Trettioåtta

Have the Sabres ever beaten Jake Allen?

Jake Allen always has our number...

The third was their best period. Let's hope they build on that and split this series.

This is looking ugly by the Sabres... It's probably 3-0 without UPL

I don't mind the bottom line's thing being that they are fast and hit stuff, whilst being a bit rubbish doing anything else. It gives Lindy a tool to wield. That said, the third line feels a bit like the spare-part line. Krebs and Greenway are closer to fourth liners than decent third liners. And Zucker is fine but doesn't have a thing he does particularly well. I'd rather have Benson - Cozens - Quinn be our defensively responsible wild card third line, and then have Skinner and two other players as our second line.

Alexander Wennberg would be my choice for 3C. I would love Pesce to round out our top 4, but he would be expensive and the Devils are strongly linked to him. Peterka - Thompson - Tuch XXX - Cozens - XXX Benson - Wennberg - Quinn Greenway - Krebs - Malenstyn Savoie / Rousek / Kulich as the thirteenth forward I think overpaying a youngish player for 2-3 years is the best option - they can double dip free agency when the cap has gone up and still make a decent amount of a short contract with the Sabres

I think this move only makes sense if you have a clear plan (i.e. are pretty confident in free agent signings), or you're desperate to do something and hope it fixes the team. Current needs: 2x top 6 wingers 2x third line defensive players 1x top-4 defensive RHD That is an achievable goal. But I think it's going to need a couple trades to make it work.

I would have happily done 42nd / 43rd for Marino. Disappointing. But at least we got whatever that bloke is called.

If this dude is a legit shutdown, defence-first PKer. Then I don't care if we overpaid. My concern is that he is simply a gritty 4th liner that you can get for $1 million on 1 July for free every year. Hopefully I'm wrong.

Urgh that Marino trade hurts

I heard Kevin chose him because both him and Kleber have 'Adam' in their names.

I heard Chicago had a 13th forward they're on the fence about giving a qualifying offer to. Fingers crossed.

I assume* that we have some internal fancy stats that mean we think his defensive game is great? Quite frankly I don't really care about winning trades at this point. If this fills one of our absolute needs and will make us better next year then great. However, from what is publicly available, it looks like we just gave away a good second round pick and didn't get better. *Generous take incoming

This must be Adams lashing out in desperation to prove he is trying to do trades. Right? We gave up an earylish 2nd for a 13th forward? Caps fans seem very happy with this trade though...

This seems like a huge overpayment? He's 26 and has played like 100 NHL games and scored 25 points. What am I missing?

He did come across more frail than I expected. Hopefully he hasn't lost a step mentally...

Samuelsson can also get added to the list. Jokiharu too possibly, That is 4/5 D men all under 25. We don't need to keep adding young D-men. We have young D-men who play in the NHL. None of those forwards who are comprable to Helenius play in the NHL. Until they do, they do not make picks like Helenius superfluous.

Teams aren't allowed to talk to pending UFAs, but it is remarkable what teams can accomplish by 12:01 on day 1 of free agency. Some real quick talkers.

Iafallo earns $4 million to be a bottom 6 player. Ironcially we should be receiving a mid-round pick to take him, not the other way around! And to be clear, I think we should be doing precisely that - take NHL players who are overpaid for assets. Win-win. We improve our team now, and add some stores to the pantry for future days.

Said the Leafs in 2019. I think people udnerestimate how close to the cap good teams operate, and the magic they pull to stay there. Florida is shopping Ekblad, Tampa is not re-signing Stamkos etc. You can only bury 900k or so per contract in the AHL, and you need to start trading 2nd round picks and up to get people to take that sort of contract. I'm not saying it is unmanageable a situation, I'm saying I wouldn't put myself in a position that forces me to manage it for no real gain. Buying Skinner out and not replacing him (i.e. using his cap space to enable us to do something we couldn't do if we kept him) seems pointless to me.

I don't know much about Mikheyev's game. Is he defensively good enough to be a defneisvely responsible third liner? Laferty would be a nice fourth liner. For the next two years cap space doesn't matter too much - I think we should be getting decent NHL players who are on bad contracts (relative to their ability) that expire within the next two years. Improve that way to make the playoffs and give some breathing space for the young guys to mature.

The last two drafts have had basically no NHL player trades happen on / near the draft. I think teams all want to retool, not rebuild (thanks to teams like Sabres, Sens and Wings all bombing at it).

The only trade that has happened, that I wish the Sabres had been in on is Mangipane. And for all we know, we were in on it and he said no to coming to Buffalo. There has been a dearth of movement across the league in terms of trades. This is basically day 2 of the offseason proper, i'm willing to give it to at least day 5 before I jump into the pit of despair.

Hopefully in 5 years we are more like Tampa, Colorado, Florida or Dallas. Ask those teams if they would like an extra $2.4 million in cap space now. We have operated with a lot of cap space over the last few years, and have been rubbish with lots of young guys on cheap contracts. However, in 5 years, that money could be the difference between keeping a guy like Quinn or being forced to trade them. I want to make the playoffs, but I also don't want to burn things to the ground to make it next year, and then settle into being a bubble team for the foreseeable because we made hasty moves for thr sake of it.

No comment on the choice. But deeply dissapoitning we didn't use it to improve our roster for next season.