Off Season Shopping List

[PerreaultForever]

3 hours ago, LGR4GM said:

What is something we lack desperately?

Defensive D men. The guys we all hoped Samuelsson would be, but he is not. Wouldn't hurt if one or two of them put a little fear into attacking forwards as well. 

As an example if our D was a group roughly equivalent to Dahlin, Power, Braydon McNabb, Jake McCabe, Zadorov and Ristolainen we'd have a pretty damn good D core wouldn't we?

Now you can find individual faults with those players (like most players) but they were all Sabres at one time and they are all in the league and they'd be a balance of puck movers, thumpers, defensive stalwarts, size and speed and thus a very solid and balanced D. 

We have 4 puck movers, I lazy piece of crap and a mighty mite who tries but is marginal at best. 

In addition our 4th line is garbage. Too soft to have an impact or energy shift like Ruff said he wanted and unskilled as well. Adams gave us a downgrade with the moves he made there not an upgrade and it's just about the easiest line you can make. 

[PerreaultForever]

3 hours ago, DarthEbriate said:

Neverr forgett McNabb!

I love these kinds of thought experiments. It'd be a good long-form exploration. But if it's the case, I'm guessing we don't get Dahlin, and I'm not sure McNabb survives two separate expansion drafts. But it'd be fun to explore in a thread....  hmmmm.

Maybe I'll take a weekend and think about this.

and I didn't even mention Will Borgen 🙂

 

[SABRES 0311]

6 minutes ago, PerreaultForever said:

Defensive D men. The guys we all hoped Samuelsson would be, but he is not. Wouldn't hurt if one or two of them put a little fear into attacking forwards as well. 

As an example if our D was a group roughly equivalent to Dahlin, Power, Braydon McNabb, Jake McCabe, Zadorov and Ristolainen we'd have a pretty damn good D core wouldn't we?

Now you can find individual faults with those players (like most players) but they were all Sabres at one time and they are all in the league and they'd be a balance of puck movers, thumpers, defensive stalwarts, size and speed and thus a very solid and balanced D. 

We have 4 puck movers, I lazy piece of crap and a mighty mite who tries but is marginal at best. 

In addition our 4th line is garbage. Too soft to have an impact or energy shift like Ruff said he wanted and unskilled as well. Adams gave us a downgrade with the moves he made there not an upgrade and it's just about the easiest line you can make. 

Whose the lazy one?

[PerreaultForever]

29 minutes ago, SABRES 0311 said:

Whose the lazy one?

Samuelsson. Wasn't that obvious? 

Power looks lazy a lot too, but there's a whole development argument there. 

[The Jokeman]

On 3/17/2025 at 2:16 PM, steveoath said:

What are your suggestions for new recruits (on the playing side) this summer?

for me:

Sam Bennett

Aaron Ekblad if they don’t re-up with the cats.

Jonathan Drouin 

Fantasy Land:

Marner

Marchand for a year  

 

 

Cody Ceci is an ideal RHD that brings some scrappiness that could put on the 2nd D pair yet I can't see him signing here.

[thewookie1]

1 hour ago, The Jokeman said:

Cody Ceci is an ideal RHD that brings some scrappiness that could put on the 2nd D pair yet I can't see him signing here.

Ceci has been in the East with multiple teams and has been a train wreck 

[Thorner]

If I’m a man of my word I can’t do this if Adams is back 

Shall see 

[dudacek]

Any interest in veteran former captain who can put up 30/30, always scores on the PP, is one of the league's best at faceoffs, has had a positive X goals for 7 straight years, and has never had a negative Corsi in his career?

John Tavares is available this summer for nothing but cash.

[jad1]

6 hours ago, Rasmus_ said:

A new owner.   That's it. 

Ain't happening.

[SabreFinn]

7 hours ago, dudacek said:

Any interest in veteran former captain who can put up 30/30, always scores on the PP, is one of the league's best at faceoffs, has had a positive X goals for 7 straight years, and has never had a negative Corsi in his career?

John Tavares is available this summer for nothing but cash.

But how much cash? And for how long?

[mjd1001]

11 hours ago, dudacek said:

Any interest in veteran former captain who can put up 30/30, always scores on the PP, is one of the league's best at faceoffs, has had a positive X goals for 7 straight years, and has never had a negative Corsi in his career?

