The Athletic Dom Luszczyszyn gives the Sabres offseason a B+

[joshjull]

Buffalo Sabres: B+
In: Carter Hutton, Conor Sheary, Patrik Berglund, Vladimir Sobotka, Tage Thompson, Matt Hunwick
Out: Ryan O’Reilly, Robin Lehner, Chad Johnson, Jacob Josefson, Benoit Pouliot, Jordan Nolan
Net Value Added: +2.6 wins

I’m just as surprised that a team that traded one of their best players grades out this high.

While it rarely makes sense to trade top-tier players, Buffalo has internal replacements for Ryan O’Reilly on the way (hello, Casey Mittelstadt) and was in desperate need of capable depth. Letting go of Jacob Josefson, Benoit Pouliot and Jordan Nolan and replacing them with the team’s O’Reilly trade haul of Patrik Berglund, Vladimir Sobotka, and Tage Thompson should bridge the gap left by O’Reilly’s void. I’d still rather have O’Reilly – there are other avenues to obtain depth that don’t involve trading difference makers like him – but I don’t think the Sabres are that much worse off based on who the new guys are replacing.

Buffalo also added Conor Sheary to the mix in a nice buy-low trade with Pittsburgh, giving them a winger who has a decent history of producing well with superstar centres. The Sabres also upgraded in net with the addition of Carter Hutton, though his small body of work does carry some risk.

The Sabres should be better off next season and took a step closer to relevancy – adding a franchise defender in Rasmus Dahlin at the draft certainly helps, too – but there’s still a lot of work left to do in Buffalo.

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[Montag DP]

Interesting take. I don't think I would grade the offseason that highly. Botterill is banking on a lot of growth from within + a bit of shakeup of the existing roster, which I think is the right approach, but it remains to be seen if it pays dividends as early as next season. I would probably give it a C+ or B at most.

Also, bracing for the same old talking points in 3, 2, 1...

 

[Buf fan in Nash]

I don't really understand the B+ rating either as he seems to be explaining why he shouldn't have rated them that high. At this time we clearly lost the ROR trade so that should already start us at a C at best then the other more minor moves move it up a bit.

The B+ rating makes sense if you factor in winning the lottery and getting Dahlin which it isn't clear whether that factors into his grading.

 

[Myllz]

+2.6 wins equals out to a B+ grade? Unless those two are unrelated, I don't really get the grading system.

 

[sabrebuild]

I don't really understand the B+ rating either as he seems to be explaining why he shouldn't have rated them that high. At this time we clearly lost the ROR trade so that should already start us at a C at best then the other more minor moves move it up a bit.

The B+ rating makes sense if you factor in winning the lottery and getting Dahlin which it isn't clear whether that factors into his grading.

I think he has to be giving credit for winning Dahlin in that grade. Otherwise it makes no sense based on his own commentary.

 

[Jim Bob]

+2.6 wins equals out to a B+ grade? Unless those two are unrelated, I don't really get the grading system.

I'd love to see that bell curve.

Also, I saw the thread title and I wondered if he was related to Curtis Lesychyn.

 

[Aladyyn]

It sure would be nice if Hutton was as good for as as he was for the Blues last season (he won't be).

 

[Buf fan in Nash]

I think he has to be giving credit for winning Dahlin in that grade. Otherwise it makes no sense based on his own commentary.

From the article i would think not. He doesn't list Dahlin as a player in.

Buffalo Sabres: B+
In: Carter Hutton, Conor Sheary, Patrik Berglund, Vladimir Sobotka, Tage Thompson, Matt Hunwick
Out: Ryan O’Reilly, Robin Lehner, Chad Johnson, Jacob Josefson, Benoit Pouliot, Jordan Nolan
Net Value Added: +2.6 wins

 

[Dingo44]

It sure would be nice if Hutton was as good for as as he was for the Blues last season (he won't be).

Because?

 

[Icicle]

From the article i would think not. He doesn't list Dahlin as a player in.

He doesn't factor in real additions like Dahlin, Pilut, Oloffson, etc. that will likely contribute.

 

[Aladyyn]

Because?

He's a goalie.

 

[Dreakon13]

So he thinks Mittelstadt, Berglund, Sobotka and Thompson can bridge the gap of losing ROR. While adding necessary depth to the roster. And Hutton is an improvement on Lehner. And we added Sheary.

Eh... I don't disagree. But I know people will/do.

 

[struckbyaparkedcar]

This is just a rehash of the Tierney chart we were arguing about last week.

Goaltending factors heavily into WAR and wins-added analysis because they play so much (Hutton played more minutes than everyone except Risto/Scandella in 33 games) and have more control on goal differential than any skater by far.

An example of this in practice, is how goaltending sabotaged Carolina’s dreamy possession numbers.

Per corsica’s “player ratings” we replaced the 46th best goaltender in the league last season with the 22nd, which is going to put us in the green unless we shot all our skating talent into the sun. The red flag is that Hutton’s numbers this past season (which this analysis is heavily biased toward) were driven by LD and MD performance, in backup sample size.

His numbers look a little more sustainable than Lehner’s LD driven work from 16-17, but each player’s success against HD chances has been scarily similar over the past three years.

