Taro T

So offer him $950k. It still doesn't break the bank and they've sent guys wtih bigger contracts to Ra-cha-cha. And you realize that unless he resides in NYS for 6 months and a day is he liable for the full contract getting taxed as a NYS resident. Taxes aren't necessarily a fully apples to apples comparison as each jurisdiction they play in have their own tax laws that the accountants are only too happy to figure out. Again, said overall they did fine on this, but personally would like to have seen them give him a bigger offer. Why? Because he's the only guy besides Dahlin that Power has played with and had the pairing look good. That's important. You find something that works, keep it. Btw, unless he wants to live in Detroit proper, his tax rate would be 5.45% in Michigan. And his NYS tax rate would be 6.85%. So, yeah, $25k would cover the extra ~$10k he'd pay in tax.

Agree that Kulich is a lock to make this year's Sabres team. But what pro team did he last play for last season?

Thing is, they aren't really storing up all that much cap space. Per puckpedia, with 14F's, 6D, and 2G's, they have $12.865MM in cap space with Byram, Timmons, and Levi left to sign. Byram will be at least $6MM on a bridge and likely around $8MM on a deal cutting into some of his UFA years. Leaving them with ~$5-7MM. Timmons will be ballpark $1MM. Levi ballpark $2MM. Yes that's 24 bodies, not just 23, but how often is the team going to only have 23 players on the big club's roster. And after those signings, they'd have ~$2-4MM left. Which shockingly is what NHL teams end up with. Not the $8MM+ they tend to like to keep available. Once Byram's fate (contract, whatever) is determined; then we'll know if there's room for any other moves. But it's not like they're sitting at $20MM waiting on making sure Byram doesn't get a $13MM offer (and he ain't getting a $13MM offer). They're about where they should be $wise, but personally would like to see them about $1MM away from the cap on opening night rather than $4-5MM away.

Agreed. The only way he's going away is if Dallas says, you know, that Byram kid looks like a good centerpiece in a package for Robertson and the Sabres end up needing to move Samuelsson in a separate deal to wind up cap compliant come October. (And that AIN'T happening. But it is nice to dream.)

Wow, are Sabres fans ever a dark bunch. Guess 14 years will do that to you.

That's why the statement was "then run the rest of it the way they did." If he won't sign, don't make the QO but tell him the $900k will be available for a time, but the Sabres will be looking elsewhere on what they're going to do. Let the agent test FA, and either you end up with him as it appears the best offer he got was Detroits or the agent gets Detroit to up its offer a smidge. Either way, its a non-loss. Paying him $1.7MM would've been the loss. And, again, they handled it reasonably. It's just frustrating that they got rid of the 1 guy we know of (besides Dahlin) that can play next to Power. And if Kesselring ends up Power's partner and they have chemistry; well, the Sabres saved $900k. It's just that seems to be a pretty low cost insurance policy.

Close. The CORRECT thing would've been to offer him $900k before QO's needed to be submitted. Then run the rest of it the way they did. But they really can't be faulted on this one.

Would consider Kulich to be the most likeliest of the Amerk F's to make the Sabres. Kozak has an outside chance of making them on the 4th line. Rosen, Östlund, Helenius, and Wahlberg might also get looks. (But none will be on the big squad on opening night.) Doubt any will be difference makers this year. Kulich could be a difference maker but would much rather see him on the 3rd line than where he appears to be pencilled in on the top line. He's good defensively for a guy as young as he is. That stated, he got his lunch eaten last year regularly when going up against the top lines of top teams and there's no reason to believe it'd be that much different this year, at least early on. Would be surprised if any other Amerk forward made the big club out of the gate. Johnson is the most likely D-man to start the year in Buffalo, but if Byram and Samuelsson are both back he's a long shot. (Expect they'd be better off letting him play in the A than have him riding the pine as the 8 in Buffalo.) Don't believe either of the big Russians will be ready out of the gate. Johnson will get opportunity. The 2 Rooskies might also. Would expect Levi to start the year in Ra-cha-cha, but he'll be up at some point.

Well, figure $6-8MM of that is going to go to Byram. Another $2MM will go to Levi. And another $1MM to Timmons. And, upon looking at that, yeah, there's $11MM spent and it doesn't really bring much hope along does it? (Now trade Samuelsson away and a trade of Byram could bring back something interesting. Or if Byram was only bridged, trading Samuelsson leaves about $6MM of that $11MM left to be spent on fun stuff.)

No urgency at all for signing Levi. He can't be offer sheeted and he isn't arbitration eligible. They'll have the rest of their ducks in a row and then get the deal done with him.

It does feel an awful lot like that off-season. It kind of feels like the off-season they got rid of Hawerchuck and Mogilny and every other big name except Hasek and LaFontaine. And that next season really did stink. And then out of the blue, they actually gelled and were good. Until the rug got pulled out from under us again. THAT is what being a Sabres fan is all about. You'd think we'd be used to getting the rug pulled out from under us by now. But spend $11MM of that nearly $14MM they have now, and maybe there's some hope. (It can't be any fun pulling the rug out from under us or the football away from us if we don't have hope. Right now, they aren't giving us the hope. So, it must be terribly dull for them at present.)

