Contract negotiation between the Buffalo Sabres and Alex Tuch should pick up soon
Daily Faceoff: David Pagnotta, on DFO Rundown, when asked about where things are with Buffalo Sabres pending UFA forward Alex Tuch. Real negotiations may get underway in two to three weeks.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Carter Hutton: “What happens with Alex Tuch?”
Pagnotta: “You know, I did the full series, the Buffalo-Montreal series, and there was some word, or at least chatter, anyway, that you know, maybe the likelihood of him returning is increased. Or has increased, excuse me. Now he’s going to have to evaluate all of that properly.
Like they stopped talking ahead of playoffs, obviously that was the focus. But there’s been a very solid open line of communication between (Jarmo) Kekalainen the GM and his agents. So this hasn’t been a point where nobody’s, you know, been calling each other, or they look at somebody calling, they’re like, ‘I’m going to ignore this guy.’ It hasn’t been that.
What if the Edmonton Oilers Offer Sheeted Pavel Dorofeyev?
It’s just been a lot of back and forth, and nobody’s nailed the number. Now the number is probably going to be anywhere from 10 and a half to $11 million. I don’t anticipate that rough series against Montreal for him, like he had seven points in his first six games in the first round. He just got kind of shut off the score sheet in round two against Montreal.
So you know, I know a lot of people are talking about how much money did he lose? I don’t think he’s really going to lose much, if anything, because of what you said earlier. He is the top dog in free agency. So if he wants to really cash out, he can hit July one and take his chances there.
But it did sound like maybe they were leaning towards, you know, sticking around in Buffalo. We’ll see kind of where that goes in the next few weeks when they reconvene with respect to actual negotiations. Conversations are one thing, talking is one thing, it’s a matter of actually negotiating that contract and what it looks like now. And that’s probably going to, I would imagine, happen in the next two to three weeks.”
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