TL;DR

If Hutton can scale his performance from last season into a 55 game workload, we’re gonna be way better even before you factor in the kids. If he’s Darling 2.0, we got slightly worse and will need big contributions from Dahlin and Mittelstadt (or Ullmark) to take a step forward.

 

[Icicle]

This is just a rehash of the Tierney chart we were arguing about last week.

Goaltending factors heavily into WAR and wins-added analysis because they play so much (Hutton played more minutes than everyone except Risto/Scandella in 33 games) and have more control on goal differential than any skater by far.

An example of this in practice, is how goaltending sabotaged Carolina’s dreamy possession numbers.

Per corsica’s “player ratings” we replaced the 46th best goaltender in the league last season with the 22nd, which is going to put us in the green unless we shot all our skating talent into the sun. The red flag is that Hutton’s numbers this past season (which this analysis is heavily biased toward) were driven by LD and MD performance, in backup sample size.

His numbers look a little more sustainable than Lehner’s LD driven work from 16-17, but each player’s success against HD chances has been scarily similar over the past three years.

TL;DR

If Hutton can scale his performance from last season into a 55 game workload, we’re gonna be way better even before you factor in the kids. If he’s Darling 2.0, we got slightly worse and will need big contributions from Dahlin and Mittelstadt (or Ullmark) to take a step forward.

Read any St Louis fan's analysis of last year and they'll note how the system they used last season had tons of breakdowns if there was ever a rebound, which will mostly end up recording as HD shots.

 

[Gabrielor]

I’d personally grade it as either a C- or a D, but the summer isn’t quite over yet.

 

[SnuggaRUDE]

The Sheary trade might be a heck of a deal. It's not as big, but people shouldn't discount it.

 

[Rasmus CacOlainen]

Shame Im effing broke and cant afford to sub to the athletic, seems like a good buy...but for eastern european wages its a tough buy.

 

[Jim Bob]

I’d personally grade it as either a C- or a D, but the summer isn’t quite over yet.

If history repeats itself, the offseason is pretty much done outside of re-signing Reinhart.

Last year, there were no NHL trades between now and Labor Day.

And there were only a handful of minor trades between mid-September and opening night.

 

[Rasmus CacOlainen]

Also...We got better. It will show and all the naysayers will eat crow. Not saying we necessarily make playoffs but we can be real close IMO.

ROR's leave is addition by subtraction. Dahlin's and Mittelstadt's additions are additions by additions. And we got much better middle 6 roster players than we had last year. Cant wait until everyone will have to admit Botts was right after the shitstorm towards him in the last few weeks.

 

[Chainshot]

I feel the need to buy a vowel.

 

[joshjull]

Interesting take. I don't think I would grade the offseason that highly. Botterill is banking on a lot of growth from within + a bit of shakeup of the existing roster, which I think is the right approach, but it remains to be seen if it pays dividends as early as next season. I would probably give it a C+ or B at most.

Also, bracing for the same old talking points in 3, 2, 1...

I’m not really big on grading off-seasons or with trying to project out the impact of players on new teams. But it’s an interesting take from a well known analytics guy.

 

[joshjull]

+2.6 wins equals out to a B+ grade? Unless those two are unrelated, I don't really get the grading system.

Having read the article, I don’t think that +2.6 wins number correlates much with the letter grade.



Philadelphia Flyers: A
In: James van Riemsdyk
Out: Valtteri Filppula, Brandon Manning
Net Value Added: +2.1 wins

Toronto Maple Leafs: A
In: John Tavares
Out: James van Riemsdyk, Tyler Bozak, Leo Komarov, Tomas Plekanec, Roman Polak, Matt Martin, Dominic Moore
Net Value Added: -0.5 wins

Florida Panthers: A-
In: Mike Hoffman
Out: Radim Vrbata
Net Value Added: +1.5 wins

 

[struckbyaparkedcar]

It looks like he’s docking us for process but deferring to the numbers overall.

 

[brian_griffin]

I’d personally grade it as either a C- or a D, but the summer isn’t quite over yet.

Right. Is there an essay portion? 5 points off for any multiple uses of the words "situation" or "scenario". Which means they still have a shot at an "F".

 

[Digable5]

There's so much to look at when determining the offseason grade. I mean, are you looking at each individual transaction or just how much better the team is? You could technically make a horrible trade and have a better NHL team next year. For example, trading all 3 firsts in 2019, Pu, Asplund, and Samuelsson to Carolina for Jeff Skinner. Someone would consider literally killing Botterill for making that deal, but the Sabres team would be better next season because of it.

Which also begs to ask, are you only factoring the offseason's impact on next season or on the organization's future? If the team performs better this year than they did last year, AND they got assets for ROR, wouldn't that be a great offseason? Sounds like it, but how much better could the team have been by keeping ROR and adding Mittlestadt and Dahlin? A 10 point improvement without ROR could possibly have been a 15-20 point improvement with him.

If you just look at the "Net Added Value" of 2.6 wins, that can't nearly be enough to be considered a B+ offseason. Even if you add in the picks and prospects acquired that doesn't offset such a small improvement, IMO. To me, in order to get that grade he'd have to be looking at individual decisions like drafting Dahlin, letting Lehner walk and trading ROR. All great moves; if you are a fan of the ROR deal. Besides, as others have said, do we deserve credit for Dahlin and Lehner?