Episode 129 – 2025 Free Agency Debrief | The Sabre Report Podcast

Episode 129 – 2025 Free Agency Debrief | The Sabre Report Podcast

Well, It’s that time. Episode 129, second week of July. Here we are. Um, you know, we waited. We waited to kind of just kind of reassess the situation, right? We’ve had a busy few weeks. are are actually well our last official episode was episode 128 which was the Purka live reaction. So I guess if you’re just following along the episodic releases, it has been a little bit since we’ve talked, but um obviously the big draft live stream that we did and then a quick live stream that we did the night before free agency. We’ve touched on some things, some topics, but you know, once once free agency started, uh it was definitely a good time to just back away. We always say it, first week of July is the week everything happens. And once that’s done, everybody goes to their cabins, the insiders go to their cabins, their cottages, and everybody calls it a season. Uh, I mean, it’s Monday the 7th and I can’t remember what the last meaningful move was. It was probably Eers, right? Which was July 3rd. So, we’ve had about no interesting things happening in the league for the past four days. And I’m not even complaining. I’m just saying that’s the reality of the situation. And that just means that for the most part the Buffalo Sabres off season is done. Now obviously obviously there is one story line still alive and well and that story line might even drag out uh I don’t even know till when. It depends on when the arbitration date is, but for the most part, the Buffalo Sabres off season is probably 90% completed. Uh, so I I think it’s now’s the best time to kind of jump back in and talk about everything that’s happened or I guess talk about what really hasn’t happened because not a lot has happened since the JJ Purka trade. The silence in the rest of this chat right now just shows how much they how much they didn’t do. very very little. Yeah, this uh this little break was definitely needed. I think there are times last week where JP’s ready to punch a hole in his computer monitor. I might not have been able to control what was coming out of my mouth. You know, sometimes we uh we bring up what is said in our group chats because it could be very funny. And I think the text of the week last week goes to JP where he said, “I’m so angry. I can’t even focus at work.” Never seen that happen before. Yeah. Last to be like a fly on the wall as he’s like he’s like air punching stewing at his desk in his cubicle. Multiple different Excel spreadsheets up at once. Can’t even focus. He either had the most unproductive day or the most productive day. No in between. It was a rough week. It was a lot of ranting in my head. Uh it was a little hard to concentrate at work sometimes. Not even joking. Yeah. Yeah. It it it’s been frustrating. I mean, there’s no doubt that I I think I can speak for a majority of people to say that these last few weeks have been underwhelming. uh at least postp trade especially, you know, it’s not not to cast a not to cast a shadow or a cloud over the entire in into the entirety of what’s taken place the last two weeks because we know we’re going to talk about it not in a vacuum. I don’t think any of their moves post Perka trade are actually bad like whatsoever. I don’t think there’s a single move you look at aside from maybe the Jack Quinn resigning where you go that’s a bad move. They should not have done that. everything they have done post I want to clarify post JJ Purka trade it they’ve been relatively positive moves marginally very marginally but it’s nothing this is the frustrating part because you can look at something as objective as the Justin Danforth signing and be like that’s that’s that’s cool you know and especially you know you move off of Sam Laferdy earlier that day. You trade Sam Lafery, replace him with Justin Danfor. That’s probably a full standings point right there, gaining the standings. The problem is that’s the biggest freaking move of the day. Unless you’re talking about Alex Lion signing for two years. That’s what is so so it’s a double-edged sword because it’s like, okay, it’s good, but that’s all we got. And it feels like that’s for the last two weeks you’ve just been waiting for that for that for that uh that trade that that well it’s the Byron. Yeah. I mean it’s what we’re all waiting for and there’s still a good chance it happens but you know the fact that that is still ongoing like that’s just another form of torch. We thought that was going to be done well honestly maybe a month ago while the playoffs were still going on we thought it could be done. Don’t forget we had to save that money in case of a potential offer sheet. So now that we’ve saved the money, we can now allocate it to the free agent. So what free agents are left? Oh god. Um Jeff Skinner. Jeff Skinner. Jeff Skinner. Do you think they’d actually they wouldn’t bring him back? No. I think we talked about I think I brought this up and it makes funny how much it makes sense though because they need a left winger to play in the top six and he hasn’t fallen off completely yet. They need to pay him you could take him they need to pay him 5 million that way has a higher that way his cap hits back to normal and evens out. It’s their way of saying sorry. I don’t know man. It it makes sense to me for some reason, but I don’t I don’t think they’d do it. I mean, other than him, was Jack Roselovic still out there? Rosik still out there. I’d rather have Fabry still out there. He’s a permanent infirmary patient, I think. Did you say you would? Rosik as a player is fine, but is this team going to employ 27 right wingers? I mean, the only the only position that’s more stacked than right wing right now is left-hand defense. And and don’t worry, we’ll get there. But it No, I said I want Skinner back. Oh, I thought you said Rosik. You’d be okay. No, no. I said I’d rather take Jeff Skinner. Ah, it just it makes sense, too. They won’t. He’s just not They wouldn’t do it. I think I said a few times this weekend, you know, when I was talking to people, you know, holiday weekend, I was saying like, yeah, I’m just I’m honestly, you know, I’m very down. Um, admittedly, this is probably my low point of my fandom in a long time. And but I’ve been saying like I’m at least waiting for the Bum trade to happen to have, you know, a final opinion on this off season because I think it’s been largely disappointing. But one move could could change that. But like Jonah said, we thought this trade was literally going to be done at the very least like two or three weeks ago. And it’s still still dragging on. We’re still getting [ __ ] rumors about it every single day. and it’s getting you nowhere. I I don’t I don’t know what they’re waiting for. Like I I can’t imagine anything is going to open up in the next 3 weeks while they wait for the arbitration hearing to start. It’s a lot of blue, guys. That is a lot of blue. Don’t look at the defense or the Ralph Krueger photo, though. For anybody just listening, Christian pulled up the uh the JFresh player card for for Jeff Skinner. There is a lot of blue. Uh the the defensive war is basically a flatline. It’s if it was a person, they’d be dead. That’s his defensive war. He does not play defense, but that’s okay. We don’t need that right now. We have Michael Kessler. Well, what makes it so frustrating is is that you, you know, I preface this all by saying it’s the second week of July. This is when we can fully not fully obviously, but like for the most part, we can judge their off season. But, you know, they they could go and swing some uh out of the park just slam dunk by trade. They they could if it’s the Blues, they could go and get like Dylan Holloway and it turns like a D deg D deg D deg D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D D Dggrade off season into like an A because they just nailed the top. They like they upgraded on Purka, got rid of Byum somehow. That’s what it would be. But instead, you have that thought at the back of your mind and but then you know common sense common sense starts talking to you and you’re like well what are the odds that that’s going to happen at this point in time especially given how they tend to target their their trades. I mean the Blues are pretty up against the cap and Holloway is an RFA next year. That’s that is what confuses me a little bit about about them. It’s like Byum’s due for this massive extension and the most you are talking about is like Jake Neighbors who makes was he in the threes? I think he might even be below three as well like Holloway. I don’t know. It’s very confusing. It’s going to be interesting to see how how that situation plays out. But um I don’t know. Do do we want to touch before we get to the more of the Byum stuff and the overall offseason stuff? Should we should we go back a little bit? Cuz you know, like I said, our last official episode was the Purka stuff. So, everything that’s happened in between, we really haven’t given our uh our thoughts on it. Just do some rapid fire. Might as well wrap it up. Yeah. All right. Um, how did we feel about their draft class? And I guess more specifically, Ratty Murka. I mean, now that we’re two weeks removed from the draft, I mean, it’s fine. It’s kind of what I was expecting in that range anyway. Um, but he’s a pretty large project. You probably won’t see him around for a couple years. Doesn’t really move them the needle now, which is why I I guess is why so many people wanted to trade the first the first round pick, but you know, picks don’t really have as much value as people think unless they’re like a sweetener in a trade. But I think it’s a I think it’s a solid pick. Obviously, the the league is pretty dried up on right-handed defenseman, and we’re just trying to acquire as many as we can right now. Wasn’t like the first two or three picks of like four, weren’t they all like shot defenseman? It was him and uh I don’t have the draft class pulled up right now. What was the second guy’s name? It was something It was something owski. Bed Bedcowski. Bedcowski. That’s right. Yeah. Um, some big some big defenseman. I know I touched on this actually in our our draft episode. I made a prediction. I’m like, guys, I I said I’m like, they are going to tell you that MKA was the next best player on their draft list. And I do not um believe them whatsoever. And I still don’t because that’s exactly what Jerry Foron said. And he also he also said something interesting uh in the post-draft presser how uh they saw five to six top players in the class and I think MKO was like the sixth best they said or something along those lines. Basically if if you connect the dots they would have passed on James Hagens for Ranny Mertka. And I just that would have been very questionable. Um, and I it’s like I said, I I just don’t believe that. I really do not believe how you could look at Murka and be like that is a top six player in this draft. Um, or he was definitely the next best player on the draft board. Maybe maybe I’m wrong, but um it’s not even that potential. It’s not even that I hate Well, that’s Yeah, it’s not that I hate the pick or I hate the idea of it. Um it very much feels like a pick that they felt like they had to make rather than one that they I don’t know if I say should have made, but it it just it was the first time I felt like they did not go best player available that they had a different No, they drafted off a need. Yeah. drafted off of a need and a different, you know, skill set. I mean, look, I know a lot of there’s a lot of misconceptions or people like to lie to themselves that the Sabres are built on a small roster. They’re not. The NHL roster is not, but their prospect pool, they have definitely gone smaller skilled forwards. I mean, at least in the first round, you got Benson, uh, Seavoi, Olland, uh, even Rosanne was a super skinny kid when he got drafted. Uh now obviously you got your colleagues and your powers but um you know they definitely have skewed there because they were the best players available. Uh so this this draft felt like I guess rest uh regressing back to the mean and you know it wasn’t just the MKA pick. They basically went