The best players to play for the Buffalo Sabres during their playoff drought

The best players to play for the Buffalo Sabres during their playoff drought

As we enter year number 15 of the Buffalo Sabres playoff drought, I’ve got little fun for you today. The All Sabres drought team. How good is it? Could it make the playoffs if we were to put everybody in their primes? Talk about it coming up on the Lockdown Sabres podcast. [Music] Your Locked On Sabres, your daily podcast on the Buffalo Sabres, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. What is up everybody and welcome in to this Wednesday edition of the Locked On Sabers podcast. Thanks for making us your first listen every day. We are free and available wherever you get your podcast. You can check us out and watch us on our YouTube channel. Be sure to hit the like button and the subscribe button if you are watching the show along there. You also can check out our locked savers text club that is available to you over at joinsubtex.com/lockdonsavers. That is the place to sign up. Sneaky Joe DBY here on a beautiful Wednesday in Buffalo. Today’s episode of the Lockdown Savers podcast is presented by Game Time. Download the Game Time app, create an account, and use code locked on NHL for $20 off your first purchase. Let’s have some fun today. It is the middle of the summer. There is not a lot happening in the world of hockey. We learned earlier uh in the week about a arbitration hearing for Sabres defenseman Connor Timonss and that is going to be coming our way in the first week of August. Not that interesting of a contract to figure out whether it’s a million, a million and a half, $2 million. I don’t really think there’s a lot of wiggle room on what that deal could end up being and they probably come to an extension before it ends up happening anyway. So, keep you updated if we get any other big moves from the Sabres, but all’s quiet on the NHL front at this moment in time. So, let’s have some fun today as you know the playoff drought is this big dark cloud hanging over our heads. Well, you ever watch the movie Twisters when they drive into the tornado and they start shooting fireworks up into the tornado? Well, I that’s what I want to do today. I’m going to start I want to shoot some fireworks up into that dark cloud that is is uh right now hanging over our heads. All Sabres drought team and how good it is, how bad even you could consider it to be. We’ll go through it where you disagree. Would love to hear some feedback from the fans and the listeners on who I’m leaving out or maybe I’m building the team wrong in your minds. Before we get into it, got my all the forwards, got all the defenseman and all the goalenders coming your way on today’s show. And this is just looking at the players career within the playoff drought. So, for example, Thomas Vanic. I’m not counting any of Thomas Vanic’s career from 2006 through to 2011. I’m going from the 1112 season and on. So you’re only getting like two and a half years of Thomas Vanic, not the previous five or six. So that’s the only part of it that I’m looking at. And I’m trying to take that player that when they were at their best during this Sabres playoff drought, you know, I’m someone in sports who likes to look at the peak a little bit more than longevity. But I do try to take both into account. How good was that player at their best and also how long did they play for the team? But I was willing to give a couple of guys a nod on this list that had not played much more than about a hundred games. I don’t think I I don’t believe I put anybody on this team that played fewer than a hundred games for this team. But even that’s not a lot. That’s only a full season’s worth and then some change after the fact. So that’s coming your way on today’s show. Again, if you want to reach out, you can do it on Twitter, you can do it on YouTube, or even better would be our text club. I’ll read a couple of texts after the fact of um of people that they thought I left off, the texters, and uh I can tell you so far they think I there were a couple of defensemen that I left off, including one that little controversial, you know, as controversial as you could get, I guess, for a list like this. So, let’s fire it off. Let’s go right to the center position as we build out this roster. Going to go position by position. tried to stick with, you know, what the guy mostly played in their careers and also what they’re listed at. I don’t fully trust what players are listed at on these sites, but you got to go by something. So, tried to do it the best I could. So, starting at the center position. Here we go. We got number one center Jack Eel on this list. Number two center Tage Thompson, Ryan O’Reilly as my third line center, and then Dylan Cousins as the fourth line center. listing Eel as the number one center over Tage. Maybe that’s a good debate. Right now, you look at their careers and both of their careers span the entirety of the drought. Tage actually played more games. Jack Eel 375 games. Tage Thompson’s 407. 