Buffalo Sabres’ Rebuild Isn’t Bringing Much Success
By Trin Potratz
The Buffalo Sabres Were Hoping For a Successful Rebuild This Season to Finally Get Around to Some Good Play. Unfortunately, the Rebuild Just Isn’t Working.
Buffalo has been one of the worst teams in the league over the past four seasons and this season was supposed to be the year that they challenged for a playoff spot.
Instead, the Buffalo Sabres currently find themselves at the bottom of their division with a 14-15-8 record.Last season, the Sabres seemed to be making headway under the leadership of coach Dan Bylsma.
The team looked like they were finally ready to climb out of the basement. Nowadays the headlines they make normally involve “struggle” and “loss.”
Struggles and Losses Continue
Jack Eichel made headlines when he recently lost his cool following a loss to the Bruins.
It gets me thinking why this club can’t seem to find another gear. What is going wrong?
While the Sabres used to “tank” method to rebuild, they were unable to secure the best player in any draft.They didn’t get the first overall pick in the 2014 or 2015 draft.
In the 2014 draft, they missed a chance to draft a budding stud d-man in Aaron Ekblad and then they managed to whiff on their second overall selection.
Now I’m not saying that Sam Reinhart is a bad player, but I think they would have been better off selecting either Leon Draisaitl or Sam Bennett.
In 2015, the Sabres were tanking on purpose and without even trying to hide it. They wanted Connor McDavid.
They had to “settle” for Eichel.
The team’s core is currently:
-a budding superstar in Eichel.
-a bonafide number one centre in Ryan O’Reilly.
-a solid supporting young talent in Reinhart.
-a budding stud defenceman in Rasmus Ristolainen.
-a veteran scoring winger in Kyle Okposo.
-A bonafide starting goalie in Robin Lehner.
So, what’s the problem?
To say injuries are a non-factor would be an understatement. The club has seen early season injuries to effective players like Evander Kane, O’Reilly, Eichel and Dmitry Kulikov.
The sad thing is, injuries are never a good enough excuse because every team goes through them.
The real reason the Buffalo Sabres have not been able to have a successful rebuild mainly stem from coming out of many trades as the loser.
Tim Murray Losing the Big Deals
Not every GM is perfect, but most GM’s don’t lose this many trades and keep their jobs.
On March 5, 2014, Murray sent two 2nd round picks, Brayden McNabb and Jonathan Parker to the L.A. Kings in exchange for prospect Hudson Fasching and Nicolas Deslauriers.
Fasching was a decent player to bet on, but he was not worth two draft picks and a decent young d-man.
McNabb is playing in the top four on a decent Los Angeles Team. Winning the trade normally consists of acquiring the best player. Today that player is Brayden McNabb.
Next, we have the real kicker.
On February 11, 2015, in the midst of the biggest tank season, Murray acquired the injured Evander Kane along with Zach Bogosian and Jason Kasdorf for a package that included Tyler Myers, Drew Stafford, Brendan Lemieux, Joel Armia and a 2015 1st round pick.
Kane has been almost a complete bust and his off-ice antics make more headlines than his offensive abilities. Bogosian has been a strong but not spectacular defender. Kasdorf is struggling at the ECHL level. Myers is playing top four minutes and seems to be rejuvenating his career.
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Stafford is struggling this season, but prior to he was a big factor in getting the Jets to the playoffs the year of the deal. Stafford also scored 21 goals last season.
Armia has broken through to the NHL level and was tracking quite nicely before injury struck Lemieux began his pro career and has been playing with tenacity and grit that should help him find an NHL career.
Oh and that first round pick? That only became current world junior player Jack Roslovic.
The trade at the time seemed like it was decently close and benefited both teams, but only two years later it’s a complete loss for the Sabres.
Sure Tim Murray schooled the Avalanche when they acquired O’Reilly. Sure swapping a 1st round pick for Lehner was a good move.
However, you need to break even on wins and losses in the trade front to be successful. They wasted a 3rd round pick thinking they could negotiate a deal with Jimmy Vesey when he was certain he would wait until he became a free agent.
Mark Pysyk was tracking well before he was dealt to bring in Kulikov who has struggled.Is Josh Gorges really worth a 2nd round pick?
In the End
The Buffalo Sabres got the short end of the stick by failing to secure the 1st overall pick in their tanking draft years.I truly believe Tim Murray put too much merit into drafting a high profile player that would catapult his team back to the playoffs.
Next: Avalanche Put Duchene and Landeskog on Trade Block
I’ll give Murray credit for taking calculated risks in certain deals, but they just haven’t paid off.