season.

The most difficult decisions for Ron Rolston and his staff will be at forward and defense, where the surplus of players is significant. However, the most delicate situation that Rolston and the organization as a whole will need to deal with is in net.

David Leggio is back for another season with the club but will have some interesting company this season. Rookies Nathan Lieuwen and Connor Knapp will each be entering their initial professional seasons but in a situation where two’s company and three is typically a crowd.

Leggio is the unquestioned starter after finding his way into Rolston’s good graces with consistently solid play last year. This was a pleasant surprise for the WNYer because of the contract given to AHL journeyman Drew MacIntyre who was signed to provide more stability as Buffalo’s third goaltender. However, one year removed from outperforming Jhonas Enroth in Portland, Leggio did it again to another goaltender who was tabbed as the superior talent.

The big step here is that Leggio is just one injury away from stepping in as the Sabres backup. This is likely something that the Sabres are at least somewhat concerned with because of the massive question mark that is Leggio’s ability at the NHL level. While he is a very good AHL goalkeeper, there is nothing that indicates how strong he would be filling time in the show.

Leggio’s presence will stabilize the Amerks crease and give the team a reliable starter for a majority of their regular season contests. He should also serve as a tutor of sorts for Lieuwen and Knapp. Where the situation gets sticky is the way in which the two rookies will be rotated. Continue reading →

Sabres lock up Ennis, assign players to Amerks as lockout nears

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As official word on a lockout gets ever closer, the Buffalo Sabres made a few final roster decisions before the inevitable becomes official.

The biggest news is Tyler Ennis’ new two-year contract. Ennis will make just over $2 million this season and just over $3 million next year on the deal. This will lead to another summer of negotiations for the Sabres and Ennis in 2014, but it comes off a moderate contract that should work well for both sides.

The only true loss here is that the deal isn’t any longer. However, with some of the jury on Ennis still out, it doesn’t shackle the Sabres to the player for a ridiculous term. Otherwise there isn’t much else to say about the Ennis contract. It was an agreeable deal between both sides that will let each party reconvene under the new CBA and what will hopefully be two productive seasons from the center.

In the end, Ennis probably comes out as the winner. He receives a raise and will be back at the bargaining table in two summers for what should be a sizeable new contract. On the bright side, the Sabres didn’t need to sacrifice dollars to buy up UFA years with this deal. So it is a win-win.

The Sabres took Friday to assign 20 players to Rochester along with returning three additional players to their junior clubs. Well, Joel Armia is playing professional hockey with Assat. In addition, the Sabres made a somewhat surprise signing by inking Andrey Makarov to an entry-level contract.

The decision to loan players to Rochester was an expected move for teams across the NHL. A number of the players were going to be playing in Rochester next season, but there are a few names which should draw the interest of Sabres fans for the 2012-13 AHL season. Continue reading →

The Instigator Podcast 2.1 – Collective Bracing

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Back for a new season, Eric and I talk a bit about how awesome home World Cup qualifying matches are (Eric just returned from Columbus), how terrible things are starting to look regarding the impending lockout and play a bit of plus/minus.

As always, catch me at @2ITB_Buffalo and Eric at @3rdManIn

Both PA and owners to blame as lockout looms

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It seems like such a short time ago that fans were clamoring for details on the labor strife in the NHL. Seven short years it has been since the last lockout and the NHL seems set on yet another.

All it took was a lost season and fans for the owners and players to come to an agreement in 2004-05. Granted, the players were poorly represented and the league as a whole was in desperate need of an overhaul to the CBA. Yet the rapid growth the NHL has enjoyed since the last lockout has done little more to muddy the waters between the NHLPA and owners.

Point fingers if you must at the greedy millionaires and billionaires. Point fingers at Gary Bettman for trotting towards his third work stoppage. Point fingers at whoever you need to blame in this situation. Just understand that this is a two-way street but the owners are driving a much wider vehicle.

By no means am I a CBA expert, so I won’t try and talk number percentages or about any of the other specific details that will ultimately be hammered out over the next few days, weeks and months.

What is so perplexing in this entire scenario is the glaring ignorance portrayed by both sides. The league and owners, as a group, are far and away the greater perpetrators here but the NHLPA should not be fully absolved of blame. Fact is that both sides took their sweet time to talk despite staring at a situation that pointed towards a drawn out negotiating process. Continue reading →

Are actual authentic jerseys too much to ask for?

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The executives with Reebok and Nike certainly know what they’re doing. The same can be said for those who control apparel pricing in the NFL and NHL.

Go into any team store, Dicks or anywhere else that team apparel is sold and you will likely need to extend your student loans just to purchase a jersey. That is if you’re a jersey kind of guy. Personally, I’ve never gotten down with wearing jerseys to a game. I feel awkward when I’m in it and there is also the impending threat of a trade or free agency sending your player out of town. Blank jerseys are obviously safer, but not nearly as meaningful as one that looks like the duds worn on the field or rink.