139 goals for Eel, 173 for Thompson. But the point disparity and then the points per game disparity is the big difference here. When you go to Eel and you go to Thompson, 355 points for Eel in 375 games. That is good for when you break it down, 0.95 points per game. That is the best of any Saber during the playoff drought. Nobody had more points per game than Ekeel did. And I know a lot of fans hate him right now, but you look back on his career, even for the uh for the graphic on our YouTube channel, I tried to find a picture of him wearing the number 15. I think our memories of Michael wearing 15 are a little more fond of him than uh than wearing the number nine, even though he was better with the with the number nine, but almost a full point per game. Nobody else was above 86 and Eel was at N5. And Thompson, he he is dinged a little bit because of how slow of a starter he was, and Ekeel was not that. He of course scored his first game as a Buffalo Saber. Um, but I go Eel over Thompson. More of a well-rounded player in my mind. He didn’t have the injury problems that did, and he never really had the bad years that Thompson did. So, if I’m building this team out, I got Eichel center one, Thompson center two. Third and fourth line center. So, O’Reilly to me at third line center is an easy one. He only played 224 games, 65 goals, 176 points, fourth on the Sabres in this time period in points per game. Um, very good player and even though it kind of amazing that he admitted to losing his love for the game, which by the way, if you didn’t see it, Connor Clifton said basically the same thing yesterday in Pittsburgh that he uh he lost it with the Sabres. That happened to O’Reilly. He never got bad. Like he never pouted out there on the ice. Maybe he was down in the dumps after the game would end, you know, like most Sabre fans would be, but show me the season where Ryan O’Reilly didn’t put it all together for the Buffalo Sabres. I mean, that year where he quote lost his love for the game, in his 16 seasons in the National Hockey League, that season in total points ranked fourth. He did get Selky votes that year, second in the Lady Bing. I mean, that’s not as much of a performance award, but whatever. Ryan O’Reilly performed that year despite all the stuff that might been going on mentally behind the scenes. Dylan Cousins, fourthline center, in part because not a lot of good options past those top three. Cousins, it’s the one big year and that one year was as good as any other center on this list. Cody Hodson had a decent year. We had 45 points, but it was so bad otherwise. I’m not doing that at all. Um Ryan Mloud, it’s only one season and I it’s not as good as the one season that Cousins had, so not putting him on the list. Derek Roy only played 80 games and it was only a 17goal campaign. Middlestat was the closest I got. Cousins versus Middle, but for Cousins, I had one great year and then a bunch of eh years or even bad years. Middle stat it was two good years, one of which he was traded at one point in followed by a bunch of, you know, or preceded by a bunch of bad years. So I go Cousins over middle stat, but that one I could see as being debatable. So that’s center. Right wing, top four right winger. Sam Reinhardt, 454 goal games, 134 goals and 295 points is definitely my topline right winger on this one. It’s the longevity. It is the consistency. Um really after he became a full-time NHLer, he was never a bad player for the Buffalo Sabres. And if you look at some of his advanced numbers and analytical numbers, it would show that he was even better than we realized while he was in Buffalo. And then that was kind of freelized in Florida and we we see why those numbers were what they were with the Sabres. Alex Tuck, second line right winger. These are the top two. This is a tier like you could even put Tuck over Reinhardt and I don’t think that that’s bad of an idea at all. In fact, really, you know, now that I’m looking at it, maybe I did Tuck a disservice. it it’s 200 more games of Reinhardt doing it at this level versus Tuck. But points per game, it goes to Tuck by a wide margin. 