Who Would the Buffalo Sabres Protect in an Expansion Draft?

Source: Montreal Gazette

This is a 'for fun' piece I also submitted as a fan post over on Die By The Blade. 

With the last of the Buffalo Sabres' remaining RFAs, Jerry D`Amigo, resigning last week, we have unofficially entered the quiet season in Sabres hockey. Save for an unexpected UFA signing, it's safe to say that hockey-related Sabres news will be minimal until training camp kicks off in mid-September. So to help fill the void, I lifted an idea that other fan bases (e.g.,Stars, Oilers, Lightning, Maple Leafs) have been throwing around the last few weeks: who would the Sabres protect in a hypothetical expansion draft?

Before getting into the details of how an expansion draft may work, some assumptions: I believe that there will be at least one expansion team (i.e., Las Vegas and/or Quebec City) that will start play in the 2017-18 season, which is when the league anticipates expansion will occur. As a result, the players that the Sabres will need to protect will be reflected by their contract statuses in June of 2017, which is the time of the year that the 1998-2000 NHL Expansion Drafts were held. All contract details will reflect what is available on General Fanager. Of course, the Sabres' roster makeup two years from now is impossible to predict, but divvying up the current roster of players into those the team would protect vs. expose turns out to be a fun and straight forward experiment if we assume the players are still on the roster. I will also make the assumption that the upcoming expansion draft(s) will also work how the previous expansion drafts did:

Teams choose to protect either nine forwards, five defensemen, and one goalie; or seven forwards, three defensemen, and two goalies

If protecting one goalie, there is no experience requirement for the goalie left unprotected. If protecting two goalies, they must leave one goalie unprotected who played in at least 10 games the prior season, or 25 combined games over the past two seasons

Teams must leave one defenseman and two forwards unprotected who played 40 NHL games the prior season, or 70 combined games over the prior two seasons

Players on entry-level contracts are automatically exempt, and every existing team will have exactly two players selected

One other thing that needs to be addressed is the introduction and proliferation of NMCs/NTCs since the last round of expansion. For this exercise, I will assume that players with a NMC in the 2016-17 season can block themselves from being drafted, but those with Full and Modified NTCs cannot. This assumption won't have much bearing for Buffalo, as Zach Bogosian is the only player that will have a NMC in 2016-17. Since late June is still technically in the 2016-17 season, pending UFAs are also treated as players that the Sabres can leave exposed (a scenario that occurred in 2000 when Dallas Drake, whose rights were claimed by the Columbus Blue Jackets, instead opted to test free agency and signed with the St. Louis Blues).

First, I will start off with next season's UFAs that I don't believe will be on the Sabres roster in 2016-17 or, if they are, the team won't hesitate to leave exposed. They include: David Legwand, Mike Weber, Carlo Colaiacovo, and Chad Johnson. Buffalo also would be favorably affected by an expansion draft happening in June 2017 as players on ELCs and unsigned prospects are exempt, meaning Buffalo wouldn't have to use a protection spot. Notables on that list would include Jack Eichel, Sam Reinhart, Nicholas Baptiste, Justin Bailey, William Carrier, Hudson Fasching, Evan Rodrigues, Anthony Florentino, Brendan Guhle, Linus Ullmark, Jason Kasdorf, Cal Petersen and whomever else the Sabres select in the 2016 NHL Entry Level Draft.

As to which scenario the Sabres would elect to use (9F, 5D and 1G, or 7F, 3D and 2G), the former is the obvious choices the odds are good that Robin Lehner he will be the only goaltender worth protecting. There's always the chance that Nathan Lieuwen or Andrey Makarov takes such a huge step in Rochester next season that the Sabres would feel one of them is worth protecting. However, neither of the goalies seems like they would be worth leaving an additional four roster players exposed. Even if Las Vegas Black Knights and/or the Quebec Nordiques were interested in Liuewen or Makarov, the precedent does exist that expansion teams will agree to not select certain exposed players in exchange for picks and/or players, as the San Jose Sharks pulled off with Evgeni Nabokov in 2000.

Given the current state of the Sabres' defense, it seems like a slam dunk that Bogosian, Rasmus Ristolainen, Mark Pysyk, and Jake McCabe would be four of the five protected defensemen. As teams must also leave one defenseman exposed that played either 40 games in the previous season or 70 in the previous two, I will leave the injury-prone Josh Gorges and his one remaining year of $3.9M exposed in this exercise. I think it's worth reiterating that just because a player is exposed he won't necessarily be selected, but having a 32-year old Gorges get claimed would likely not be the worst thing in the world. I personally believe that there will be a different fifth defenseman worth protecting once 2017 rolls around, but for the sake of this exercise I have decided to make Chad Ruhwedel the fifth protected player (though to be honest, I think it's a coin flip whether him or Matt Donovan is more worthy of protecting).

As for the nine forwards, there are four players that I would consider to be slam dunks to be protected: Ryan O`Reilly, Evander Kane, Tyler Ennis and Zemgus Girgensons. I would also consider Johan Larsson and Marcus Foligno to be locks, provided neither is involved in a trade in the next two seasons. Assuming the ELC provision will stay the same and the Sabres don't have to use a spot on Eichel or Reinhart, the Sabres shouldn't have any trouble protecting the forwards they want to keep. Though he's a 2016 UFA and would need to be resigned first, I've also added Jamie McGinn to my list of protected forwards just because there's room to shield him (though as with Ruhwedel, I think another RW will come into the mix by 2017 that will make McGinn expendable). As far as having two NHL forwards exposed goes, 2017 UFAs Brian Gionta and Cody McCormick would fit the bill as the odds that either of these players will be retained by the Sabres beyond 2017-18 are pretty low.

Ultimately though, the most decisive player to leave exposed or not is going to be Matt Moulson, who in 2017 will be 33-years old and have two remaining years at $5M per season. There will be a lot of variables that will ultimately shape this decision: will Moulson's regain his form as a 20-30 goal scorer alongside Eichel, or was last season's 14-goal performance a sign of things to come? Even if Moulson regains his form, would leaving him exposed in 2017 be worth getting him off the books for 2018-19, when Kane will be a UFA and Eichel and Reinhart are RFAs? As with all teams, the continued weakening of Canadian dollar is likely to negatively affect the Sabres' long-term cap situation. Granted, I am talking 2-3 years out for an expansion scenario that may or may not happen. As of today, I have Moulson in my keep list as I am bullish on his future production now that he has high end making centers to play with again. But assuming expansion does happen in 2017, I would expect protecting or exposing Moulson will become a #HotButton issue for Sabres fans.

So my final protected list and key players exposed looks like the following. While teams like Dallas will have tougher logjams to address, it's safe to say that expansion teams have it pretty rough just based on the players they would be able to claim from Buffalo. Feel free to leave comments on who you think should and/or would be protected in an NHL Expansion Draft.

Goalie (1): Lehner

Defense (5): Bogosian, Ristolainen, Pysyk, McCabe, Ruhwedel

Forward (9): O`Reilly, Kane, Ennis, Girgensons, Foligno, Larsson, Moulson, McGinn, Nicolas Deslauriers

Notable Exposed Players: Gorges, Donovan, Gionta, McCormick, D`Amigo, Cal O`Reilly, Philip Varone, Tim Schaller, Jerome Gauthier-Leduc, Lieuwen, Makarov