Shutdown Pair

Tag: Alex Tuch

  • Your First Offseason

    Your First Offseason

    The Stanley Cup Finals are going on right now. It’s Vegas and Carolina, so I have a less-than-zero interest level. I thought instead, I would take you through your first offseason, what to look for, what the fun events will be.

    First off, Lindy lost the Jack Adams trophy to Jon Cooper? Whatever. Everyone in the league knows who should’ve won, so it doesn’t bother me much.

    Anyway, the Sabres site has an article with key dates. The first thing is actually happening right now, right here in Buffalo: The 2026 NHL Draft Combine. It’s not quite the spectacle of the NFL one, but once in a while you’ll hear something unhinged from one of the prospects during the media availability (tomorrow and Saturday mostly).

    The Draft is also being held here, on June 26-27. It’ll be a quiet couple of days for Buffalo barring a blockbuster deal, as the Sabres have a 1st, 4th, 5th, and 6th rounder. The 2 and the 3 were traded for Norris and Carrick.

    To me, the most interesting date is June 29: the deadline to send a “qualifying offer” to any restricted free agents. RFAs are players who don’t yet qualify to be unrestricted free agents (you are unrestricted if you are over the age of 27 or have played at least 7 years). Some notable RFAs for Buffalo are Zach Benson, Peyton Krebs, and Michael Kesselring.

    Here’s how it goes – any player that the Sabres want to still have the rights to gets a qualifying offer. Puckpedia has the full details but basically it’s a 1 year deal at either the same salary, or a slightly higher one. As long as the team does that, the player stays a restricted free agent and property of the Buffalo Sabres. They can choose to sign the QO and go another year, negotiate a different contract for a longer term (most common option), or they can field offers from other teams. BUT, the Sabres have the option to match any of those offers and keep the player, or receive draft pick compensation if they choose to let the player go.

    That’s where Jarmo Kekäläinen earns his pay this offseason. An RFA contract is tricky – you are weighing the term of the contract versus the money. If there’s a player you absolutely love, you try to sign them as long as possible, sometimes overpaying them, to get extra years on the contract locked in. The player may want to sign a shorter deal on the chance that they’ll REALLY get paid as a UFA. Zach Benson is an intriguing case – he started playing regularly right at 18, so he could be an RFA as young as 25.

    With Tuch as one of the most prominent UFA names out there, I don’t see how they keep him without some moves. Buffalo has a ton of players that want roster spots (Finnish hero Helenius, Noah Östlund, Jiri Kulich) and Tuch might just be in the way. There’s only so much cap space to go around and Buffalo already has $20mil going to 3 centers.

    That brings us to July 1, the first day of free agency! Normally a day to be excited if you’ve got that up and coming team like Buffalo…but with less than 12 mil in cap space and a bunch of needed signings, Jarmo would really need to get on the hotline with some spicy trades to make a splash. He didn’t shy away from making moves in Cbus so it’s worth keeping an eye on your phone on 7/1.

    I hope that gave you the scoop on what to look for in the 2026 offseason for Buffalo. Let me know what you think happens with Benson in the comments (or on Bluesky!)

  • Crushed but Hopeful

    Crushed but Hopeful

    Didn’t go the way I wanted.

    Loved the effort, I'm sad the Sabres didn't put it over the line. But I think it won't take much to re-tool and be ready to play this way a full season next year and get back to it.

    — TheTickMS (@thetickms.bsky.social) 2026-05-19T02:59:50.893Z

    Dahlin went hero mode, scoring the tying goal which eventually led to overtime, but Montreal ended up the victors.

    I’ll have more later, I might be so far back into the Sabres that I start looking at prospects and draft picks and free agents. But for now, time to be sad (and sweaty, it’s fucking hot in here).