John Tavares is available this summer for nothing but cash.

The tought of Tavares enterered my mind but I didn't think much of him.   He would be 'interesting'.

He was never really fast, but when I watch him now, well, he just doesn't play a fast game. But his skills are still mostly there.

I would not be upset with a 3 year deal, no longer. The problem is, there are probabably teams that want him and can offer more of a recent history of winning/being a contender that would do the same.

The Sabres don't have a ton of cap space like they did in the past, but they aren't up against the cap (yet) either. Maybe you offer him $1-$2m more per year on a 3 year deal than anyone else...and see if he bites?  Its tough, he is going to be 35 when next season starts...and about 1200 games played.

Edited Wednesday at 11:27 AM by mjd1001

[bob_sauve28]

So I guess we are "good" in goal with UPL and Levi? 

[GASabresIUFAN]

14 hours ago, dudacek said:

Any interest in veteran former captain who can put up 30/30, always scores on the PP, is one of the league's best at faceoffs, has had a positive X goals for 7 straight years, and has never had a negative Corsi in his career?

John Tavares is available this summer for nothing but cash.

Of course there is interest but probably not for what he wants in both $ and term.  He also probably wants to go for a Cup contender as he has never even played in a Cup final.

[BlowLeafsBlow123]

On 3/17/2025 at 8:31 PM, thewookie1 said:

Vet Defenseman to play with Power

A new defensive assistant coach

Power's defense was better when he came up from college than he is now.

There's no way they bring all these assistants back...right? RIGHT?

[GASabresIUFAN]

15 minutes ago, bob_sauve28 said:

So I guess we are "good" in goal with UPL and Levi? 

I think “stable” in personnel, don’t know about performance.  

[Drag0nDan]

Well here is... what's available at the store for Buffalo this offseason specific to defensemen:

RHD - Free agents (UFA and RFA) who have played 40 games this season:

RHD - Players with no contract clauses (Former sabres highlighted in Yellow) who have played 40 games this season

[Pimlach]

21 hours ago, thewookie1 said:

Not sure if its perfect in value but

Peterka (if he does seriously want out) for Weegar + ?? maybe (Flames)

Quinn for Spence (Kings)

Muel for Hathaway (Flyers)

Byram for McCann (Kraken)

Re-sign

McLeod 4x4.25mil

Johnson 2x1.25mil

JBD 2x1.25mil

Brannstrom 2x1mil

Levi 2x1.5mil

 

Sign

Jake Allen 1x4.5mil

 

 

Kulich - Thompson - Tuch

McCann - Norris - Zucker

Benson - McLeod - Greenway

Malenstyn - Krebs - Hathaway

Dahlin - JBD

Power - Weegar

Johnson - Spence

UPL

Allen

 

Clifton

Lafferty

Brannstrom

 

 

JBD is jumping to a top pair defenseman from a 7?  

Spence for Quinn?   Spence is small, how does he help toughen up the backline, especially playing with Johnson?  I prefer Clifton. 

[BlowLeafsBlow123]

19 hours ago, PerreaultForever said:

Defensive D men. The guys we all hoped Samuelsson would be, but he is not. Wouldn't hurt if one or two of them put a little fear into attacking forwards as well. 

As an example if our D was a group roughly equivalent to Dahlin, Power, Braydon McNabb, Jake McCabe, Zadorov and Ristolainen we'd have a pretty damn good D core wouldn't we?

Now you can find individual faults with those players (like most players) but they were all Sabres at one time and they are all in the league and they'd be a balance of puck movers, thumpers, defensive stalwarts, size and speed and thus a very solid and balanced D. 

We have 4 puck movers, I lazy piece of crap and a mighty mite who tries but is marginal at best. 

In addition our 4th line is garbage. Too soft to have an impact or energy shift like Ruff said he wanted and unskilled as well. Adams gave us a downgrade with the moves he made there not an upgrade and it's just about the easiest line you can make. 

Are you telling me these aren't the results they were looking for?

4 minutes ago, Pimlach said:

JBD is jumping to a top pair defenseman from a 7?  