Not technically authentic.
An NHL fan is going to spend roughly $150 for a replica uniform and well north of $300 for an authentic sweater from the NHL. Football fans have a similar financial burden. There are three options that range in terms of quality and price from $100, $135 and $300 each.

Perhaps the biggest drawback for buying an NFL jersey is that fact that your cheapest option is little more than a $100 mesh t-shirt with screen printed numbers. The secondary product is closer in form to what is seen on the field and the authentic jerseys have all the bells and whistles as the on-field product (to a certain extent). Continue reading →

Building on the Sabres’ Canadian exploration

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The Sabres have officially begun their Canadian Bacon mission of an invasion of Ontario. The goal isn’t to litter, but to establish a greater footprint for the organization in the golden horseshoe.

Ted Black, Danny Gare, Jay McKee and Ville Leino all took a trip through Ft. Erie and St. Catharines  that included visits to schools, hockey clinics and, naturally, Tim Hortons. Good on the Sabres for seeing the comedy in having Leino serve up donuts much like he did last season (see what I did there). Social Media Sam deserves some credit for her Ricky Bobby “I’d love to sign your baby” Instagram caption as well.

All kidding aside, the Sabres have taken a wise approach here. Obviously there are a ton of fans in Ontario that are ticket holders. While most of them either sell their tickets to fans of other teams or simply root for the Leafs, the Sabres have a significant portion of their patrons in Ontario. The same goes for the Bills, the Galleria and Buffalo Niagara Airport and most of Western New York.

Pulling from Ontario would occur even if the Sabres (and Bills) didn’t bother marketing themselves. It is just how sports fans will operate. For fans in Fort Erie and St. Catharines who don’t have a pro team in their city, having the Bills and Sabres a hop and a skip down the Q is beyond convenient. While Toronto is the obvious first choice for many of these fans, Buffalo provides a natural fit for sports fans looking to affiliate with an NHL or NFL franchise.

From a business standpoint, cultivating this fanbase and maybe even building upon it is an easy approach for the Sabres. What has changed is the proactive approach the team has begun to show. This type of physical outreach shows that the Sabres don’t just respect the contingent of fans they have from Ontario, they want to grow that fanbase.

This relationship could potentially have a positive effect on the rest of the Western New York sports scene as well. Continue reading →

Amerks seeing red for 2012-13

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While Jhonas Enroth’s mask tweet was rather unexpected, the Amerks third jersey unveiling was scheduled ahead of time. In addition to their white home and royal road jerseys, the Amerks will wear a screaming red alternate uniform this season.

Amerks.com

 

They did it right, however. The uniform remained unchanged aside from the base color. The triple stripes on the sleeves and waist stay blue and white and the Amerks crest also sticks around. Aside from incorporating an alternate color, the Amerks kept their jersey largely unchanged.

Perhaps it is that red, white and blue are a pleasing scheme that can be used in any combination. The Sabres use of gold doesn’t necessarily allow for too many subdued uses. While a red uniform isn’t conservative (hello, butter knives), it complements the color scheme the Amerks use quite well. Gold, on the other hand, contrasts the Sabres (or Preds) use of navy in a much louder fashion. Yet, I’m left wondering if the Sabres third jerseys (due for 2013-14) will use gold as a primary color. Continue reading →

Jhonas Enroth’s stunning new mask

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Jhonas Enroth, king of Instagram, has a new mask for the upcoming (hopefully) season. It happens to be totally awesome.

Enroth uses the world’s best helmet artist, Dave Gunnarsson (daveart), and has yet to disappoint with any of the artwork he has worn during his time in North America. His newest lid is a thing of beauty, perhaps the best helmet he will wear at this point in his career.

The brick wall art remains down the middle of the design with the Sabres primary logo prominent on the left side. On the right side is a combination of the jersey stripe form the white uniform, silhouettes of bison, Buffalo scripted on the chin and a badass longhorn skull.

Aside from providing the most vivid, sharp artwork on a mask, Gunnarsson’s specialty is working stripe patterns into his masks. This instance makes the blue, silver and gold stripes a focal point of the right side despite being the most basic portion of the artwork.

The buffalo from the primary logo adorns the gold stripe while silhouetted bison run above the upper blue stripe. Gunnarsson also worked a diamond plate pattern near the chin. However, the longhorn skull does it for me. Despite being relatively obscured towards the top of the helmet, it reminds me of a mask once worn by Grant Fuhr during his time here. That mask that Fuhr wore was my favorite Sabres mask of all time.

Combining this mask with the white bison helmet that Ryan Miller will wear ought to give the Sabres the best one-two punch of helmet artwork in the league.