086 to 65. I, you know, now that I’m looking back on it, I would change this. I would put Alex Tuck as the first line rightwinger and Reinhardt as a second line right winger. Tuck’s been better with the Buffalo Sabres. Um, Tuck ranks second in points per game, tied for second in points per game at the right wing at all positions. So right-winger tuck in Reinhardt though that’s top tier third and fourth tough could go Kyle Kyle Poso but he was such a disappointment in almost every season he played that I don’t there was no great season for Kyle Poso and I don’t know that thing that happened at the end of the the end of the his career where he led a revolt against fans which was complete BS and will always be um you know Pomville Jason Pomville Jason Pomeville at the very beginning of the drought. Had a fantastic season for the Buffalo Sabres. He was a great player still and in that 1112 season he’s an all-star. 30 goals, 43 points, 73 points. One of the top seasons that anybody’s had during the playoff drought while being really good defensively, Palmville. And then he comes back and he wasn’t great, but 32 goals in two seasons, that’s fine. That is completely fine for a player that was 35 and 36 years old. He’s a part of the Jay Crew line with Jack Eel and Jeff Skinner. So, Palmville, yeah, 72 goals in the playoff drought. Not bad. And then Tyler Renis, who was listed as a right winger on hl.com. He played a little bit of everything. I’m going to throw him in here. You know, little personal bias for me. I loved watching Tyler Renis as a player. There is a statistical argument to back up him being on this list. Again, you look at points per game and some of the other advanced stats, you know, he was a good creator of chances, but not a very good 2-way player, but 0.54 points per game. I’ve got some worse players on here. Drew Stafford was in consideration, AOSO, as I mentioned, but um I’m going with Andis as the uh the fourth right winger on the All Sabres Drought team. And then finally at forward, left wing, Jeff Skinner, Thomas Vanic, Victor Olivesson, and Evander Kane. Skinner. Every year that Ralph Krueger was with the coach, he was fantastic. Or, you know, that very last season, he was okay. 20 goals and led the team in goals with a month to go in the season, whatever. Thomas Vanic, it’s only 129 games at the end, but he was very good in that drought still at the end with 86 points per game, 50 goals, 111 points in 129 games. Olison and Evander Kane. I went with goals, goal production, and both of them scored. I could have put JJ Purka on this list. Um, but him and Kane were almost dead even in goals. Uh, 68 for Kane, 67 for Purka, I believe. But Kane played 30 fewer games. So, I’m going to go with the guy that was more efficient scoring goals, at least by games. Kane shot the puck a lot, so efficient might be the wrong word there, but um, I’ll throw Kane on there as the fourth line u right winger, left winger. So, that’s the forward group. To the defenseman, when we come back here on the Lockdown Sabres podcast is, uh, have a little fun. All Sabres drought edition of Locked On Sabers. Today’s edition of the Locked On Sabers podcast is presented by Game Time. Have you ever decided at the last minute to head to a ball game with friends and family? Maybe it’s game day and you suddenly realize you want to be in the stands. I’ve been doing that with Toronto lately. They have been playing so well, a quick drive up for an afternoon game. It’s exactly where game time comes in. It’s the easiest way to grab last minute tickets without all the stress. With the money that you save on tickets, you can splurge on food, drinks, merch, or even invite a bigger group to come with you. Game time makes it possible. Game time makes tickets fast and simple. Prices on the app actually will drop the closer that you get to first pitch. I do that a lot for football and for baseball. And they’ve got incredible last minute deals, clear seat views, the lowest price guarantee that takes the worry out of buying. Game time is the official ticketing partner of Lockdown MLB. makes it easy to browse the app for an exciting upcoming Major League Baseball game. Again, Toronto and New York got this series wrapping up here, but Toronto’s got some big ones coming up. Boston is coming into town, so be sure to check that out. Take the guess work out of buying tickets with Game Time. Download the Game Time app, create an account, and use code locked on NHL for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply. Again, create an account, redeem code locked on NHL for $20 off. Download the Game Time app today. Last minute tickets, lowest price guaranteed. Sticky Joe Diosi back here on the Lockdown Sabres podcast. Middle of the summer, Bills are underway at training camp and I know that uh football’s on the brain, but you know, once in a while maybe you like a little bit of hockey and uh glad to bring that to you here in the uh middle of July. So, all Sabres drought team went through the forwards. We’ll show you the whole roster at the end here. Put that together, too. But starting with the defenseman, just want to mention forwards. You know, there were a couple tough ones. Do I really do I want to put a Vander Kane on this? Do I