Spence for Quinn?   Spence is small, how does he help toughen up the backline, especially playing with Johnson?  I prefer Clifton. 

Not to come in here with saying metrics are everything...but we cannot keep putting guys like Clifton on the ice when the eye test and analytics speak to him being a terrible player for us....

[Pimlach]

2 minutes ago, BlowLeafsBlow123 said:

Are you telling me these aren't the results they were looking for?

Not to come in here with saying metrics are everything...but we cannot keep putting guys like Clifton on the ice when the eye test and analytics speak to him being a terrible player for us....

Clifton often plays with that 4th line so that does not help him.  He adds a physical presence and he helps on the PK, we need more of both, not less.  Not saying he is a great player but Spence and Rob Johnson is not an upgraded 3rd pair.  Maybe this Spence is better than I think but he looks like another Bryson to me, which means he is a bad match for Johnson.  

[BlowLeafsBlow123]

It kills me that Fabbro was available on waivers and we could've grabbed him for nothing. Instead we put up with the combo of Bryson, Samuelsson, Jokiharju and Clifton as our bottom three. That's not to mention icing a player like Gilbert.

To me, they need three competent defensive d-men this offseason, at least one true righty to play with Power. Dahlin is fine on the right side and doesn't need someone at Byram's offensive level next to him to be elite. Perhaps Ryan Johnson gets an opportunity considering his age and pedigree. Bernard Docker can also be a passable depth piece.

It's about making incremental improvements and weeding out the weak points of the roster. It's death by 1,000 papercuts every year with this team and Adams just doesn't take it far enough.

[BlowLeafsBlow123]

2 minutes ago, Pimlach said:

Clifton often plays with that 4th line so that does not help him.  He adds a physical presence and he helps on the PK, we need more of both, not less.  Not saying he is a great player but Spence and Rob Johnson is not an upgraded 3rd pair.  Maybe this Spence is better than I think but he looks like another Bryson to me, which means he is a bad match for Johnson.  

I think you need to try and improve the top 6. If Clifton stays around due to his outlandish contract, then fine, but we're notably worse when he's in the lineup. 

You are correct on the 4th line. It's probably one of the worst units in the league and both of the anchors are signed through next season. Adams thinking he had it all figured out is hilarious in retrospect. Tying his boat to Beck Malenstyn and Sam Lafferty to change his team around is just comedy gold at this point.

Small sample size alert, but it seems Kozak is able to get better results in that spot, at least defensively. He might be worth a longer look at 4C. But then again, I'm very much out on Krebs and don't think he's a real NHL'er at this point. He's hanging on by a thread from my view.

[BlowLeafsBlow123]

Just now, Drag0nDan said:

ooo now do bryson! 

See above. Apologies for spamming the board with these but thought they spoke well to what we're seeing on the ice. It's fairly easy to see why we're a bad team this year. We're getting terrible results from our 4th line, and basically all but two defensemen are completely under water. Not only that, our 2nd line had completely tanked us early in the season and never truly recovered. Add onto that some piss poor, unclutch goaltending and it's easy to see. They need to identify the weak points (they've started to) and get the right group here.

 

Here's a few more of the drains:

[Drag0nDan]

16 minutes ago, BlowLeafsBlow123 said:

It kills me that Fabbro was available on waivers and we could've grabbed him for nothing. Instead we put up with the combo of Bryson, Samuelsson, Jokiharju and Clifton as our bottom three. That's not to mention icing a player like Gilbert.

To me, they need three competent defensive d-men this offseason, at least one true righty to play with Power. Dahlin is fine on the right side and doesn't need someone at Byram's offensive level next to him to be elite. Perhaps Ryan Johnson gets an opportunity considering his age and pedigree. Bernard Docker can also be a passable depth piece.

It's about making incremental improvements and weeding out the weak points of the roster. It's death by 1,000 papercuts every year with this team and Adams just doesn't take it far enough.

Interesting thought on johnson actually, i've completely forgotten about him.  

The hard part of the sabres roster view is that of a very young team, which makes us all reluctant to promote players.  But every good team has some unheralded dude whos like 25 and paid like nothing. 