You mean besides @Sabres Fan in NS?

Bernard-Docker wouldn't get an arbitration award that's big enough for the Sabres to walk away from. But he very likely would've gotten more than he settled for in the offer from Detroit. So, yeah, @Porous Five Hole was right on that, the Sabres would've been paying the guy they expect to be their 8 significantly more than they'd want to. BUT if neither of the new guys gel with Power, the contract they'd end up with for JBD would've been very good for the player that is effectively their #4/5. Because we know, at least from a small sample size that JBD can be an effective partner for Power.

Correct. The Sabres pretty religiously avoid arbitration since the Pegulas bought the team. And, not only is there the strong likelihood they'd be locked into an arbitration agreement they don't like with a guy like Bernard-Docker; they might not have certainty on the roster for about 1 more month which can mess with planning.

Yes, he kept the Sabres out fo the playoffs that year. He very well might do it again.

No. Ruff definitely has a say in the type of player he wants here. But there are soooooooooo many posts here (not all yours, heck that one that was quoted might've been your only one) about how "oh, this was Ruff influenced" or "oh, that was Ruff." Of course the GM is going to try to get players the coach wants (and get rid of ones he doesn't want) because if he doesn't, he needs to get rid of the coach, they necessarily aren't on the same page. Adams got players Krueger wanted, he got players Granato wanted, and he's now getting players Ruff wants. But at the end of the day, he "talks to Terry every single day," all of these moves are blessed by the higher power that Kevyn reports to. No disrespect intended, and again, this isn't fully directed at you (but yours was the post that got the response, it's more directed at the post) but "the coach wanted this" or something to that effect isn't insightful and very likely isn't even fully correct. Ruff either didn't want Bernard-Docker or more likely didn't care whether he was back or not. They had their plan to get the D significanlty bigger; JBD doesn't bring larger. And at the end of the day; Ruff coaches the players he has and develops a system to run that works for THOSE players. He has run significantly different systems at various stages of his 18 or so years as the HC of this team. He could, and successfully did, coach JBD.

Wtf is every single thing a "Ruff influenced decision?" This isn't the 1st time this team has done this. They traded for Kahun back before Ruff or even Adams was here. Then they let him walk. This is YOUR Buffalo Sabres. Personally expect, if anything, this is a Wilford influenced decision; which pretty much by definition makes it an idiotic one.

Well, this time will be different. They won't have upper management crowing about losing on purpose. 😉

Well sure, he hasn't had to pay Byram, Timmons, nor Levi yet. That's $14MM glistening in Pegula's eye. They'll like it a lot less when they're within $5MM of the cap (maybe even $3MM).

Untrue. Byram doesn't qualify to be a UFA until '27. So, signing a 1 year deal leaves him 1 year from becoming a UFA.

Is very possible. Who are we kidding, it's very likely. But Adams shouldn't be the one choosing who plays with whom. That falls on the coaching staff. Adams job is to get Ruff the best set of players he can and if Ruff identifies a gap, it is Adams job to fill that gap. But who goes out when and with whom is on the coaches. That isn't on the GM.

And totally get them having Dahlin, Byram, Kesselring, and Power inked in pen ahead of Bernard-Docker. Not sure where the certainty that Samuelsson and Timmons are (well, were, now) ahead of Bernard-Docker stems from. Just one more thing to dislike about Marty Wilford, IMHO. The guy who has responsibility for coaching that portion of the team HAS to have input in that area of the team, right? And they HAVE to put a ton of weight into how pairs look in practice, because they ALWAYS would roll back to Dahlin-Jokiharju as a pair even though Henri didn't belong anywhere near a top pairing in the NHL. Expecting he's a really smart guy and that in practice knowing what the forwards he was facing would be trying to do that he looked like a world beater; but in real games, he didn't work well with Ras and that forcing of that pairing is why it was a good thing to trade him away. Save the coaches from themselves. This seems to be working the exact opposite way. Power JBD must not have looked very good in practice, but it looked good in games. Just flat out don't get how they evaluate the D-men.

We need to accept the fact that no matter how much the fan base believes Bryson should be the 8 at absolute most; the Sabres brass see him as their 7. We don't have to LIKE it; but it simply is.

Well, yes, they did. They also had guys like Rodrigues playing in the top 6 because they were defensively responsible playing with guys that could carry the offense even with a bottom 6 guy on their line. They also, by the time the playoffs rolled around had a team payroll that was way over the cap. Both of those tended to make that 3rd line REALLY hard to play against. The Conn Smythe winner and one of the runner's up was playing on that 3rd line. And both are going to be paid this coming year. Cracks me up when people try to boil the winning formula down to 1 thing.

That's the point. Who are your 3 best pairings? Don't really care who the 6 best are individually. Power and Byram are the 2nd and 3rd best D-men on last year's roster in no particular order. They were awful together. Power and Bernard-Docker were good together. Get it, that they're likely planning on using either Kesselring or Timmons as a partner for Power. And if either pairing is better than what Power JBD were, then awesome. But, we don't know yet if they will be. We do know that there are several players that Power hasn't meshed with yet. Will they be Power JDB when paired together or will they be Power Byram when paired together? No data. But it would be nice to know they could run the actual Power JBD if necessary.