really want to put Olafson? Do I really want to put Dylan Cousins? Some of these guys have been big disappointments. All of them at one point in time were really good players for the Buffalo Sabres. Every every forward I mentioned at at least one point in time. That’s a good player. Defenseman. It was hard to find six good defensemen. I did not put Rasmaser Stallion on the top six despite the fact I still think it’s true. He’s played more minutes during the playoff drought than any Buffalo Saber. Think that is still true. It was bad the whole time. And maybe he would have been better on the second pair or the third pair, but I got to go with what was out there. He was out there all the time and he stunk. And I still believe to this day there is no individual player that is more that has more to do with the 15 or 14-year playoff drought than Raspus wristan. I think he’s less to do with it than coaches that have been here and less to do with it than GMs and ownership and management. But amongst the players, you can blame Jack Eel if you want. You can blame Sam Reinhardt if you want. Those guys were great when they were here. This guy was on the ice all the time and was always bad. So, he’s not on my list because I never thought he was a good good defenseman. Six good defenseman. All right, I tried. Here you go. Number one, easily Rasmus Dene. You could argue he’s the best saber of the drought and I think you can make a really convincing case of that. Not a great start for Diene. Of course, Ralph Krueger almost ruined him. You had to have Don Granado come in and kind of save the day, but he did. And Dene has turned into one of the best defenseman in the world. I would argue is the best two-way defenseman in hockey if you include physicality and playing your own end plus the offensive game, power play, all of it. Diene is incredible and I pray that he never has the urge to leave this team and I don’t blame him if in the next couple of years he does because he is a Stanley Cup caliber player. No doubt. He’s a Norris caliber caliber player. He’s a KSM caliber player. He is a Stanley Cup caliber player and he deserves better. And I really hope the Sabres are able to give him better and we’ll see if they’re able to. Second already tough. I went Christian Airhoff last week when it was the anniversary of or two weeks ago when it was the anniversary of Airhoff signing. I guess that was three weeks ago now. Um got a lot of oh that was bad. It was a bad signing and that’s because you see the big flashy 10 years on the contract. Ahof was good and he was good the whole time. Now the only thing he wasn’t good at and it was the thing with people were sold on and that’s why they thought he wasn’t a very good player. When he got here it was man wait till you see this guy shot. He’s got a cannon. He’s going to shoot at 100 miles an hour and he constantly missed the net. Always was having a shot blocked. No doubt that part of it didn’t really work out. He scored in his two previous seasons before arriving in Buffalo with the Vancouver Conucks 28 goals. And in three years with the Buffalo Sabres, he scored 16 goals. So yes, you should have been let down by that. He did not stay at the level that he was in Vancouver, but that’s because he was one of the 10 best defenseman in the world with Vancouver. If you don’t believe me, go look at the Norris voting. He was ninth in Norris voting in 2010. He was eighth in Norris voting in 2011. Then he got to the Buffalo Sabres. Was he a top 10 defenseman of the Buffalo Sabres? No. But he was good. He was a very, very good defenseman. And they didn’t buy him out because he was bad. They bought him out because they were afraid of a compliance buyout recapture penalty if he were to retire at a certain year. It was a weird cap reason that they got rid of him. And they got compliance buyouts then to walk away for zero dollars on the cap. So that’s why they did it. 192 games, 87 points. I get it. He wasn’t great, but 23, 24, 25 minutes a night, playing big minutes, exposed to the toughest matchups. I thought he was good the whole time he was here, and I think he honestly to me should deserves to be the second defenseman mentioned here. Third, I’m already putting Owen Power third. He is not the player yet that I hope he becomes, and I think there is a lot more there for Owen Power. But what do I have already? I have a defenseman that’s played 242 games, three full seasons. Has been very good in all three of those seasons and puts up points, but you know, he doesn’t body check a lot. He’s not imposing in his own end. But I got a player that for three years in a row has played 20 plus minutes a night, puts up good points, and is a pretty good defenseman all along the way. Again, the bar is pretty low here, guys. Power makes this lot list whether you like