Among the best crop of forward prospects in the league. Reasonably good chance for a top-5 defense in coming seasons. But goaltending is an enormous question mark.
The 1-way in the 2nd season of UPL's contract implies the Sabres believe he can be at least a serviceable NHL backup in 23/24 and that Anderson will have finally retired. At $925K it's not a huge risk, but UPL certainly hasn't demonstrated NHL worthiness yet.
Ideally he has a healthy, productive season this year in Rochester, and him and Comrie form a quality tandem starting in 23/24. If both flop this season, certainly not an impossibility, goaltending will be the weakness that could well jeopardize playoff contention in the next.
Then it's back to the trade market where Adams failed this summer, and keeping fingers crossed that one or both of Levi and Portillo sign, prove NHL capability, and do so quicker than should be expected.
After thinking through the implications of UPL's contract, I'm suddenly a lot less confident in the team's chances.
Agreed. But, if UPL isn't fully Sabres-ready next year, he won't break the bank on the 1-way in Rochester. Alternatively, if either UPL or Comrie stink it up badly this season, either could be traded easily this offseason to a cap-strapped team with a better caliber #2 goalie on a worse contract.
Yes, the Sabres goaltending plan is the biggest question mark / biggest risk, but they've taken steps to mitigate.
45 goalies had NHL SV% >/= 0.910 last season.
32 of those 45 played 19 or more games (Comrie played 19, intentionally used as a cutoff).
34 of those 45 played 9 or more games (UPL played 9, intentionally used as a cutoff).
UPL was the youngest of all of them, Swayman and Oettinger a year older.
Separate from the age sort, only a dozen of those 45 who played 9 or more games had a SV% equal to or higher than 0.917.
There are only about a dozen really good NHL goalies, IMO, so not every playoff team will have one, and not all those good goalies are on playoff teams.
Sabres gave up 290 goals last season: 270 with goaltender in net, 17 ENG, 3 shootout loss goals not assigned to a goalie.
The Sabres collective SV% last season was 0.899, let's round to 0.90. They gave up ~32.75 shots/game.
If they cut their shots against to 30 per game and get a 0.91 save % from their collective goalies, that's 221 goals against next season.
Add in (3) shootout loss goals, and the same ENG, and that's ~245 goals against, which puts them at the league midpoint.
Cut the ENG (I assume with an improved roster, Sabres will be in more games closer to the end) in half, and with the same shots against and SV% assumptions above, that puts the Sabres in the top quarter of the league in total goals.
Although I haven't done an analysis, the league-wide change the past couple seasons in the empty net strategy (teams pulling goalies earlier, and with greater deficits) has widened the range to the "lower" (worse GA) end of the league distribution.
Better (0.910 for the platoon) goaltending will help not just in tended goals against, but reduce the # of ENGA.
If BUF can get 82 games from Comrie, Anderson, UPL, and not need to dig deeper, and if one of those goalies puts up a ~0.915 for ~50 games, they'll be fine.