size every single round. I don’t think they drafted a player under like 6’2. You don’t think that the league is trending that way though with the way the Panthers have been winning like back to back? It seems it seems like it’s such a copycat league and I feel like we’re in the middle of one of these transitions where it’s they’re going more towards I don’t want to say like pre lockout era hockey but just more of a style game. It’s just I think it’s recency bias. It’s a well bias that that it’s recency bias. It’s also the big guys, you know, and not everybody, you know, like MKA has the Tyler Myers comparisons, but even MKA is probably like a lot more skilled as a prospect than Tyler Myers was. Like the big, it’s kind of the Ta Thompson dilemma. Like everybody when he came into the league and you look at how Phil Hley used him and you looked at how Ralph Krueger even wanted to use him. They wanted him to be this, you know, power forward that would just live in front of the net and obviously he is not that type of player. He’s much more skilled and the big guys can do what the little guys can now. So now it’s just kind of, you know, we went through that era of the small guys. the small skilled guys are better than the the hulking uh I don’t know the simpletons the guys that play the simple heavy hockey but simpletons now the now the now the big guys can do what uh the little guys can do so feel like you’re seeing more of that I mean I’m pretty sure I saw that not a single defenseman under six foot got drafted this draft which is makes sense I mean you you struggle to find small defenseman on contenders these days. It’s been trending down over the past few seasons, too. I think it was like four last year, too. Yeah. I And I I agree with it. You know, you can’t you really can’t have a Jacob Bryson on your roster. Uh your everyday your everyday lineup, you know, not every small guy’s a Quint Hughes or even a Lane Hudson. So, not every guy’s a glue guy like Jacob Bryson is. So, just the fabric of the team, you know, overall the draft class itself, I’d probably give it like a I don’t even know like a even a B minus feels kind of wrong. I give it like a C+, you know. It’s not in love with the strategy they went. I understand why they did it. You know, I will revisit years. Yeah. I will wait to be proven wrong. I’ll put it that way. Yeah. Like I don’t even know. I don’t even know what my favorite I I feel like every class to this point I’ve had a favorite draft pick. You know, like last year was probably Brody Zeamer or year before that obviously Zack Benson, but you know, even in the later rounds um you know, going back to 2022, you had um uh I just lost the player I was thinking of. I’ve had favorite players, though. That’s that’s the point. And I feel like this draft, I don’t know who like my guy is here that I’m excited to watch. Yeah. The the only other thing of note in the draft class is I mean we drafted two goalies so it’s like we have like six goalies in our pipeline now. I mean that’s including you got UPL Levi Ratlaf Lennin in and then the two goalies that we just drafted. So hopefully one of them works out but it’s like you that’s quite a few of them. Got to fill out the Jacksonville roster too, right? Well, I’m also too Well, I’m also I’m also the type of guy that’s draft a goalie every year. You always draft 100%. And if you draft two, okay, so be it. Just draft them with a picture. Like that’s all I’m asking. Yeah, they they had nothing. They had nothing on that guy. Uh the one draft pick that the Sabres did not select was Delt. second year in a row of a second round pick being traded on day two of the draft. Obviously, last year was for Beck Menstein. Uh this year they traded their 39th overall pick with Connor Clifton for Connor Timonss and Isaac Bleo of the Pittsburgh Penguins. What did we think about I mean overall I you know overall I think we can kind of jump the gun on the perception this Timonss Connor Timonss is an upgrade on Connor Clifton at least looks to be that’s pretty well documented. Um no I I I agree with you there but it’s it’s like the Purka trade. just it underwhelms me because it was either we didn’t get something back that was better which that’s the purka trade but for us in this one it’s like you had to give up another second round pick just to move up from Clifton to Timonss that’s I mean yeah you think about it that’s why like once upon a time Connor Clifton was the marquee addition of an offseason yep and he had to be packaged with a second round pick just to upgrade on the third pair remember that offseason we were putting him next to Dene. We’re like, “We f we found him. We found our number one right-handed defenseman. There it is.” I I cringe at the thought every time I think of that 2023 summer. I’m just like, you’re just constantly chasing it. Constantly you’re a year behind and now you you had to do a cap dump for your your uh your man your marquee edition. So that that hurts. But Conor Timonss, it’s a net positive. It is a net positive move in terms of the roster uh today. Um however, you know, second round picks have been a bit of a discussion recently uh and it plays into the next situation that was well documented and there was quite a bit of discourse around Jacob Bernard Docker. He’s not a Buffalo Saber anymore. The Buffalo Sabres did not qualify him. And the following day in free agency, he would sign with the Detroit Red Wings. Yeah, that that that’s pretty bad. So, last time we talked, we didn’t know whether or not they were just maybe working out an extension, which we thought the chances were pretty low because it would make no sense. His qualifying offer was dirt cheap, but you know, we held back. We know we reserve judgment until it happened. And not only did he sign elsewhere, he signed in the division. He signed for what, 825K, I think it was, with the Detroit Red Wings. So, a right-hand defenseman acquired not even five months ago, gone for nothing. and basically another second round pick gone because we had we all agreed that when that Cousins trade happened, that second round pick that went with Cousins was to get a 24year-old young causecontrolled defenseman in Bernard Docker who played well who played well down the stretch and played well with Owen Power nonetheless. Yeah, I I think it just frustrates me that they’re just the the asset mismanagement is this bad. Just throwing away, you know, guys you got in trades. I I feel like they just never have a plan. There’s never a plan. And they say they’ll have a plan, but you know, we all know how that goes. I’ve already made my my thoughts known on this. I’m not as pissed off as I was the night before free agency. So, go relist to our free agency live stream on YouTube if you want to hear my full thoughts. But I just I don’t understand it at all. He played good with power. And I mean, it was clearly an emphasis of this organization this off season to at least get more right-handed defenseman um in our pipeline. Um the two the two biggest um moves we’ve made this off seasonason were for right-handed defenseman for Castle Ring and Timmons. But even with those two moves, here is your right-handed defenseman depth in the entire organization. Castle Ring, Timonss, then Comro and Mets, you still only have two NHL competent right-handed defensemen. And then on the left side, you have like six or seven. Like you could one, two, three, four, five, six, like seven left-handed defensemen who are competent versus two on the on right on the right side. It it makes no sense that they choose Jacob Bryson and Ryan Johnson and Zack Jones over Jacob Bernard Docker, another right-handed defenseman who played good. And it’s like and like part of Adam’s reasoning was oh, you know, we saw him as our eighth guy, you know, for for that amount of money we didn’t want to pay him, which is complete [ __ ] Like he’s literally making less than um Bryson and I think Ryan Johnson. But it’s like, okay, if you don’t see him as one of your organizational pieces, you could still bring him in to compete and to have organizational depth at right-handed defenseman. But no, or something didn’t. Something that we brought up the last time we talked, look at what happened with Cody Glass in New Jersey. They were going to not qualify him. Then they heard there was a ton of interest around him, so they signed him to a new contract. So now they are totally now the power is back in their hands to just go and get an asset for him. Even if it’s a seventh round pick, they could flip Cody Glass for something. And I just don’t see why there’s any reason why Jacob Bernard Docker, a former first round pick, basically signed to league men, someone who can play up and down the lineup and has is a good puck moving defenseman. And it just the fact you don’t even qualify him. It it just doesn’t make any sense. And it’s like, yes, we are definitely spending way too much time on a player that doesn’t really impact the roster. But it’s just so it it just there’s no logic behind it. There is no good out there’s no good reason that they did this. I’m talking about one legitimately good reason. There there isn’t one. And now you look at the last two years, they’ve traded three second round picks basically for Beck Menstein, uh, and Connor Timonss. That’s basically it. Yikes. And then they’ve traded three, they basically traded three second round picks to gain one bottom six forward, dump a bottom pair defenseman, and trade for a bottom pair defenseman. But B, you traded for nothing. basically just gave it away now because now the trade is essentially now that Dennis Gilbert is out of the equation as well. It’s Dylan Cousins in a second round pick for Josh Norris. That’s the trade. That is the trade and it just it just doesn’t look good on paper. You know, it’s not it looks terrible on paper. not the end of the world, but now we have now we have a large enough sample size where it’s like Kevin Adams and the second round have a terrible relationship because not to mention uh Alexander Kisikov just also did not receive a new contract. So that’s another second round pick gone that just completely fumbled from the Taylor Hall trade. So, it’s it’s now now it’s enough to be a pattern and it’s just it’s frustrating asset management and if Bernard Docker finds a nice role in Detroit, you’re going to be looking at, you know, you’re going to be kicking yourself being like, well, that could have been, you know, a useful piece to have because it’s also, you know, this isn’t like Bernard Docker was a if Jacob Bernard Docker was a left-handed defenseman, nobody’s saying anything. It’s being like, okay, you know, you got Bryson, uh, sign Zack Jones, Ryan Johnson. It’s just more of the same. And Bernard Docker, just the fact that he shoots right-handed makes him a need. He’s a need for every team in the league. What team does not need a player like Jacob Bernard Docker? I think every single team in the NHL, you could look, there’s not enough right-handed defenseman in the league to go around to be like, “A team could not use that player.” Yep. Yep. It’s just dumb. Yeah. Very frustrating asset management. It’s I’m still scratching my head about it. I I just I I don’t understand. That was That was my first initial thoughts. I was just like, why don’t you just tender him and then just like shop him around a little bit? You know, some like you said, someone could use a right-handed defenseman, but just let him walk. I I don’t know, man. It just it just like I said again, it just seems like there’s no plan. just you got no idea what’s going on. Well, it just and it just makes you wonder why they would have wanted him in the first place, right? Exactly. Like why did you want him with even out a body for Dennis Gilbert like you could have you could have called up Ryan Johnson. You could have called up uh Eric Brandstrom you acquired at that same deadline who has NHL experience. I don’t really care about that. I mean, you traded him for a Kubel, but you could have done all those like you could have given him the shot and just not acquired Bernard Docker and pro like you could have just done Cousins for Norris. It still would have been frustrating. You probably still should