it or not, and I think he does pretty easily. And then the bottom three really tough. I went Jordan Leopold number four. It’s only 103 games. I went back and looked at Jordan Leupold’s evolving wild page, evolving hockey page. Maybe we should do this with some former savers. Like, you know, hey, was this guy actually good? Do the numbers show this guy I remembered from back in time was actually good? Jordan Leupold, you’ll find that the answer to that question is, uh, yeah, he was. that 2011 12 season 90th percentile goals above replacement at the defensive position in the NHL. Really good player and it was only one year but played 22 minutes a night that one season and then I’ve got 24 more games the next year before he was traded for a couple of second round picks. So yeah, I mean his careerhigh in points for the Sabres and really in general and goals was in the year they made the playoffs, but that next year after they made the playoffs where he was still here, he was still a good player. So, Leopold, it’s only 103 games, but I’m putting him on the list. Andre Sakara, again, not a lot of games, 106 games. Advanced stats. This guy was really good. Really good player in his own end. He was smooth. Put up a little bit of pointage. He probably should have been a guy they hung on to for a long time. That’s when the Sabres started to worry too much about toughness and not enough about just who are the good players. Sakara became Sakura. He should have stuck around. He was a very good player. He is to me one of the six best defenseman the Sabres have had during the playoff drought. And the sixth guy I’m going with Jake McCabe. Jake McCabe physically imposing, was a well-liked player. Um, played a lot of games for the Buffalo Sabres, 353 games. And really, he was really young and not a big contributor for a lot of his career in Buffalo. I mean, of the eight years with the Sabres, he only averaged 20 minutes a night once. You know what’s interesting? In the last two years in Toronto, he’s averaged 20 minutes a night. He’s been very good while doing it in his own end. So Jake McCabe, good defensive defenseman, physical player. Remember, he blasts Patrick L coming over the middle. Um to me, he’s one of the six best defenseman as well. So Delene, Airhoff, Power, Leopold, Sakara, and McCabe. The Tex club really wanted Brandon Montour on here. Montour was not good when he was here. It’s not his fault though. So I’m not putting him on here because he didn’t show me. He didn’t have the big year because he didn’t get a chance. Ralph Krueger ruined him while he was here. He was great when he left and pretty good before. Um Ralph Krueger played Brandon Montour at forward. Gave him no opportunity. It was a disaster. It was a joke. Um he was a good player the whole time, but we just didn’t get to see it. And that’s not his fault. It was the coach’s fault. When we come back, the goalending, and there’s a good debate for number two goalender, not a good debate for number one goalender. Talk about it when we come back. Today’s episode of the Locked On Sabres podcast presented by FanDuel Sportsbook. Summer sports are in full swing. And whether you are all about baseball under the lights, golf on the green, or high stakes soccer action, FanDuel is the best way to make every game even more exciting. If you are already following the action, why not make it a little bit more thrilling? You know, these I mentioned these Toronto playoff games right now or baseball games. I’m watching them against the Yankees and I’m thinking, “All right, they’re down one. let me live bet that and, you know, get the odds while they’re a little bit lower. And I always like throwing Bills to win the division with anything. I know I’ve got to wait on that until the winter, until literally January, but it’s such an easy bet and it it to me the odds don’t reflect what it probably should be. How could you imagine the Bills not winning this division? Of course, it could happen, but I can’t see it. I like throwing that in to make anything a little bit of a parlay. So, FanDuel Sportsbook, new daily promotions every day. The app is super userfriendly. You got same game parlay options. You got a bunch of different things that you could do if you’re new to FanDuel. New customers can bet just $5 right now and you get a $150 bon $150 in bonus bets if your first bet wins. So, open the FanDuel app today or visit fanuel.com to get started. Sneaky Jody Debasi wrapping things up here on the Lockdown Sabres podcast with the All Sabers drought team. Goalender. goalender to me is a uh a an easy one for number one and then a little bit more difficult for number two. The leader for the Buffalo Sabres during the playoff drought in save percentage amongst goalies that have played at least 50 games is Ryan Miller. No surprise he