NHL trade grade: Sabres acquire Jimmy Vesey from Rangers
The Buffalo Sabres have officially traded for Jimmy Vesey of the New York Rangers, giving up a 2021 third-round pick.
The Buffalo Sabres have been looking to add to their scoring depth. They’ve been aggressive so far, even after re-signing Jeff Skinner to an eight-year deal. In their second trade in under a week, Buffalo has acquired Jimmy Vesey from the New York Rangers for a 2021 third-round pick.
This trade might seem simple on paper. But it has some interesting layers to it if you read between the lines. Let’s look at this trade from both sides.
Sabres
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Vesey should give Buffalo some much-needed scoring depth. That’s something they really lacked last season. Vesey isn’t going to wow you, but he has scored at least 15 goals in each of his first three seasons. He’s a quality third-line forward who can give you goals in the right situations.
What’s interesting is most of his scoring has come at even strength. Combined over the last two seasons, Vesey has just seven power-play points. He has 63 total points over the past two seasons, so that’s just over 10%.
Vesey has a $2.275 million cap hit and his contract will expire after the 2019-20 season. He will be an unrestricted free agent. Ironically, Sabres fans might remember they traded for Vesey’s rights several years ago but wound up being unable to sign him.
Buffalo managed to avoid giving up a 2020 third-round pick, which seems small but is fairly significant. The 2020 draft is going to be one of the deepest ones in years. Giving up a 2021 third-round pick is reasonable. Buffalo got a nice upgrade to their offense and only gave up a third-round pick to do it.
Grade: B. Pretty good trade for the Sabres. Could flip him at the trade deadline for a nice pick or prospect if they don’t extend him. I imagine they’ll sign him to an extension of some kind, given their lack of scoring depth.
Rangers
This is an interesting trade for the Rangers. They’re still very much in the running for Artemi Panarin. So it’s a little suspicious New York’s clearing cap space. It’s not like Vesey had a signing bonus or anything, so trading him on July 1 is an eyebrow raiser.
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New York had a bit of a clogged up forward group. This helps them unclog it and they got a nice pick for him. Expect to see more picks like this from the Rangers, especially if they sign Panarin. They have to extend Jacob Trouba and make a decision about Chris Kreider. So the more cap space they can create, the better.
Grade: B. Hard to hate the trade.