have gotten more for Cousins, but whatever. Instead, you burned a second round pick to trade for a right-hand defenseman that you maybe thought you might like, but now you don’t. And he’s gone for nothing. when a team. But here’s the thing, like we always say you should have gotten more when when are you telling me that at the deadline Josh Norris more value or equal value? That’s not what I’m saying. What I’m saying is when it when it when you make it know like we there were rumors around Cousins for a while and he was struggling really bad. Teams aren’t stupid. They know this stuff. When you make that pitch to be like, “Hey, like we’re shopping Dylan around. What what what could we get?” You’re going to get lowballed like crazy. Like nobody’s overpaying for them. Nobody’s running to you to overpay for them. You’re never going to win these trades. Well, especially when you corner yourself in a position when you’re like, I want help now, right? cuz like it just goes back to the the rumor that it seemed like them and Detroit were close on a trade and there was no NHL ready talent on the Red Wings roster besides a very uh fresh to the NHL Marco Casper which you know they would have gotten killed by everybody for getting another 21-year-old into the lineup but you know not to relitigate a conversation we’ve had multiple times obviously I’m not a fan of how the Cousins trade has gone but this was just an unnecessary another unnecessary wound that you opened up. Basically, it just makes it that much worse. And I’ll say it is e it is easy to to to micro manage and and pin like you know needle these moves and you know poke holes in them and all this stuff because they suck. You know if they were winning we wouldn’t care. It’s like okay you lost a second round pick for some BS. It’s okay. We made a deep playoff run. like it would still people would still be like, “Hey, you know, you should have maybe been a little more careful, but you win a lot of the a lot of the noise goes away and people just don’t care.” I mean, I don’t want to compare them to the Bills, but the Bills haven’t had the greatest, you know, luck in certain drafts and they just keep winning. So, no, but it’s like just move on with your life. You move on to the next season. We’re just kind of spinning our tires and every small little bad move that’s made, it’s always like, you know, it’s the end of the world. Oh, yeah. You’re spot on. I mean, like when dude years 14 years of everything makes a move like this that much more infuriating because it’s like you can’t even do the littlest of things correct. Like I don’t know why I wasn’t more mad about it. I mean, maybe I’m just, you know, to a point where I’m just like, yeah, it’s pretty normal. But when the Bernard Docker thing happened, like I I don’t get me wrong, I was a little bit upset, but there are people who are just, oh my god, like J like JP, they’re ready to smash their laptop over their knee. I’m like, guys, it’s just Jason Bernard Docker. We didn’t lose Rasmus Dalene. But I get it. There’s frustration. There’s, you know, the idiocy doesn’t end. And then that’s what people are most fed up with. I think just choosing Jacob Bryson and Ryan Johnson and Zack Jones over JBD I think is just absolutely disgusting. I I don’t don’t get it. Disgusting. Power hasn’t played with any anybody like other than Dene. He’s never had like any chemistry with anybody and he finally plays good with somebody and that’s just freaking throw him to the side. It’s just dumb. like unless they still have chance to go get a right-handed defenseman who can make this lineup. Lilrin is out there. Um, you know, there’s it could be a part of the bow and trade. Like, who knows? If they go get another right-handed defenseman, I’ll stop my complaining about JBD. But if they don’t, I I’m just going to be baffled by them. I feel like even if they get they could get like a bonafide um, you know, like I’m not a fan of Rasmus Anderson. Like I basically just think he’s another by run, but there’s a guy like he’s a top four defenseman. Um, a flawed one, but he is a top four defenseman and you’re number four right-handed def it’s still comrav or Zach Metsa. That’s what it is, you know. I agree. That’s just why it just makes no sense, you know? Like you could have like like I feel like Ryan Johnson is in a very similar situation where like they could have not qu like like if you flip the script and be like they didn’t qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qu qualify Ryan Johnson then this then people saying calm down then I think it has more merit because you know Ryan Johnson former first round pick you could argue maybe wasn’t given the most opportunity here right away. um you’re losing him for nothing, but um you have so many left-handed defenseman, so who cares? It’s not that with Bernard Docker. And I don’t know, we’ve gone like 10 minutes. We’ve probably gone way more. I get it. Some people are probably sick of it. Um but it just it just makes you scratch your head. Uh I do have a little bit of breaking news here. Uh the other notable arbitration candidate, Jack McBain, just resigned with Utah. Five years, $4.25 million. So Bowen Barum’s like the only big name going to arbitration. Uh it seems now we wait. It’s all right. I mean, I I don’t worry about players going to arbitration. I mean, it’s part of I don’t know. I don’t know about that. I I was I don’t think I’ve ever been a player. I always get very very worried about that. What do you think? What do you What What are you nervous about? That they’re going to walk him to free agency. We’re going to overpay. Arbitration always ends badly. Look at Jeremy Swayman. That guy almost didn’t start for the Bruins last season. I just feel like it doesn’t actually get there that much. So, look, next time I’m not too worried about it right now. We’ll we’ll do a TSR arbitration. JP will be the mediator and I’ll explain why Christian doesn’t deserve what he thinks he deserves. Hey, I’ll litigate every single negative thing that he has done over the past two broken equipment, forgetting equipment, making me cut stuff from the final episode. I’ll just pin I’ll make you cut something right now. Not being available for the next two weeks. That as well. Jonah, you’re going out of town, too. Don’t say that to me. This was a planned vacation. God knows I need it. My point is that’s how arbitration goes, though. But my point is that’s how arbitration goes. They have to tell every single negative thing. I mean, you should like MLB arbitrations are wild. I think NHL keeps like theirs pretty low-key. I MLB arbitration, there’s some like crazy crazy stories. I forget. Well, also I will also say that in arbitr if anybody is wondering out there because that when we when we talk about stats it is illegal to use micro stats and like analytically driven material in arbitration. So basically Bowen Bar has all the advantage here because he just be he could just point at the piece of paper and be like I had this many points. I had this many goals, this many assists. Why are you not paying me? And they can’t be like oh you and they have to turn around and be like the goals. turn around and be like, “You fell a you fell apart quicker than Jeff Skinner’s career when you weren’t next to Don.” This is true. Which is why if it doesn’t go great, I mean, I wouldn’t mind having him back next to Don, but you know, it’s just more of the same. Man, I don’t even know if he stays after everything. He said he wants to stay. He just wants to get paid. Oh, I believe it. I mean, Freriedman straight up said that like this isn’t the Purka situation where Purka straight up asked out. You know, Byum just wants to get paid and if he thinks the best place to do that is in Buffalo, then he’ll stay, which, you know, I respect that. All my homies hate Alan Walsh. It’s not like God, I think he deserves to get booed when he comes back. Full stop. Turka. Oh yeah. Oh yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I can’t believe I was considering getting his jersey a year ago. I don’t want to like cast him off as some villain, but he was like, did not even entertain a contract. Like really, you didn’t even want to entertain it. This this like I know like we spent that whole draft night episode being like or not draft night, the the whole Turk trade episode being like you did this to yourselves. Like you walked him, you didn’t um you didn’t give him the money when he probably deserved it. It’s like, yeah, that’s all true, but we all still at that frame of mind, we thought Purka was still maybe coming back, like he would be open to it when we realized, you know, if there’s no going if we found out that there was no going back before, I think that trade makes a bit more sense. Now, I just think I at this point in time, Purka has just as much reason to receive a cold welcome back than like Eel did. Absolutely. Yeah. 100%. Also, it’s like it sets a bad precedent for other RFAS. Like if you’re a client of Alen Walsh, you basically if you’re if you’re a team controlled asset and you’re on a team that’s not doing well, you basically ask him to go, you know, do your dirty work for you and just, you know, find a way to get out of there. That’s why it sucks, too. Like I kind of wish they would have waited just because it feel it just when you trade him that early for a a return that seems underwhelming, it gives the impression that you lost control of the situation. They gave Berserka gave exactly what he like I understand why they did it. They wanted to secure the fact that they were getting a right-hand defenseman back right away, you know, as soon because maybe they knew this by room stuff was going to drag on the the market was soft. Uh they weren’t getting the returns they wanted and they knew this was maybe headed towards an offer sheet or an arbitration case. So that’s why they did purka when they did it. I understand that. But it goes back to not having a plan and not being ready with, you know, the situation at hand and um, you know, one little wrinkle, you know, one [ __ ] decides not to play for your team and acts entitled, acts a bit more entitled than he probably should, then you know, you find yourself here. Yeah, that’s the other thing. It’s like he was able to take advantage of a vulnerable situation because he knows how this market is looked upon right now. He knows that it’s tough place. It’s a tough draw to get people here. You know, it’s it’s 14 years in a playoff drought and he knew where the GM was at in his own line of work in his own job security because Kevin Adams wasn’t going to try and get worse. And um if you go out and you trade someone like Purka, you’re obviously going to look for comparable assets back, but he he knew. It’s like Alan Walsh knew. It’s like it’s like you can’t go out and you can’t you can’t go out and be like, you know, hey, I I want to I want to get out of here and then you just be like you can’t you can’t just be like, no. Because if Purka just sat there and didn’t play, then you’re in a way worse situation. So Kevin Adams was like, “Well, I can’t have this dragging on into the season because this is this is probably make or break here. So I got to move him for something.” I know that thought went through his head. Well, I kind of I kind of lost my train of thought for just like half a second, but I found it. Well, I I was just going to say that maybe he was posturing and and just doing GM talk, but he said he said the exit meeting with Purka went well. So, like something changed between uh the end of the season to the trade. Well, I think it was two things. I think a the Sabres wanted to bridge him was which was obviously going to piss him off. Um, but B, obviously after I think he was going to get bridged or that the Sabres wanted to bridge him, Alan Walsh got into the ear of JJ Purka and said, “Dude, just just request out.” Like, this is a sinking ship. You can get money from literally anywhere else. Uh, do it now. I think that’s why we ended up with the outcome that we did. So, all the homies hate Ellen Walsh and even JJ Purka. Now, he will not be getting a warm welcome back from me. Nope. Definitely not. Not for me either. So, Jack Quinn’s back for another two