Sygvard

Friends and comrades, As some of you know, I have been unbelievably burnt out lately. I am barely limping through work days at the hospital, and increasingly I just don't have the brain power for fantasy hockey. Hobbies shouldn't feel like homework, and I am not giving my team the love it deserves. I need to take a step back, and a break until life makes sense. I will be stepping down as GM of the Buffalo Sabres. We took on this team as a sack of aging spare parts, and leave it with the rebuild complete. A top 10 team, full of young players, with a stacked prospect pool and extra picks lined up for the years ahead. I would be absolutely gutted to hand off years of drafting to a random stranger to tear apart. Thankfully I am leaving the team in the best of hands: @Master Mind will be following his one true love DeMelo, and taking over the distinguished mantle of the Buffaslug. May he slug with pride. My intention is to stay in the discord as long as you will have me, with the hope of maybe taking another team at some point in the future. I like chatting with you walnuts, so you can't get rid of me that easily.

Dylan Duke. @Patnat96 is on the clock

Logan Stankoven. @Art Vandelay is up I think.

Im dumb. Atu Raty

Cole Sillinger

You mean so the pick is NOT moved right? I mean, im ok with it moving to 2022. But condition was that it moves if top 5.

Buffalo Protection List Rantanen Point Lowry Konecny Reinhart Thomas Dickenson Krug Slavin Spurgeon Gibson Sorry that I have been a bit AWOL for the past month or so folks, I have been adulting. I am in the process of catching up on signings, prospects, protection list, and diving into the draft. I hope to catch up on my egregiously dust covered inbox shortly. Huge congrats to our absolutely terrifying cup winner @pmalina. @Canuck Surfer wiped the floor with us without breaking a sweat: it takes a hell of a team to slay that multi headed monster.

Yeah that team is in WAY better shape than some of the tire fires folks have inherited here! Full iceable roster with extras in the minors. Couple stars. Two goalies. Multiple recognizable prospects and recent 1sts. A bountiful crop for a good old fashioned gutting!

Jason Robertson was my first pick in this league years ago. I had huge faith in him at the time, and am super happy to finally see him arrive in the league. With 13 points in 16 games Robertson now has the highest points per game of any rookie, playing on the 2nd line in Dallas. It really feels like a landmark for my team to be finally competing for a playoff spot right as my first draft picks when we took over the team arrive in the league.

Buffalo would like to drop McKegg through waivers, and activate Hawryluk off of reserve. Thank you.

Strongly support the changes. Not a big difference in the standings for me, but makes so much more sense when scouting and drafting. I can scout for players who will create shots and draw penalties. Less so for plus minus.

I believe that in a normal season RFAs need to sign before Dec 1st to play that season. That date being 2 months into the season. Since the season started on Jan 13th this year, we would have to move the dates accordingly. I assume the equivalent date would mid March this year?

BUFFALO SABRES WORLD JUNIORS RECAP Trevor Zegras USA 18 P 7 GP - GOLD Gold medal, Tournament MVP, most points by a US player in tournament history, over double the points of the next highest scorer on the tournament winning team. Just looked dominant in every game. There is nothing left for Trevor to prove outside of the NHL. Make me proud my little Zebra boy. Bobby Brink 6 P 7 GP -GOLD Brink did what he has done at every level and found ways to score points despite his size. The elite brain is still there, and the skating looked noticeably better than last year. He was no Zegras, but was an important part of that Gold win. Kasper Simontaival 7 P 7 GP - BRONZE Kasper exploded into his first WJ tournament on Finland’s crucial pillar of a first line. Despite his stats not being padded by any high scoring blow out games, Kasper channeled his immediate chemistry with Anton Lundell into a point per game tournament. Speed and vision lived up to expectations, with some defensive responsibility which surprised me. Rodion Amirov 6 P 7 GP Despite a disappointing tournament for Russia, Amirov lead the team in points as an all situations first liner beside Podkolzin. That transition and possession game is what we drafted him for; weaving into the zone and curling back to rag the puck on the PK. I was also pleasantly surprised by the power behind his shot. Looks ready to play against men in the KHL with his all around game. Alexander Holtz 3 P 5 GP Sweden never managed to put things together, with a disappointing first tournament for the otherwise electric Raymond-Holtz duo. Despite this, I was pleased with what I saw. Holtz lead the tournament in shots for as long as he was in it, and was a danger on every rush. With that shot volume and his cannon wrister, better puck luck will come.

