NHL Rumour Report: Elliotte Friedman on Sportsnet on Buffalo Sabres pending UFA forward Alex Tuch: “They were not anywhere near what Tuch considers his market value — around $10.5M; Adams felt if he went that far, it would prevent him from doing other things; I believe two of those items were extensions for (Zach) Benson and (Josh) Doan.”
Daily Faceoff: David Pagnotta on the Buffalo Sabres, and how aggressive will newly named GM Jarmo Kekalainen be?
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Carter Hutton: “And I think about that with the Buffalo Sabres and Jarmo Kekalainen. He’s been around enough to get a feel for who these players are and what he has. How long till we see you know him, like, what’s his first move in Buffalo here as he takes over the helm?
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Pagnotta: “Yeah, you know what? That’s a great point, because this isn’t a guy coming in fresh. He came in, in the summer. He’s already been acclimated. He’s well educated within the organization, the roster, the prospect pool, the (AHL). Everything that they’ve got in the system, plus the staff off the ice.
So this isn’t a matter of him coming in and now having to spend the next whatever, six, eight weeks to evaluate his team. He’s already done that. He’s been on the ground floor, and he’s been across the league. I’ve seen him in Toronto at a bunch of games. He’s been across different parts of, of the conference, trying to get a good hands on approach to how the rest of the teams out there are looking. Not just from, from a scouting perspective, per se, but also just to see what options may be available to him later.
It sounds like priority number one is Alex Tuch. Figure out exactly what that runway looks like. Is there a pathway to a deal? And by all accounts, and we touched on this earlier on in the season, I mean, my indication was that he’s looking at eight figures on an AAV. So somewhere in that 10 to $11 million range. Is Buffalo comfortable doing that?
It didn’t sound like they were when Kevyn Adams was leading those negotiations. Has anything shifted, and will anything shift with Jarmo? That’s what him and Brian Bartlett, Alex Tuch’s agent, are going to have to figure out. And then, once that’s determined one way or another, then it’s on to the other, you know, kind of boxes that he’s going to have to check. And he mentioned that in his introductory press conference.
Goaltending, he wants to get down to two once (Colton) Ellis is healthy. They got to figure that out. Are there other areas of his team that some teams that had conversations with Adams prior, with respect to guys like Bowen Byron, Owen Power, other players on the team, Jordan Greenway, etc. Are those going to now be reignited in a different manner with Jarmo leading those, those negotiations?
So there’s certainly a lot to handle here. But you know, based on what he said, he wants to kind of get things going in short order. First is figuring it Alex Tuch and then kind of going from there and checking some of those other boxes. But this is expected to be an aggressive approach.
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I know there’s a lot of speculation about Lindy Ruff’s future. He’s in the final year of his contract. He’s the only head coach, to my knowledge, who’s on an expiring deal. They don’t necessarily have to make that type of move in season. They can kind of wait things out and just see how the season plays out as Jarmo is making those roster adjustments.
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