seasons. This was something that I think took some people by surp I mean took me a little bit by surprise especially that they did it so soon getting that contract uh was it on draft day and what what are your thoughts? Obviously like this was another thing that we touched on previously but where how are you feeling about the Jack Quinn thing? I’m overall fine with that. Um I mean he’s shown a lot of promise and flashes be especially before he got injured. Um and I think if he has a full healthy off season and has a good training camp, you know, he can you can maybe return to that form. Um, I just don’t like that right now he’s basically slotted in our top six and we’re kind of relying on him when he had a very disappointing year last year, even if it was because of the injuries. But I just don’t think like that’s a spot where I think we should have tried to get better and we just we didn’t. And I also think the timing of the signing was really really dumb. like I I don’t get why you you don’t wait until at least the draft is done um just in case a deal does come across um you know for Bum or for anybody else where now you know they have another forward sign so maybe they would consider other deals less because of that um even till like after free agency started like there was nothing rushing that deal like I the timing really didn’t make sense to me um but end of the day, I’m not too surprised by it and I’m I’ve I’ve opened up to it a lot. I hope he does return to form because he’s a great player. It’s just he needs to he needs to stay healthy and he needs to, you know, hopefully return to form. I just don’t want to rely on him to be our top six replacement for Purka. Yeah, I mean originally like I was kind of I was happy with it just right off the bat. I know a lot of people weren’t. Yeah, because I I know I know a lot of people weren’t. A lot of people knew that a lot of his a lot of his underlyings were pretty bad and he was he was one of the worst players on the roster last season. Let’s not let’s not sugar coat it. Obviously, he ended with 40 points, but No, I know we won’t sugar coat it, but it’s low it’s low term. It’s I guess considering the cap is going up, it’s a low. I Well, I think some people I think some people were I think people were surprised that it was I know, but he’s you know, but points are expensive. Yes, points are expensive. He’s a first round pick. He’s going to play I I do think he’s going to get minutes in your top six next year. I think that could benefit him. and that th that Achilles injury, man, you know how hard it it takes a long time to come back from those tendon injuries. There’s a good chance he wasn’t at a full 100% last season. So, this is going to be the most important season of his professional career coming up. I’m excited for it, but I can’t say I I don’t have my doubts that he’s going to be able to, you know, put up an even bigger performance than he did, I guess, like considering last season he got 40 points. I don’t know, man. If he can get 50, is that a win? I think even if if he hits 40 again, but it just looks a lot more respectable in the process like he’s not falling over himself while doing it. I think that’s, you know, can he just be an average player? And if he can get a full off season of like a good solid strength training that he doesn’t have to worry about rehabbing or anything, well, I think we I think we haven’t seen prime Jack Quinn yet. I think we’re we could be ready. This could be the season he really does emerge as a talented player on this roster. I I think we all definitely hope so. Um he’s definitely got his doubters out there. Uh the the one idea we toyed with when we talked last was like when you look at the story of Jack Quinn, there’s just a weird little wrinkle that just doesn’t make any sense because he everybody, you know, you talk about the Achilles injury or even the high ankle sprain and you touch on that and be like, well, that’s why he just was not good this season. But the weird thing about those injuries is the Achilles injury happens. He comes back for like a month, looks great. High ankle spring happens. He comes back for the last eight or so games of the same season, looks great. Like still looks like Jack Quinn. And then this past summer happens, he comes into this year, he’s a train wreck. Like he’s he’s making bad plays. He looks slow. You know, his his uh NHL edge speed stats were down, his speed bursts were down. Everything just looked worse. And it’s like, well, why why didn’t this happen last season two times when he came back? There was always that weird little wrinkle. And so it just makes you wonder, well, you know, they were pretty obviously pretty displeased with how his conditioning was during the summer. Did he just take the off seasonason off? Did he, you know, did he empty the tank to rehab and just got sick of it and took it easy for the summer? He might have. like that’s the more optimistic route to take, you know, otherwise, you know, you don’t really know you don’t really know why his his play decreased so much when when he came back initially. Uh the play was it seemingly was back to normal and he looked better. He looked better than his rookie season. Uh, so you hope it’s not like a false positive and maybe, just maybe, you know, one Lindy rough boot camp can get him back, more push-ups, more sit-ups. I would assume he was just trying to rest and then he fell behind in his offseason training and it caught up to him. That’s what I would assume. Mhm. So obviously, like you said, he had to do a lot of a lot of rehab and then, you know, he came back, played a few games, got hurt again, came back, played a few games. Like he probably did need a rest, you know, rest his lower body, but which is why I’m worried about Owen Power. Yeah. Yep. that the thing that’s so weird about like Quinn and I’m I’m even gonna throw Samson into this too is I feel like those are the two players that you we know that the organization hasn’t been too pleased by partially because of the offseason training partially because not staying healthy. Um and in Samson’s case obviously you know the TA situation. Um, and I’m just surprised they’re bringing both of them back when it’s it was pretty obvious they were not too pleased with how they acted in the past year. I was expecting honestly at least one of them be gone. And that’s kind of why I thought Quinn was going to be gone because he was clearly the front of the strength and conditioning complaints for Kevin. At least that’s who we’re assuming. Um, and then obviously, you know, Samson, you know, everybody that was a cult Samuelson’s weird because that was a that was a culture thing. I mean, you even had, you know, Ta Thompson kind of relitigating the whole New Jersey response thing on a podcast a few weeks ago and, you know, everybody basically agrees, you know, if you going back, you look at that play, um, if you remember, Jason Zooker said he didn’t see it. You know, Yuri Koulik is a rookie. when Power is not a guy that you want fighting. Um like Samuelson’s the guy that everybody looks at and says, “Well, he should have done something.” Um and it wasn’t just that incident. You know, there was the Detroit Red Wings game late in the season where they got blown out, but the game ended in like a line brawl and, you know, Ta Thompson got into it, Zack Benson got into it, and once again, you know, Matteas Samson is just kind of floating around grabbing some guys but not really doing anything. Um, it is it’s weird because it does seem like he is going to return next season. It would be very surprising if they ended up trading him at this point. Yeah. Hopefully those cultural kinks are worked out. You know, you you would have hoped that would have been a just, you know, an unwritten rule to begin with, but you know, if you have to learn a lesson along the way, I guess hopefully almost having your star player concussed severely will wake you up pretty quick. Yeah, I meant to mention this when we were talking about Quinn, but the one thing that does worry me is, I mean, he’s, you know, at the end of the day, he’s got a really good shot. Um, he’s not, you know, the best play driver. You know, he’s not like a great forch checker or anything. You know, he’s more of a finesse player. It does worry me that he’s probably slotted in to play with Norris right now, who is not exactly a good puck distributor. So, I don’t know if that’s gonna be the best combination. No, I’m I’m hoping that’s I’m hoping Jason Zucker’s in there. If if anything, that’s doomsday scenario, too. And I love Jason Zucker, don’t get me wrong. You just You got to be better. You got to He said it. He said it himself. Hope is a shitty strategy. So, if you’re hoping on him to fill the need of a top six guy right now, I don’t know, man. Well, and now that Quinn’s back and Josh Don was the main piece of a JJ Purka trade, and then they go out and sign Justin Danforth in free agency, who is a pretty good fourth liner. You now have [ __ ] Thompson, Alex Tuck, Jack Quinn, Josh Don, Justin Danforth. That’s five right wingers on the roster. And I don’t think I’m forgetting one. That’s five right wingers. And I just I’m a little confused what their plan is there because I feel like all of those guys are everyday NHL players, you know, in their minds. You know, got Thompson, got Tuck, Jack Quinn. They probably want to give the chance. You know, he he might be on that second line and hey, maybe he starts on the left wing. Uh, and then you got Don, you got Danforth. But then it’s like if well Quinn’s starting on the wing, that’s fine. If we think things are going to go the way they’re going to go and Bow and Byron gets traded for a forward, probably one that shoots left, well, now you’re back down to having a left side that has four left-handers and now the right side’s back to having five right wingers. So, um, I don’t know. Like, is Danforth is he an early scratch in the season? Maybe, you know, maybe that’s maybe that’s just what they ended up doing. I mean, Sam Laferty was very quickly a healthy scratch like a month into the season. So, maybe they go the same route with Danforth, but I’m just I’m a little confused on how they’re going to make that work. But, I I guess we’ll see. I just I hope I hope they eventually move Thompson back to center. He’s got to be that complete player if he’s going to be the face of this franchise other than Dene. He’s got to be that center man. Even that has a ri even that has a ripple effect cuz then it’s like okay well koulie obviously goes to the left and if they did that now that’s fine but like it goes back to the bum conversation where they pretty clearly want to forward and whether it’s Jake neighbors or I don’t know like dream scenario it’s Dylan Holloway like it’s another left winger and I’m just very interested to see what they do there is like is Jordan Greenway going to be a healthy scratch at some point this season. You’re going to get some injuries here and there. You will. No, you will. Just acquire just acquire some top end talent. Maybe a center/winger. You are going to get injuries, but opening night the opening night lineup will be interesting. Mhm. So, um, we’ll see how that goes. Um, I guess, yeah, jumping ahead to free agency, Sam Laferty, no longer on the Buffalo Sabres roster. Sixth round pick from the Chicago Blackhawks for him. I’m surprised they got an asset. Mhm. Man, opening opening night. We will meet at the former Sam Lafery respect poll and we will have a moment of silence. He got a banner, man. I cannot believe he got a banner. That’s incredible. I was eating a slice of pizza at a game and that’s when I took that picture. I just looked over. I’m like the the [ __ ] like he’s the bald man’s up there. H funny drought iceberg potential. Uh and then I I guess we get to arguably their the probably their biggest signing of the off seasonason, Alex Lion. Two-year deal, $1.8 million per season. Uh is he on your opening night roster? Yes, 100%. 