Johnson was probably elevated too soon last year (one of the themes of this org is not creating depth to let players develop), but he's a defense first defenseman, who last year had the same 7 points as Samuelsson... while on the ice 7 minutes less per game.  He'll be 24 next year, and the only blocking I see is byrum (if you extend byrum, probably trade johnson since he's not going to make the club with 4 lefties under contract).

Interested to see if he's at all included in plans for the 3rd pairing.  Probably not since we have Samuelsson stuck here indefinitely.  

Edited Wednesday at 03:29 PM by Drag0nDan

[BlowLeafsBlow123]

46 minutes ago, Drag0nDan said:

Interesting thought on johnson actually, i've completely forgotten about him.  

The hard part of the sabres roster view is that of a very young team, which makes us all reluctant to promote players.  But every good team has some unheralded dude whos like 25 and paid like nothing. 

Johnson was probably elevated too soon last year (one of the themes of this org is not creating depth to let players develop), but he's a defense first defenseman, who last year had the same 7 points as Samuelsson... while on the ice 7 minutes less per game.  He'll be 24 next year, and the only blocking I see is byrum (if you extend byrum, probably trade johnson since he's not going to make the club with 4 lefties under contract).

Interested to see if he's at all included in plans for the 3rd pairing.  Probably not since we have Samuelsson stuck here indefinitely.  

I think Johnson is more likely a Bryson replacement. I cannot see them re-signing Bryson again, really under any circumstance. Perhaps Johnson/JBD can be an ok third pairing. We just need a third pairing that keeps it simple, plays a smart/heady game and doesn't kill them. Clifton, while physical just seems to make a lot of dumb plays out there. In a vacuum he's a fine third pairing d-man but I think this team needs guys that make the right play and play within themselves.

My preference would be for them to find their way out of the Samuelsson deal and decide if they're extending Byram or trading him. Ideally they change the look of the defense by quite a bit:

X-Dahlin

Power-X

Johnson-JBD

Clifton (if you can't move him along)

I would imagine this would have to come in the form of trades, as top 4 d-men are rarely sitting in UFA willing to come to Buffalo. It might be time to trade some forward prospects for established d-men. Worst case scenario you keep Samuelsson and pair him with Dahlin to minimize the damage he can do to your team, as Dahlin is otherworldly. Power's partner is mission critical for this offseason. I still have a lot of belief in this kid and think he'll get back to tilting the ice in our favor more often than not. This year has been rough for him, no doubt. But they've continually saddled him with less than ideal partners (i.e. Jokiharju) and the 2nd pair just never found it's footing. The fact that guys like John Marino and Dante Fabbro were available for very little to nothing and Adams did nothing really chaps my ass. He literally did the bare minimum and simply re-signed guys like Bryson and Joki. They also need to hire better defensive assistants that can help get Power's defensive zone development on track. I have to remind myself that Dahlin was struggling at a similar age, in a similar fashion before all of a sudden figuring out his defensive game. Now he's elite at both ends.

Byram, while solid, has not proven he can do well without Dahlin. He's been solid and I'd love to keep him, but don't think it's a luxury we can afford in terms of cap or team construction. Best bet is to move him while his value is high and perhaps you can pull a defensive RD from someone that badly needs an offensive d-man. I really hope we have a new look next season, just not sure I want Kevyn making these crucial decisions.

[PerreaultForever]

4 hours ago, Pimlach said:

Clifton often plays with that 4th line so that does not help him.  He adds a physical presence and he helps on the PK, we need more of both, not less.  Not saying he is a great player but Spence and Rob Johnson is not an upgraded 3rd pair.  Maybe this Spence is better than I think but he looks like another Bryson to me, which means he is a bad match for Johnson.  

Clifton was a 7/8 guy in Boston on a league minimum contract. Because of injuries he got into their bottom pairing and played decent hockey in their structured defensive system. But that's who he is, a bottom pairing guy and expecting more is silly. I guess we had to overpay him to get him but we grossly overpaid him and if the idea was pair him with Power on the second pairing it was a ridiculous idea. When we signed him Boston fans were like "wtf? well good for Cliffy, get the money, but that's a ridiculous contract for him".

It's a good point about who he plays with though. He hasn't exactly been put in the best situations and his own pairing isn't helping his stats.