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Sabres most interested in these two Penguins

September 4, 2020, 4:36 PM ET [302 Comments]
Ryan Wilson
Pittsburgh Penguins Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
The Penguins and Sabres have been talking




It makes sense. Jason Botterill is the Sabres GM and Conor Sheary could be a target for… wait a minute.

Kevyn Adams is now the Sabres general manager. We don’t know much about him. What we do know is he’s been a yes man who has worked his way up in the Pegula’s organization. Whether that translates into being a successful GM we will soon find out.

Chad DeDominicis is piped into the Sabres happenings and if he said they’re talking it is because somebody with knowledge told him that. I trust his reporting 100%. Chad is editor in chief of Expected Buffalo, a Patreon subscription based site focused on analytics, and is also the managing editor of Die By the Blade, the SB Nation Sabres blog. I really enjoy Chad’s work and even if it is about the Sabres you can still get great insight about players from around the league.




So what are the Sabres and Penguins talking about? I reached out to Chad to see if he knew anything more about the discussions and I was told the Sabres were most interested in Matt Murray and Jared McCann. Dominik Simon came up as well, but is not the focal point.

We all know the Penguins are shopping both Murray and McCann. The Sabres are probably looking to upgrade from Carter Hutton and they are definitely looking for players who can play the center position. While the Penguins may not want to roll the dice with McCann at center again the Sabres probably want to throw as many darts at the board as possible for a position they have a huge need for. So if the Sabres are interested in both players maybe we can look forward to a package. Let’s say Matt Murray and Jared McCann for Samson Reinhart? Reinhart would guarantee both Crosby and Malkin have legit top six wingers. Reinhart will likely earn 7-7.5M on his next deal and I think it would be worth it. Only problem? That isn’t going to happen. The Sabres are going to want a better offer if they even want to move Reinhart.

What is more probable? Well, I don’t think my personal speculation is going to comfort Penguins fans. I present to you a younger right-handed version of Jack Johnson, Rasmus Ristolainen. Yep, I could see Rutherford being interested in bringing in the big bodied Finnish defender who puts up points on the power play. Ristolainen has been one of the Sabres biggest mistakes of the past few seasons. They had a player with a high perceived value and sat on it. They were offered Taylor Hall and declined. Instead, they were convinced he would develop into a legit top pairing force. Instead, he’s a negative drag on his team.

Out of 154 defensemen who have played 3,000 minutes the last four seasons Ristolainen’s 46.37 xGF% is 140th.



People think of him as an offensive player, but he’s a huge liability offensively as you can see. It wasn’t just a last year thing, here is the year before



He is below average in both categories. In fact it reminds of me a defenseman both Rutherford and Sullivan seemed to detest this year, Justin Schultz



Moving out Murray and McCann’s money would certainly free up the space to acquire Ristolainen and his 5.4M cap hit. It would also give us a Johnson-Ristolainen pairing(!) or even worse it would put John Marino back with Johnson. Here’s to hoping I’m wrong about Ristolainen being a player the Penguins would be interested in, but you know it isn’t out of the question.

Other players I could see Rutherford looking into include Buffalo’s two other right-handed defensemen Brandon Montour (RFA) and Colin Miller (3.875M for two more years). Montour will be looking for term and a raise from his 3.387M cap hit. Miller would be preferable if you had to choose from the two, but you don’t have to choose from the two in real life.

A Sabres player that may make sense is pending UFA Johan Larsson. However, he would not be in the mold of an offensive center. He is very strong defensively. I don’t dislike the player, but my approach with the third line would be geared more towards offense considering the fourth line is already a defensive specialty with minimal offense. Crosby and Malkin are going to need depth scoring in their advanced age just like they did when they were younger.

Or maybe Rutherford can pull the reverse Oleksiak and get Dominik Kahun back. Stay tuned.

Thanks for reading!
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