100%. I don’t think I I don’t think Levi starts the year in Buffalo. I don’t think they make that that m I don’t care how good his training camp is. I just don’t think they do that again. I really don’t. I think his training camp performance definitely impacts what they do there. I feel like they just given him so many opportunities and at this point I feel like it’s just better if he just started in Rochester. Don’t, you know, don’t force him into the lineup. UPPL, you know, it is what it is with that guy. But as long as Alex Lion isn’t [ __ ] the bed like when he’s in net, I don’t think we’re going to see Levi much. I have no clue. I I’d probably lean towards Lions. I I would lean towards Lions. Um these are the answers we’re looking for, folks. But I wonder what these guys have no idea. Your guess is as good as mine. all the listeners out there, they’re just like, “What are you what are you asking me for?” I wonder what’s going to happen. It’s like, “What the [ __ ] you looking at me for? I don’t know. You think I know?” I mean, the whole offseason we were saying, “Oh, it’s going to be UPPL and Levi like what other chance they have.” And and now they brought someone else in, which I like it’s fine to me, but I I don’t know. I could definitely see Levi making a push for the roster and then at that point I don’t know what you do because I don’t think Lion is a guy that you could slip through to the AHL. Um, no. I mean, if you couldn’t, especially with the goalie market with what it was this offseason. I mean, basically had what Gibson went to Detroit, Jake Allen resigned for five years in New Jersey at 1.8 million a year. That dude needs to fire his agent right now. He could have signed somewhere for like one year 5 million and then I think the Sabres honestly probably got the next best goalie. I mean Alex Lion has been very good, you know, dating back to his stint in Florida which ended the Sabres playoff hopes. Uh but he was a big part of getting that dynasty up and off the ground and into the playoffs. Uh but then last year in Detroit, he was or last two years in Detroit, he was very very solid. Uh very streaky goalender that can come in and steal you some games for a month or so. Like I think he’s a very good backup opt option. And you know, the Levi Levi being in this conversation is an interesting wrinkle into everything. Uh but me, I I don’t think I’ve been saying this since last season. If they were a real team, they would get a real backup and Levi would have to force his way in there. And thankfully, they have Alex Lion now who should be on the roster come opening night. But, you know, it’s not like they haven’t been afraid to put a goalie on waiverss before and lose a waiver or lose them to waivers all to justify Deon Levi getting a spot. So, that’d be so dumb if they if they did that again. Not even going to sugarcoat that one. It’d be dumb. Mhm. All right. Uh, other housekeeping. Tyson Kak three-year deal. Uh, what was it? 700K. Very cheap extension that um can really only help them. Love Tyson Kak. Mhm. Ryan Johnson basically just ressigning his entry level deal. He got a three-year deal for was it I think 900k. Mr. College himself. Dr. Johnson himself. Doc Dr. Johnson MD. And then Zack Jones, who has played some games for the New York Rangers over the past few seasons, also signed to a one-year two-way deal. As we were alluded to earlier, the the left-handed side of defense in the Sabres organization is very full. Uh I was reading some comments from Rangers fans. Apparently, he quarterbacked their first power play unit at points last season. I don’t know. That just shows where they were at last year. I don’t know why. Uh I I don’t know. I mean, I know Adam Fox was getting like a hate parade last year, and I guess that was part of the part of the equation. I don’t know. He only had one power play point last season, so it doesn’t look like it was a very successful uh stint as quarterback. Do you think that they just end up, if they trade Byum for a top six guy, do you think they just say, “All right, this is what we’re going to do. We’re going to move Dallene over to the right and then it’s just going to be an absolute free-for-all for whoever gets that top left-handed defenseman spot. Why would be a free-for-all be Samuelson? I mean, like that’s that’s why they’re acquiring so many of them, though. You know, if they’re just going to rotate through the lineup, maybe they’ll keep the same guy at the top, but if they need more help at the bottom, I mean, don’t you think it makes kind it kind of makes sense? Maybe, but I feel like at the same time like there’s some of these guys gonna go right to the AHL. Like I don’t think Zack Jones makes I can’t Zack Jones and Ryan Johnson are both now making the Savers roster. One of them’s going down. Um I mean you could shoe in Jacob Bryson to that seventh defenseman spot. So you mean the first defenseman he’s going to be playing with Rasmus Don on opening night? Well, it just like you’re one Michael Kessle ring Connor Timonss block shot away from having one right-handed defenseman. And you know, like it could be like Conor Timonss could be your only right-hand defenseman at one point during the season. Like even if Kle Ring is out for like a game for like maintenance, like what is that lineup going to like? Oh god. Like it just makes the Bernard Docker thing that much more frustrating. So I really hope that if they trade Byum that they don’t stop. Like I don’t like if Lilrin cost you like another second round pick. And I know we’ve we took some time to really four straight second round picks. Like four straight second round picks gone. Uh, like I know that wouldn’t be the best, but I don’t know. Like you just might have to do it because otherwise, you know, you’re you’re handcuffing yourself otherwise. Um, I don’t know. I mean, I guess that’s kind of where we’re at now. I mean, the overall outlook of the team. I mean, when you look at this roster, uh, I mean, I’ll pull up, uh, for anybody that’s watching on YouTube or even on audio platforms if you’re watching. I mean, the the last mock lineup that uh we put together after free agency was done, this was July 3rd, and nothing has happened since then. Um, it’s not a very uh encouraging lineup. Like, it’s not the most fun. I mean, your top line is still it’s still Benson. It’s still Kik and it’s Tae Thompson and then Jason Zooker, Josh Josh Norris, Alex Tuck is your second line and your third line is Jack Quinn, Ryan Mloud, Josh Don, fourth line, Greenway, Krebs and Danforth, Melenstein, Kak your extras and then you know your your your defense as of now is still Denene and then it’s Byum and then Owen Power, Michael Kessle Kessle ring and Samuelson Timmons Bryson and Johnson is your actual Uh it it just I don’t know, man. You you you don’t have a lot to say about the lineup. Like it just feels like it doesn’t inspire much hope. No, it doesn’t. It does not inspire hope whatsoever. You know, it’s it’s another year of hoping that things go right. I mean, Yuri Koulik has to prove that, you know, even if that’s not the top line come the end of the season, he probably still has to be a top six center. And if he’s not the first line center, well, it’s probably Josh Norris. And we know there’s big question marks about that. And and basically, you’re riding on Benson and Koulique both taking a step, Josh Don taking a step, Jack Quinn having a bounceback. Uh even like Jason Zucker like he was great last year but what he did last year isn’t what we expected of him going in. Can he do it again? And is M is Kessle Ring is he a is he a top four defenseman? What if he’s not? It’s that you know what it’s just a pathetic off season. It’s he’s back to the hate train genuinely. Okay. We missed the playoffs by 12 points last year. Did we get anywhere close to 12 points better this off season? No. No. They they rearranged they rearranged the entire roster. So the forward group is worse. The defense is on paper better. It’s a wash. Like we’ve said it so many times. You’re rearranging deck shares on the Titanic. Exactly what I was going to say. It’s a wash of an offseason at best. At best. It’s a Washington off season. You did not get better. Your defense got better, but your offense probably got worse. You traded away your second best point scorer on your team for more defense and you didn’t replace him. Like it’s it’s it’s a pathetic offseason there. For the third or fourth year in a row, they’re banking on internal growth to bring this team to the playoffs. They’re banking on Benson becoming more of a point producer. They’re banking on Koulique having another, you know, breakout type season. They’re banking on Quinn coming back. They’re banking on Norris staying healthy and hopefully he can find his footing back in the NHL. They’re banking on Don have hopefully being, you know, making make it another step. They’re banking on Kessle Ring trying to be a top top four defenseman. They’re they banking on a power comeback because obviously like he kind of had a sophomore slump and he’s coming off an injury. They’re banking on Quinn hopefully having another comeback season. They’re banking on UPPL having another comeback off seasonason or or even you Levi. It’s just a lot of internal growth and it’s a lot of [ __ ] ass. cannot convince me that Kevin Adams came into this off season, had a freaking threeday powerpoint presentation for Terra Begula, and this was the [ __ ] [ __ ] roster that he presented to him and said, “Oh yeah, we’re going to get so much better this offseason. This is my plan. This is what we’re going to do and we’re going to be a playoff team next year.” The other teams in our division got better and made meaningful moves. Not the Canadians who were already a playoff team got Dobson. We did not make any meaningful moves. We did not get better. Like no. Anybody listening to this, don’t delude yourself into thinking we got better. Don’t. Like it’s we at best it’s a wash off season. They’re banking on so much internal growth. It’s it’s ridiculous. It’s pathetic. It’s absolutely pathetic. in in a make orb break off season for this organization where if we have another [ __ ] year, Tage and Dali, at least one of them is probably asking out maybe both. And this is the freaking roster they put in front of us. It’s pathetic. How how are they selling any tickets to fans? Like how how can you tell a fan, you know, to come back in the building? They aren’t. Yeah. Like how can you convince fans to have interest again? They’re losing so many fans. Like no joke, our Jonah and I’s dad is saying like they’re so close to losing, you know, him as a fan because it’s ridiculous. Like how are they going to explain to fans that this was the off season that they wanted to get better? Like even casual fans know who JJ Purka is because he was one of our best young players, had 68 points last year and they just traded him away. Like I don’t know. It’s not all about the fans, but how can you convince the fan base that we’re serious? We’re a serious organization who actually wants to make the playoffs. It’s It’s absolutely pathetic. They did not get better this off season. And it’s like I might, you know, I might delude myself into thinking they still might make the playoffs. And even if they do, that does not prove any of this off season wrong. It just Well, that’s that’s the thing. Like no matter what, this was a bad off season. Even if they make the playoffs. Yeah, it’s bad process, good results at best. It’s that there’s the crash out. I’m not done. Remember at the beginning of the episode, we were like, “Oh, I think I’ve had kind of had to refresh, you know. You know, we’ve been on vacation. Very fun July 4th weekend. Had to get back in the swing of things. get back in that mental state. And I mean, he’s he’s spot on. He’s also spot on in saying like they have a chance at the playoffs. Of course, like of course they do. It’s so goddamn easy to make it in this league, which is, you know, always a hilarious statement coming from us. But I mean, look at what the East has been since the Sabres I I kind of got back on their feet like since 22 23. I mean, obviously the Panthers were the eighth seed somehow, which is just hilarious to look back on, but you know, the Islanders were a pretty weak wild card one. And then the past two years, I mean, the eighth seed has been a joke. It’s been a freaking joke. I mean, the Washington Capitals we thought