did play 141 games during the drought because of course remember he is he’s here through into 2014. So, you get multiple years, good save percentage, good seasons, while Miller’s the goalender. He actually had a winning record during that time. Miller’s the number one by by far. Um, number two is really the bigger question. Most, and I will admit myself, I’m I’m going to put Lenus Almark on here. Lenus Almark had a winning record during his time with the Buffalo Sabres in the playoff drought. Had a 912 save percentage. He was a good goalender. He was a consistent goalender with his play. The problem was he just couldn’t stay healthy. The guy you could argue above him honestly is Robin Leonard. Would you be surprised to know Robin Leonard started more games for the Buffalo Sabres than Lena Smark and had a higher save percentage by 4 hundredths of a point. He had more shutouts, twice as many as Lena did. If you carry it four times many penalty minutes, that shouldn’t surprise anybody. Robin Leonard, but some of the advanced stats show that Leonard was not as good as all, even though some of those very, very baseline stats do. So, with that, the winning record that Mark had and the likability that had, I think you can make a smart argument that Allar was a better goalender, and I think most just liked more during his time here. Um, I feel bad for Leonard. Leonard’s had a I mean he has had you know these rants on Twitter where you worry for the guy’s personal well-being and of course there were stories about that when he left the Buffalo Sabres maybe even while he was here. Um problems with maybe substance abuse like there’s just a lot there with Robin Leonard. Um and he’s kind of out of the public eye right now. Doesn’t isn’t still playing in the National Hockey League. His career kind of came to an end there with that surgery. Um, I think it’s pretty much over despite the fact that he’s still only like 33, 34 years old. All though, was good the whole time. All was well-liked. He’s maybe the most lovable drought saber. That I think you can make that case. He’s the most lovable drought saber. So, I’m the minions helmet. I’m putting him as the backup goalender is my number two. So, at the end of it all, this is what the Sabres drought team looks like. Top line, Eel, Skinner, and Reinhardt. Second line, Thompson, Vanic, and Tuck. Third line, O’Reilly, Olivesson, and Pomville. Fourth line, Cousins, Kane, and Ennis. Defense group, Airhoff and Dene on the top, Leupold and Power on the second, Sakiraa and McCabe on the third, and then Miller and Olmark in goal. When you look at it in totality, you might think that’s that’s a that’s a playoff team. That’s a playoff team and that’s a team that could win multiple rounds in the postseason if they were all at their best at the exact same time. And I didn’t really focus on, you know, the fourth line like, oh, Johan Larson’s a better fit for the fourth line. I just threw as much talent on there as I could find. So, that’s the group. If you disagree with somebody being on the list or you think somebody that isn’t on the list should should be, feel free to reach out. Let me know what you think as uh you know, this has been an edition of Sabers Droughy as we enter the 15th season of the drought. And here’s the hoping that the drought doesn’t actually reach number 15, but there’s a probably a decent chance of that. Well, that’ll do it for us today here in the Lockdown Savers podcast. If you want more hockey talk and you want it more leaguewide, be sure to check out Lockdown NHL. There’s no offseason like the NHL and there’s still stuff that could be happening leaguewide. So, be sure to check it out. Locked on NHL’s on YouTube or wherever you find your podcast and we’ll talk to you. I’m going to Montreal actually this weekend. So, I will talk to you next week here on the podcast. Uh, I’ll let you know how it is. I’m excited. I’m never been to Montreal. I know a lot of people I know that have played hockey like at higher levels have done that and everybody says it’s great. So, might be a place I want to check out a game too in the future. But that’ll do it for us. Talk to you next week here in the Lockdown Sabers podcast, part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day.

The Buffalo Sabres playoff drought enters it’s 15th season, but there have been a lot of really good players to play for the team during those fifteen years. Who are the best of them? Sneaky Joe builds a lineup with the likes of Rasmus Dahlin, Tage Thompson, Jack Eichel, and many others. Did Jason Pominville and Thomas Vanek play enough games to make the team?

Has anyone played enough to unseat Ryan Miller? And how have the Sabres not had six good defensemen play for the team in this amount of time?

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