Wednesday 3/4, 7:30am ET
Looks like the two teams cannot come to an agreement, with the Sabres not wanting to change their current roster too much it looks like.
Tuesday 3/3, 5:30pm ET
With the trade deadline rapidly approaching on Friday, it sounds like the Buffalo Sabres are swinging for the fences. Rumours from hockey insiders indicate that the Sabres are in talks with the St Louis Blues for center Robert Thomas, with the Central Division team asking for top dollar as they look to retool.
In his TSN article, Darren Dreger indicates that things seem to be heating up between the two sides, with plenty of internet speculation on what the Sabres will need to give up to obtain the top line center who is 26 and on a reasonable $8.125 million AAV contract with four more years of term. Thomas does have a no trade clause which he would have to waive in order to come to Buffalo – he has not been asked to waive that as yet.
Buffalo General Manager Jarmo Kekäläinen will be reluctant to move too many pieces of his current roster in a bid to maintain the chemistry that has seen the Sabres become one of the hottest sides in the league since late fall.
Thomas has 12 goals and 35 points in 43 games with the Blues this season, and would immediately strengthen the team in scoring, especially given Josh Norris’ injury struggles ahead of what could be a grueling postseason. His 0.81 points per game would put him fifth on the team. Thomas’ faceoff win percentage of 52.4% would be the highest on the Sabres by far.
As things stand, this trade cannot be completed today purely on picks and prospects as the Sabres have $1.72m in cap space and Thomas’ prorated cap hit is $1.9m, so at least one piece off the current playing roster will have to be moved. Alternatively, a move to LTIR for Jordan greenway could make up the difference too.
Thank you Michael Closser – HockeyStatsCards.
An interesting tidbit courtesy of T McGee and Schmidtxc is that Kekäläinen worked with Doug Armstrong in St Louis, and when the latter was promoted to GM, Jarmo left the Blues to go back to Finland.
Expected Buffalo – what Thomas does for the Sabres.