Reserved

I forgot to react to this, but am really happy to welcome Matt Grzelcyk to the team. I think he is a really under rated defenseman in Boston's top 4 last year, and was happy to see him signed IRL for 4 x 3.7M. He has never put up fantasy numbers in line with his real on ice value, but looks like Boston plans to have him take over Krug's spot on PP1, as well as top pairing minutes. I am hopeful that the increased minutes and opportunity will result in a solid uptick in fppg.

2021 Buffalo Sabres Forwards Travis Konecny Brayden Point Mikko Rantanen Jonathan Drouin Jack Hughes Sam Reinhart Robert Thomas Adam Lowry Ilya Mikheyev Jason Dickinson Greg McGegg Jayce Hawryluk Defense Torey Krug Jaccob Slavin Jared Spurgeon Shayne Gostibehere Matt Roy Matt Grzelcyk Bradd Hunt Goaltenders John Gibson Elvis Merzlikins Top Prospects and Possible Callups Trevor Zegras Bobby Brink Alexander Holtz Ryan Poehling Grigory Denisenko Nicholas Robertson Evan Bouchard Jason Robertson Ryan Merkley Rodion Amirov Lassi Thomson The roster is slowly pulling itself out of our never-ending rebuild and into something that half resembles a team. Considering that we never won a lottery or picked higher than 8th, I am proud of the direction it is moving. For once we will be icing a full roster, with lines that resemble an NHL team, full of (mostly quite young) players that I find interesting. We have a great duo in net, a killer first line, Jack Hughes waiting for a breakout, buckets of recent 1sts waiting in the wings, and a still a couple 1sts in the upcoming draft. The roster still holds a snowball's chance in hell against some of the absolute juggernauts in this league, but I would feel comfortable icing it IRL and would be excited to cheer for it's future.

BUFFALO DRAFT REPORT Buffalo is happy to report that we had no clean misses this year. After a particularly volatile draft, all of our targets were drafted, and landed within the first 5 rounds. We saw a couple modest slides, but I was encouraged that each of the slides ended with a team trading-up to snap up the clear falling value. Outside of this we saw modest gains across the board, with some validation of our two 1sts, as well as one of our 4ths climb their way into the 2nd round. Our Pick NHL Pick Alexander Holtz 8 7 1 Rodion Amirov 20 15 5 K. Simontaival 66 66 0 Danil Guschin 69 76 -7 John Ludvig 75 69 6 Brandon Coe 90 98 -8 Yegor Sokolov 98 61 37 Evan Vierling 101 127 -26 D. Ovchinnikov 143 137 6 In terms of composition, our selections are forward heavy in a year that was packed with good forwards. Up high we targeted some game breaking offense, and took some gambles on some undersized but electric forwards. Our mid rounds filled out some big bodies for the scoring system in Coe and Sokolov, as well as an undrafted 3rd round D from last year who has since exploded with offensive. Down low we targeted the kind of individual skills and tools that we think have a chance to elevate a late pick above their inevitable flaws. Thanks to @thejazz97, @Salter, @Master Mind, and @Jaku for their work this week, and with the upcoming free agent tire-fire. We continue to love the league, and live for the draft. Here is to another year of inevitable mediocrity from the Buffaslugs!

3rd or 4th? Spicy to ask for a 3rd for your mid 4th

Man the last three picks just brutalized my list. Was looking so good up to that point that I thought I had guys for my next two picks. Buffalo picks Egor Sokolov @pmalina

Was wondering when that would happen. I took two swings at "skilled but overly small guy for this scoring system who is dropping" earlier in the draft, so I decided to skip him. But he was dropping SO far that even then I considered him for my next pick.

I can't say that the way he said it made me think it was likely though. Interviewer kept pushing. Would you trade picks? "Yes". " Would you trade prospects? "Yes" Would you package them? "Yes" Would you do it this week? "Sure I would do it tomorrow, but it takes two to tango" Seemed like more of a vague "Yes I would be willing to do my job". Than an indicator that anything was likely.

With the 90th pick, Buffalo selects Brandon Coe. @Jaku

With pick 75, the Buffalo Sabres will get a bit funky and select John Ludvig. How can you say no to that smile. @inane is on the clock.

That feeling when you realize the guy you have been excitingly watching drop was actually picked in the 2nd. Damn spelling errors on spreadsheets. With pick 66, Buffalo selects Kasper "The Unfriendly Ghost" Simontaival Please tell me I didn't miss that one being taken as well @Azzy it is all you baby.

@JimLahey is an absolute animal on the draft floor. Leave some picks for the rest of us!