might have been one of the worst teams of all time to make the playoffs. And then the Canadians followed up that this year. The East has been so so so weak that yes, this lineup can get in. It can somehow get in, right? Like if Zack Benson makes the breakout that I think he’s going to have this year and if Yuri Kik takes another step, which is, you know, it’s not unrealistic. And if Josh Norris is healthy and like you can talk, you can talk yourself into this from any angle. You can talk yourself into it, right? Like I mean my god 3 weeks ago if you had told me Jack Quinn was going to be back I’ I’d be I’d be pretty livid. But now it happened. You have to live with it. You have to see the positive side. Now I’m talking about hey I can see a one where he comes back and he gets back to his rookie year form. But it’s an awful awful awful awful off season from what they had to do to where they finished. And it it sucks because like I still have that thought lingering in the back of my head. They could nail this Bow and Byum trade. Like they could just fleece some team that gets desperate. Uh you know, deadlines spur action. And the Bowen Byum thing has a deadline now. You know, he’s set for arbitration. If the Sabres don’t, there’s two scenarios. Either they get a trade done before or Bowen Byron’s back next year. If they go to arbitration, Byum will be on the team. Maybe that deadline, maybe a team that wanted to sign him long term finally pays the price Adams has been asking for and you know, we look at this roster and like I said, like in a dream scenario, like Dylan Holloway is somehow on this team like they were somehow able to get that out of St. Louis or in Calgary. I I don’t know what a Calgary adjacent Dylan Holloway would be, but you get the idea. Like maybe maybe they can still do something here, but God, like it feels like you’re in the same spot as last year, but just worse. I mean, it goes back to like selling the fans. I don’t even know what they’re selling the fans on this year. Genuinely, every year Josh Stone and Michael Kessler’s cat and dog. That that was that was their big post of the freaking free agency day posting about their cats and dogs. So, one one of you guys is being super positive. The other one’s being completely negative. No, I’m I’m very I don’t know how you listen to I don’t know how you can come away with what I just said and act like this was it was a positive. It’s just a more like I’m just I I I’m getting myself into the headsp space I’m going to get in when we get to September and training camp and but then you know they’re going to do something like stumble out of the gate or they’re a flawed team. You know they’re going to be a flawed flawed flawed flawed team and it’s going to frustrate the hell out of you because it didn’t have to be this way. It didn’t. You know this is just such it’s so obviously a team they are a team that claimed they had a plan. They do not have a plan. They have concepts of a plan. I They have concepts of a plan. They had a slideshow for Terry Pagula. I guarantee JJ Purka asking out was not on that. No. And and I I I tweeted this out. Some people agreed with me, some people didn’t. I legitimately think this is the way the offseason went. They wanted to get the Byron thing over with quick. They shopped them. The deals were super super weak. Purka asked out. They shifted focus, got the right-handed defenseman out of that deal, pushed the Byum thing to the back burner, and here we are. We’re on the back burner. The original plan was 100% trade Bum for the same return that JJ Purka got. They might have even asked Utah for Josh Don and Michael Kessler. Couldn’t get that return out of him. Um, but they wanted to do that and then they just would have bridged JJ Purka and we’d be right here. We would have the same exact roster except Purka would be extended and Byum would be gone for Kessle Ring and don’t. Yeah, that was that was a three-day pre presentation. I like I can’t I I just would love to know what that presentation was just like what he said. Blowing smoke up his ass. That’s what it was. It’s ridiculous. And and the the thing that pisses me off the most is they never show urgency and like they they did not prove to anybody that they actually wanted to get better this off season. They weren’t linked to a single top free agent that was out there. And don’t get me wrong, it was a weak free agent class, okay? But there were still top guys out there that could have made this lineup so much better. I’m not even going to mention Martner, but Ellers was out there. Like, you could convince me on Orof. Like, there were there were guys like Christian was holding out out hope. I mean, all of us were that maybe we’d be in on Ellers, but there wasn’t a single freaking rumor saying the Sabres were interested in him. The Sabres made an offer. All I had to say was Ellers didn’t want to play for Buffalo. Yeah, no [ __ ] I don’t blame him. I I wasn’t expecting to sign him. I just want to be interested. I just want to know that we like him. We were laughing at the Red Wings yesterday because we saw the report that they were interested in him. He didn’t even entertain a phone call. Like that’s funny. That’s a little bit That’s a little bit ripped out of our world, but like they still wanted to get him. We don’t even know if the Sabres wanted to sign him. If they even wanted to make a pitch, but same thing with Mner. Like you couldn’t even get the fourth period to loosely say you were interested in Mitch Mner. You were interested in nobody. so low. We did not want to get better. We were satisfied with our team. We’re sat but I I basically think they that Josh Norris is like one of their offseason additions because he only played three games with us. So it’s like oh you know we’re not factoring him in. I think he’s going to be better than you know probably both of you think. But it’s like it’s just astounding to me that they haven’t been linked to any of the top free agents. They just they did not want to get better. They’re complacent, and they shouldn’t be complacent when they’re on a 14-year freaking playoff drought. How much uh how much cab space do you think we end the se the off seasonason with? I was just about to bring this up. Uh currently, here here’s a quick little guessing game. So, I’m sure you know where they rank in terms of cap space available because it hasn’t changed in the past few days. They’re eighth. Yeah. How many playoff teams from last season do you think are below them? I was just looking at Puckedia. Okay, so if they’re eighth, the top two are Anaheim, San Jose. Mhm. I got to see I got to say Chicago’s down there, too. Yep. You’ll be surprised by who the answer is, but maybe not once you think more about it. But well, let me let me throw out a number first. Let me say there’s one other team below us that was a playoff team. There is one playoff team in there. Is it the Islanders? It is not the No, they didn’t make the playoffs last year. Oh, wait. No, they didn’t. Jesus. Shoot. I forgot. They run They won the lottery. Damn it. My bad. Um, Blackhawks, Sharks, Ducks, um, some other bottom feeder Western Conference teams. Oh, are the Penguins below us? Penguins are below. Okay, that’s another one. Playoff team that has less cap space than us. The Senators, no, the Senators have spent more. The team that admitted the team that admitted there’s going to be an internal cap next year has spent more than the Buffalo Sabres. At least they’re honest with their fans. This is true. Um, who is a wildcard team? Is it the No, it’s not the Blues. The Blues are up against the Cap. Um, you know what? I can tell just the way you’re thought because you you said wild card team. You think this is going to be like a bottom uh bottom of the wild card race team. It was the Winnipeg Jets. They have $20 million in cap trophy winners. They have $19 million in cap space. Have the most cap. But, you know, you think about it. They just lost Eers. Um, I think what they still have to, you know, they’re probably saving money for Perfetti and Valardi. Samberg, I know, is going to arbitration, so like they make a little bit of sense, but that’s it. That the one playoff team, yes, it was the President’s Trophy winners, but they also just lost one of their highest paid players. You know, if Nikolai Eers has another year left on his deal, they have more money spent than the Sabres. That’s it. the Calgary Flames, the Pittsburgh Penguins, the Columbus Blue Jackets, the Winnipeg Jets, Chicago, San Jose, Anaheim, those are the only teams below the Sabres. And what is a common theme amongst most of them? They’re all not trying to win now. And the Buffalo Sabres are trying to win now. And and then you you have your you have your GM and management staff look you in the face and be like, “Oh, you know, we don’t really worry about spending to the cap. If we if we really need to, we will.” It’s like, “Hey, dumbass. It’s a numbers game.” It’s actually amazing Kevin Adams admitted that Byum was one of their main reasons for saving money when he easily like he’s he just dug himself a hole. He eliminated the offers. You could have just said like we’re he could have just left it at was at we’re saving money for Byum, but he said no, we want to eliminate, you know, we want to be able to match an offer sheet. Well, you just took an offer sheet off the table. So, what’s the excuse now? I mean, even if they trade by for like, you know, like if Jake Neighbors, for example, the only player coming back and then if they go out and get Timothy Lilligrin, like they’re still going to be like they’re still gonna have like $10 million left in cap space. I could I mean I could be wrong with the math. It’ll still be it’ll be around eight. Like it’ll be the same as last season. I I think it’s going to be it’s going to end up around six or seven because they still got Timonss and Levi which will probably I don’t know account for like 3 million maybe. That’s true. Um and then if if Byum were to resign, it would probably be like six six and a half. So there’s you know there that’s actually a decent amount of it. But if they trade him, he’s we’re probably trading him for a guy or guys who aren’t going to be paid as much. So you’re going to have cap space open. It’s just and then you know the excuse team would spend to the cap. Well, you know what the excuse will be? Because you’re going to see it now because the cap’s going up so much. There are going to be a lot of teams under the cap ceiling and a lot of it is, you know, there’s so much money to spend and there’s not enough players to spend it on. And that will be their excuse, even though it should not be. There is no reason they couldn’t have done what San Jose just did with Demetri Orof and sign him to another $6.5 million contract. There’s nothing that would have prevented them from doing that. It’s not how we operate around here, Jonah. And I I’ve I’ve seen the argument out there and I I’ve also thought this myself um that like you know part of the reason, you know, we’re not always close to the cap is because we got TA on a bargain deal. Um Mloud we probably got for maybe a little cheaper. You know, we we’ve made some, you know, decent deals with our own guys, but it’s like any competent organization would use that money that they didn’t spend to go get another good player. Oh, like there’s other deals around the league that teams get at bargains and then they’re like, “Oh, great. We got more money to go get Mitch Marner or to go get another good player. They don’t just freaking sit on it and then make excuses to the their fans and lie to them.” Alex Tuck has the best he might have the best contract in the NHL dating back to the moment he signed it. Well, maybe not dating back to the moment he signed, but the past three years maybe. A top six forward who averages about 30 goals a season making 4.75. Just extend him now. Give him $9 million. Well, I I’m not even saying that. I’m saying this contract is going to end this season and not one of these years did you take advantage of that. Not one. Not one. Tage Thompson and Alex Tuck cost you less than $12 million together. And you did nothing with that. Nothing. Oh, they did something. Wasn’t