Time to start talking players - Nicklas Backstrom

[carpandean]

Matt Cullen centering Kennedy and Grier or Kennedy and Gerbe. YES PLEASE!

Matt Cullen as a line 1 center, no thank you.

Agreed.

[FearTheReaper]

i think this dude makes a point. we all know that if it weren't for briere/drury leaving, there's no way we keep Vanek for $7+ mil a year.. we could put the caps in the same position, and with Ovechkin there, they'd have to think long and hard about it. and as others have mentioned, we have the cap space to do it.

 

giving up the 4 first rounders (or whatever compensation) would suck, but I think it's worth the risk. there's no doubt he's a franchise center, and this team finished in the Top 3 this year without him. Adding him would only improve the team (obviously i hope they make some other moves as well, what im saying is youre adding Backstrom without LOSING any of our own talent.) and it's not like we'd be losing four Top 10 picks, as I expect the Sabres to be competitive the next several year.

 

 

obviously I realize this scenario is very unlikely, but Darcy really should pursue options like this. I took a very brief look at upcoming free agents, and outside of the obvious (Kovalchuk, Marleau) there's only a few guys that were that appealing to me.. Matt Cullen being probably the best.

 

How do we have cap space avaliable for a 7 million dollar cap hit? Take out Pomm, TC, or Roy and yes we do. Eliminate Hank and Toni, use there money, and you have some serious holes on the backline. Let Grier go, and you lose leadership and girt. Theres no room, Darcy is going to do nothing because he doesn't have the balls to move these core guys. Its a joke to think of Backstrom as a Sabre, or any other player who makes over 4 million dollars, if you live in any sense of reality.

[will]

oh well. link.

 

caps knew what they had and locked it down. i bet the kid could have done better on the open market, but you can't look down on $67mil.