I believe what you meant to say is that they're having a hard time finding partners at the price Botterill is asking for. He's not gonna just give ROR away.
- Tsyolin
I would guess finding partners period is right. How many teams can take on a $7.5M cap hit, let alone the actual cash commitment over the 5 years remaining on his deal? Most teams would need to send a contract back or need Buffalo to retain money. There aren't that many players in the league that have contracts that stretch out that long and for that much money, and most of the ones that do exist are for true first line forwards or top pair D-men (or are considered bad contracts). O'Reilly isn't a true C1. He is an excellent C2.
Look at what the Leafs got for Kessel. A late first and a former late first rounder and the Leafs ate $1.2M of his salary for 7 years or something like that. And his productions was at a PPG level for several years. O'Reilly's has never been at that level, and as much as two way play is important, guys get paid that kind of money to score.
O'Reilly clearly has value, but to maximize the return for him, the Sabres are either going to need to retain some salary or take a bad contract back in return. Otherwise, I think the package will be underwhelming.