good. No, they did nothing. They did nothing. No, they did something. It wasn’t good. They did something. Go on a 13game losing streak. It’s God. Like here here’s here’s an example. Sam Reinhardt is has an AEV of like 8.62 million. He clearly deserves probably two or three million more, right? That’s fair to say. So the Florida Panthers instead of sitting on their asses and doing nothing with the money that they saved on the Sam Reinhardt, they went and got Brad Marian. They went and, you know, somehow signed all their guys this off seasonason and are still going to be competing to be the best team and potentially become a dynasty. No, they those guys just love to win. It has nothing to do with state taxes. Absolutely nothing. Not 1%. Zero. Has nothing to do with that. And like you Kevin can’t even say, you know, in the past offseason or two he said, you know, yeah, you know, we have to consider, you know, signing guys do extensions and, you know, we got to consider that into the cap for for future years. The cap’s going up and you got like almost nobody who’s really really due for an extension. So you you can’t make that excuse. Like Tuck’s the only one, sure, but you know, cap’s going up. Like I know Joel wants Benson. I agree. If you look at that Logan Stanovven contract and you do not immediately lock up Zack Benson for eight years, what you can’t even deny like there’s nothing that says there isn’t an internal cap because dude, what did what did Stank Kovven was it six on the dot? Did he sign for six on the dot? I think it might have been eight by six. Did he sign? He signed for Hold on. Or did I get it back? Stanovven. Stanov. Logan Stanovven who was like one of the best players in the playoffs. Um at least for that team. I if they do not sign Zack Ben they could get Zack Benson for under six million which like oh my god I don’t think they will but you could like are they going to ask for more than Logan Stanovven I would be beside myself if if they do not get that done ASAP in a year where he’s going to probably play a lot of his minutes with Ta freaking Thompson. It’s the same thing as Purka. It’s the same thing. You can see him walking into the season with a breakout on the horizon. I mean, he’s at least he’s going to score more than last year. It’s probably going to be a career season. I don’t know. I’m getting mad at stuff that hasn’t happened yet. But yeah, we got to we got to We tend to be able to predict how things go here. Mhm. That’s fine though. we were getting mad at predictable that you know hasn’t happened yet because that that’s that’s that’s the story of Kevin Adams tenure as a GM. The moves that he made you really can’t complain about. It’s the moves that he doesn’t make that just leads to no excuses and leads to why they’re a [ __ ] team. Like the moves he needs to make. Yeah. They just doesn’t they’re just never there. The he surprise you. They No, no, no, no. They’re never there. Like they’re they’re not here. They just don’t happen is what I’m trying to say. I honestly think the moves he makes they they surprise you. And you know what? Half the time, more than half the time, I’m I’m cool with them. But yeah, you just not enough. You got to be more active. When was the last time they gave out like a a long extension? Like what? Mloud ended up getting five years, but like before that it was Cousins Tamson. or he got four years. Yeah. Four by five. Before that, it was Cousins, Ta. It was power. Power. Power is a good point. It was before the 23 24 season. They gave that seven years to one power. I’m just I’m just saying I think they realized that Samson and Cousins did not work out for them. So now they’re scared away. They’re scared away from, you know, signing another long term. It’s literally It’s literally like it’s like it’s Leno and Airhoff all over again. They got burned by some extensions that they got burned by contracts that did not work out. Um, hey, that’s not to say Christian Airhoff wasn’t very good. People like to throw him in with Vill Leno. It’s not true. Airhoff was elite. But same same point, right? Like Terry Pigula spent a ton of money on Villaino. Christian Airhof. It did not lead to playoff success. So, he’s like, “Ah, screw it. We’re not doing that anymore.” Now, here we are. They were handing out extensions to everybody. And it worked out beautifully for Tae Thompson. It worked out badly for Matteas Samuelson and it worked out below average. Never. You’re never going to bat a hundred, a thousand. You’re never going to bat a thousand. You just got to understand that. That was like one of the hallmarks of Adams to that point that he was like the guy that, you know, they were trying to emulate the Bruins. They were trying to emulate the Tampa Bay Lightning. They wanted to get ahead, take chances, and now they just they do not have a plan. They don’t have a plan. They do not have a plan. and they don’t know what to do. They’re just hoping stuff works. They’re hoping that they’re just It’s a great episode to really hit the off season with, you know, nice and positive. We haven’t had a good positive episode in a long time. They deserve this. Draft night was fun. We had fun that night. No, I’m not saying it wasn’t fun. Of course it was fun. But you know like when was the last time we had like an episode we were just like excited the well yeah I mean last episode we were excited. I don’t know that is a good question. It has been a minute about how about excited about team success. Let me look I’m going to look through our episode list here. See if I can remember any be so many bad titles. Defcon one. Defcon one. I’m surprised they haven’t used that yet. Um maybe Kalinan being hired. That was like the last one. Um but again, I’m saying like team success. Oh well, team success has been a You got to go back a couple years. Yeah. Um God, I don’t know. It’s been a minute. It’s certainly been a minute. probably when they were in first place or not first place, third place going into Thanksgiving. I forgot they were. That was probably the high point. We’re going to get back there, guys. Don’t worry. What’s our What’s our concernal meter right now? Probably an eight or probably a seven. I’ll say seven. Yeah, probably s eight. God, I was being sarcastic. I thought this would be tens across the board. What are we doing here? I just want to stay positive. You like a 9.99999 and then wait for the by room trade to break. It’s like it’s like hand sanitizer kills 99.99% of germs, man. Well, we’ll we’ll be waiting for the Byum trade. I know it’s going to happen when I’m on vacation, dude. Do we think he gets traded? Always does. Yes. Yes. Too much smoke. I hope so. I wouldn’t put him past him if he doesn’t. What if they keep him? Because if they keep him, we know what this off we know what the roster is going into opening night. I mean, I won’t be too upset. The defense would look would look fine. It would look good. It’s just the forward group would just be so lackluster. They would need to make a different trade somehow. I don’t know what they would do. I don’t think they would do I don’t know for who. I don’t know for what. They have no trade. I know. You can’t trade the 26 first. Uh you’re down a second round pick. I mean, I guess if you want to throw your 2027th first in there, but do that even have any value? Or I mean, if you want to get really stupid, 2026 first has a lot of value because there’s a guy at the top of the class. Do it. I mean, like, if you want to lottery protect it, fine. But like even then if you like I’m not taking any like I you lottery protected it just goes down to a first round pick. You lose that ill. Well I know it’s just another asset gone from Yarmmo Kolinan’s cabinet. Like I’m just not I’m not doing that. There’s no reason to do that. No. The worst thing you can do now is just keep o trying to uh I don’t know put a band-aid on a uh I’m forgetting the analogy. Yeah. Like a bullet hole. Yeah. You can’t keep throwing away first and seconds like that. You want to throw If you want to trade a third for Little Grinch, sure, do that. I don’t think it should be a first. I think I said at some point earlier this episode that if it’s a second, fine. But I No, I changed my mind. No first or second round picks traded from here on out until Yarmo Kalinan is GM of the Sabres. That’s where I’m at. Okay, we’ll sit with that. Okay. You know what wasn’t on your docket and maybe might have pissed me off the most of anything? Some PR blunders, I’m guessing. Well, you know, hey, the Sabres have made some huge moves to their staff this off seasonason. and they’ve done absolutely [ __ ] to the coaching staff, but they fired their strength and conditioning coach and they fired the producer of of their game day um cast. So, because some people in the front office think it’s it’s been uh it’s been too negative. Too negative 14 playoff draft. Here’s the thing, though. What What the hell do you mean? Whoa. Whoa. How are you going to How are you possibly going to defend this? I’m not going to defend this, but I was I was listening to WGR and they had Rob Ray on and they made mention of this and he said that he had a conversation with the guy and it was all goodwill and he Rob Ray said and I quote, “Everybody’s got a shelf life in this business. You know, you you never know when the end is.” I mean, [ __ ] he was talking about maybe hanging him up soon. I mean, obviously he’s not going to get let go, but I I think I think there’s a little more to it than just without goodwill. Like, what good what what such thing is there as a as a good firing? There’s never such thing as a good ex. So, it’s is it is it budgetary? Did they fire the producer because they’re running out of money? I don’t know. And like I look, I love Rob Ray, but like of course he’s going to say that. It’s just the information I wanted to relay. It’s it’s either he got fired for the re like what So who was the source then? Like who’s telling the Buffalo News that he was fired for because people thought they was too critical. Yeah. Like I feel like it would just be that guy. If that quote didn’t come out and you know, oh producer changed like okay like fine. But it’s the fact that somehow it got leaked. Like I don’t think someone would make that up that people in the Sabres front office think that our broadcast has been too negative, which I got to be honest, I can’t I don’t think they’ve been negative at all. I I mean, respect to to Marty and Duffer, you know, I love them. They’re some of the most positive guys like in the Savers fan base that I I don’t understand how I how are people negative. The only guy who’s like I guess negative is like Rob Ray, but even that’s what I was going to say. But like he never says anything. He’s just like he’s over the years he’s gotten like you can hear the groans in his voice. Disgusted. Like when Utah or when they scored on their own net against Utah and Rob Ray’s just in like he’s you can hear the disgust in his voice. That’s And he’s like, remember he was like, he was like screaming at like the rest of us at his television. Give them the puck. Yeah. He was like, “Give them the puck.” And then they scored on their own net. Like that’s as like negative as it’s gotten. Yeah. It’s just like if that’s true, then you got a bunch of snowflakes in our front office. Like what do you expect? What the hell do we expect? We’re in a 14-ear playoff drought. The fans hate you. Like yeah, the broadcast isn’t always going to be positive. They’re not gonna blow smoke up her ass the entire time. We watch all 82 and I’ve never once been like, “Man, I can’t believe Brian Duff said that or I can’t believe Marty was talking about like even on Sabres Live.” Like I never hear him talk ne like super negative ever. They It just And it makes you wonder It makes you wonder which part of management would get mad at that. Mhm. Like Kevin Adams goes to most of the games. It’s like he’s not watching the TV broadcast. Could it possibly be somebody watching the games from Bokeh? Maybe from Bokeh. I don’t know. And we didn’t even get to like we didn’t touch on the fact that like it’s so dumb to get mad at, but they didn’t live stream a press conference with the general manager or I’m sorry, it