    Thanks, guys. (not you Tuch)

  • A Tale of Two Teams

    A Tale of Two Teams

    Watching the game last night (and to an extent every game in this series) it felt like I was seeing two different Buffalo team. The one that started periods was dominant. They skated circles around the Canadiens, scoring goals and hemming them into their own end for multiple shifts. Then the Bad Sabres emerged, making dumb passes, skipping decent shot chances for a fancy pass, and otherwise making stupid decisions.

    I’m not sure what’s wrong with the first line. Alex Tuch has caught whatever Tage and Quinn have and all three were useless most of the night. Quinn in particular seems to be squeezing the stick, getting the puck multiple times in the slot and just, not shooting. Thompson took a stupid penalty away from the play which led to a Montreal power play goal 10 seconds later.

    Bright spots continue to be the Benson/Doan/Norris line, with Doan scoring on a deflection in front. Zucker had the first goal, and young Konsta Helenius continued is excellent play from last game with the Sabres third and final goal.

    Buffalo travels to Montreal tomorrow. I believe that with a few tweaks, they can push it to game seven. I’m planning to go to the watch part at KBC, I hope to see you all there!

  • That One’s On Me

    That One’s On Me

    Sorry all, that last goal is on me:

    The only thing I want: NO RYAN MILLER SHUTOUT. Gimme a real one!

    — TheTickMS (@thetickms.bsky.social) 2026-04-26T20:22:09.349Z

    There’s a tendency with Buffalo sports to wait for the other shoe to drop. No matter how the last game went, how the last series went, there’s always a little spot in the back of your mind wondering how it all goes wrong. You wait for the first goal, or that easy Josh Allen TD, to relax. The Sabres delivered tonight in spectacular fashion, scoring *four* goals in the first en route to a 6-1 obliteration of the Boston Bruins. Less than five minutes in, Fraser Minten gives the puck away on the half-wall, and Alex Tuch serves up a sweet pass to Peyton Krebs for the first goal. That set the tone for the first period, where Boston seemed completely unprepared for the pace of play as the Sabres skated around and through Boston. Josh Doan added the second goal on a sweet redirect of a McLeod pass. Two minutes later, Doan steals the puck in the Bruins zone and delivers it to Zach Benson who drives the neat and sneaks it in from beneath Swayman’s pads. The last goal of the first comes on a D to D pass from Owen Power to Bowen Byram, where Swayman’s pads get caught on one of his own players in front of the net, which stopped him from getting across for the play.

    Whew, that was a lot! The second period saw Boston wake up and realize the game was at 2pm, but they were unable to get anything past Alex Lyon. This is the time that little spot in the back of your mind makes itself known again. We’ve already had a wild comeback in this series, you know?

    But there was no comeback to be had tonight, as Beck Malenstyn tips a Jordan Greenway shot into the net to get to 5-0. This is followed about 90 seconds later by a Thompson feed to Alex Tuch at the front of the net, and it was 6-0. Swayman would be taken out shortly after this, most likely to get him some rest after the abuse his defense allowed him to take. Seriously, none of this was his fault, and you can see him letting his team know here:

    Sean Kuraly would break the shutout up with less than a minute to go to get to our final, 6-1. The last notable even was a wicked cross-check/sucker punch combo away from the play by Nikita Zadorov on Rasmus Dahlin:

    Lindy Ruff stated after the game that he understands where the emotion comes from (as a man who once flying tackled a goalie who hit him in the face, he should) but to me, this shows me that the Bruins aren’t nearly as tough as they claimed to be. Marco Sturm called his team bigger, stronger, and more physical, and maybe they are, but their mental toughness is in question. The Bruins had no answer for what the Sabres did on the ice tonight, and ended up resorting to cheap shots and message-sending late. It didn’t come off as tough, it read as pathetic. You can contrast it directly with the Game 2 loss from the Sabres. Down 4-0, goalie chased, they clawed their way back with two late goals to make it respectable. At the exact same point in this game, Nikita Zadorov broke his stick over Dahlin.

    Game 5 is Tuesday at 7:30 back here in Buffalo. If the Bruins want to show how tough they are, they’ll have to take 2 on the road.