wasn’t a press conference. It was a freaking media scrum. It was a media scrum, which is why they said it has never been the case. The free free agency has always been a press conference. Day one or day two, the GM sits down, answers questions, Kevin Adams met with the media for like 15 minutes while standing up before a prospect practice and we couldn’t even listen to it live in 2025. Yeah. Sal Kapagio was twe like live tweeting during it. Well, not about it, but he was just saying, “We’re gonna we’re going to carry the we’re going to carry the audio afterwards because we couldn’t set up to get it live quick enough or something like that. It’s just, oh my god, this might be the worst three-w weekek stretch, but again, it’s like you think about this, you think about this stuff like the producer getting fired and like this media scrum stuff and it’s like for an organiz if you look at what the Panthers have done just in the playoffs and stuff. It’s like if you saw that over this offseason, if you’re a fan of that team, I wouldn’t give two [ __ ] shits who is running the producing show. You can fire whoever you want. I don’t care that I didn’t hear a 15minute media scrim because the team is winning and we just keep losing and that’s why all these little things it’s like death by a thousand cuts. This they they certainly are masters of PR. It’s crazy they haven’t like hired a PR firm because every freaking week something comes out and fans get more and more upset. So Ryan Mloud got extended. Oh man, that was good. It was nice to win one for once. Good deal. Good deal. Let’s end on a positive. Ryan Mloud got an extension. He’s going to be around for the next few years. Your second line center? Yes. The second line center of the Buffalo Sabres. Going to be the second year in a row he overtakes the current 2C. All right. Anything else we should touch on? Feel like we covered all our bases here. Yeah, nothing else comes to mind for me. I feel like I got more anger left in the tank, but I don’t really got much more to say, so I’m just going to You got a gym down in that basement. Go and go and throw some weight around. I’m getting angry again, and I haven’t been angry in a few days. It’s actually pretty funny. Like, um, you know, we, you know, we’re from Lancaster. big big Fourth of July event is on the third to go to the beer tent. Um and legitimately like you know it was a good time. I was fine like the whole night and then someone someone got me ranting about the Sabers and I lost my voice. Like like I’m just saying like I wasn’t talking over to anybody like I wasn’t yelling all night. I was having, you know, a good time just hanging out with friends and I talked to a good fan of the show, good fan of um one of our big fans, Brandon, and I lost my voice in like 5 minutes. Just absolutely just blew his stack. And that was like towards the peak of me being really upset. And then after that, like I kind of I kind of calmed down. So I I think I think Brandon actually same night. I had a similar I ran into somebody I hadn’t seen in years and like they asked cuz I think they knew about the podcast and they’re like, “Oh, you’re a big savers guy.” Like, “What what the hell’s going on?” And I think I went for like five straight minutes like and he’s just st staring at you. He’s just like, “I just want to go get another beer, man.” Like we are we are really a simple question. I was just I was just trying to make simple conversation, man. Yeah. It’s uh h it sucks like not to be excited. You know, I always it I’m not excited now, but when the when the season rolls around, I I’ll have a little bit in me at the beginning of the year and then they’ll they’ll quickly stomp it out. I agree. I’ll probably get excited once it gets close. But yeah, I always there’s always I need I need this break. 100%. I need the buyer trade to happen. So then I have like a month or two where I have to think about the Sabres. Can I just get closure on the off season? Cuz it’s like now it’s like there’s this annoying little threat like I want to like I know we we dumped on them a lot, but there’s this one annoying little thread that like we can make us look stupid and it’s not that I’m afraid of looking stupid. I just I just want to know. Please make stupid. This This has been a theme since the JJ Purka trade. I still don’t like they want to make the playoffs, but I still it doesn’t look like a team that’s allin to win. It’s like I still don’t know which direction they really want to go and I feel like it’s still they want to have a foot in both worlds. They want to compete for playoffs, but if they’re in the McKenna race, then so be it. You know, there’s one team in the whole league that wants to be bad next year. It’s the Penguins. They want to pass the torch again. They want to go from Lemieux to Crosby to McKenna. I hope it doesn’t happen. I hope they get their they get their heads stomped on. Crosby carries them to a good for too long. I think it’s awesome that um Terry Beigula can spend some money on some college players with Gavin McKenna, but can’t really spend money on NHL players. There’s there’s a good chance Gavin McKenna will be making more money than like Beck Menstein next year thanks to Terry Bugula. So, hey, get him in the pipeline. Get him in the pipeline, I guess. So, and so it begins. Plan B. Eminem offseason part two. Eminem off season was pretty freaking disappointing. Eminem off seasonason 2 Electric Bugulu. All right, I think I think we’ve gone long enough here. Anything else left to touch on or should we sign off? Maybe we should throw some like trivia into our next episodes, you know? make it a little more fun for us. We’ll we’ll see what next time we’re on. Yeah, I don’t even know the next time we’ll run. I’m throwing all this equipment. This is actually over. This is it for us. We’re done. We’re throwing in had enough. Throwing in the towel. All right. Um yeah, like I said, folks, don’t know what when we’ll be on next. You know, hopefully if this B run thing resolves itself, like we’ll obviously talk about that, but otherwise, we’ll see. We’ll see. Take it day by day, week by week. Definitely slows down this time of year. Although, according to the insiders, the trade market’s supposed to heat up this week. Neither one [ __ ] It’s not going to happen. Alen Walsh said it’s there’s going to be trades this week. Who the hell’s interviewing him? All right, Alan. Alen Walsh biting the curb in 4K. Oh my god, that guy. I’ve just I’ve had so I’ve had more than enough with that guy with the whole even with like I I dunk on Leafs fans too and I hate them, but like even the Mitch Marner stuff like that guy just he just insufferable. Give give your give your uh your guys his like um his contract AAV is their jersey number and stuff. Like get out of here, dude. He’s like the uh what’s what’s the guy in baseball who’s the he’s the big agent for all of them was the big agent for one Scott Boris. Yeah. He’s like he’s not like Boris. He’s not Alen Walsh has like a handful of clients. Well, that’s fair. But I feel like same intentions. Oh, yeah. Well, I mean it’s it’s his job. It’s like a big a big supposed to make his clients money. Yeah. Yeah. It’s like it’s like a a big just a big wig agent like Drew Rosen. Drew Rosenthal in the NFL. I think it’s Drew Rosenthal. Yeah. Yeah. Well, annoying. They all had enough of I I don’t I don’t want to hear any more I don’t need rumors coming out of that guy’s mouth. I’d rather I’d rather hear from Kevin Weekes. I don’t like I don’t like his rumors as it is either. It’s a bunch of horseshit. Now I’m getting pissed. Let’s wrap this up. Getting pissed at this. Not the Savers. pissed. It’s just it annoys It just annoys me. It annoys me. I know. I get that these agents got to make them got to make them money. It’s the ones that are like vocal and are out there that are very I know. Like, dude, like Allan Allen, you don’t need your own podcast, man. Like, nobody’s listening. No. Nobody’s listening to that. Nobody’s listening to you. God. All right. On that note, if you want to follow us on Twitter, you can follow us at the Saber Report. also on Instagram, Tik Tok, and YouTube. And at the Saber Report, uh if you listen to this on YouTube, thank you very much for listening. Be sure to like, share, and subscribe. Tell us what you thought down in the comments below. We covered a lot of topics. Would love to hear your input on all of them. Uh especially some of like, you know, we’re very down on this off seasonason. If you’re up on this off seasonason, if you think it was good, tell us why. Would love to hear what some other fans are thinking, especially if they’re in a positive headsp space. Uh, as always, go give our friends over at the Buffalo Sports Talk podcast a listen. They’re in offseason mode as well. Um, but stay tuned. Uh, also I think we have our yearly BST trivia come our Buffalo Sports Trivia episode uh coming up. Uh, people don’t know what that is. Usually, uh, Christian and I compete against Ryan Hagen and Maxo of the Buffalo Sports Talk podcast in a Buffalo Trivia Jeopardy put together by JP uh, to see who knows the most amount of Buffalo Sports knowledge. Um, TSR coming to defend its title. If you want a flashback to last year, uh, the Bills podcast guys did not know which year the Bills were founded. Yep. And they also made up a first round draft. top 10 just a first round draft pick, a top 10 pick in Bill’s history. They they they committed at Tarosu Tujimoto and made up a player as an answer. It was incredible. I think the Bills founding question was like the first question when that when that answer came across, I was just like, “Oh my god, we’re about to cook these fools.” Even as like myself, like I’m not a Bills historian. Christian Christian carried us to victory last year and even I’m in that moment. I’m like that is not the year they were founded. So, and he’s also I mean we’re all around the same age, but Hagen’s the oldest guy. Like you’ think he has the most knowledge. I don’t know. And he was like, “Well, I was trying to like I mixed it up with the year they merged with the NFL.” It’s like, dude, that is that is Did they merge with the NFL in ‘ 63? I think I think he said 63, right? Let me see. When did the I’m almost certain that was his answer, though. Just I think it was 63, too. Yeah, I think it was. Okay. Um, well, I guess I can understand that kind of mix up or No, they looks like they merged in 1970. I thought it was 1970. I just didn’t want to know. I think that’s what it was. I think he named a year they won the AFL. Yeah, cuz it would have been the first Super Bowl. So, it would have been like Well, actually, no, cuz there was like a couple Super Bowls before they merged cuz it was the NFL championship. It was the world championship or something. Yeah. For a while. I don’t know. Very funny moment. Um, our Jeopardy episodes. I mean, stay tuned for We’ll have ours this summer. We’ll bring back Derek. He always puts a good one together for us to to compete in. I got to defend my title. Uh so stay tuned for that. We still got offseason content planned. I plan on bringing back the Sabres versus the Atlantic series. So can’t wait for that to get killed by every single fan base in the division. Uh especially ABS fans again. Uh that should be we want all the smoke. Yes, we do. Uh so stay tuned. We we got stuff planned this summer. Um, but until then, until next time, thank you very much for listening. See you next time. And as always, keep the faith. Go Sabres. Go Sabres. Go Sabres.

In this episode, the guys discuss everything Sabres related that has happened since the JJ Peterka trade. They discuss the NHL draft, trades, signings, departures, additions, and more!

(0:00) Intro
(0:30) Opening Offseason Discussion
(11:36) NHL Draft Recap
(19:08) Connor Clifton/Conor Timmins Trade
(21:06) Jacob Bernard-Docker Not Qualified
(34:41) Bowen Byram & Arbitration Situation
(42:55) Jack Quinn Re-Signed
(55:46) Sam Lafferty Traded
(56:25) Alex Lyon Signing
(1:00:06) Kozak/R. Johnson/Zac Jones Signings
(1:03:36) Current Offseason Outlook
(1:34:14) More Sabres PR Blunders
(1:40:22) Ryan McLeod Extension
(1:41:03) Closing

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