This is a FanPost written by BuffaloBuckeye
With the draft over and the Sabres’ pipeline almost overflowing, I thought it could be useful to take stock of the players the Sabres have in their system, which by my count is a whopping 40!
I’ve created a tier list to help break them all down, splitting the Sabres prospects into one of six different categories, which I’ll summarize below. S: Elite. A top-six forward who’s either projected to score 30+ goals and/or 80+ point projections or is a Selke-type 3rd liner, a top-pairing defenseman, or a goalie who can start 50+ games a season.
A: Contributor: middle-six forward, #3-#5 defenseman, 1B/good backup goalie.
B (High Ceiling): Has a chance to become a contributor, or even possibly elite, but also has at least one major flaw that could keep them out of the NHL entirely.
B (High Floor): Has a chance to become an NHL contributor, but also has flaws that may make them a fourth-liner/depth forward, #6-#8 defenseman, or average backup goalie instead.
C: Likely a career AHL’er.
Long shot: Will likely struggle to stick in the AHL, if they ever make it there. Even though I have the high-ceiling portion of B-tier above the high-floor portion, that doesn’t mean I think every player in the high-ceiling portion is better right now (for example, Alex Kisakov v. Lukas Rousek); it’s just a measure of potential. There’s a good chance several of the high-floor players like Rousek end up playing more NHL games than several of the high-ceiling players like Kisakov. I also think it’s important for teams to have a healthy mix of high-floor and high-ceiling prospects; a mix the Sabres sure seem to have. If you want to make your own list, you can use the tiermaker template I’ve made at this link. Sorry that some of the names on the player portraits got cropped out; apparently Tiermaker doesn’t like the dimensions of the pictures the Sabres used for a lot of their draft picks.
The List
S: G Devon Levi, LW/C Jiri Kulich, RW/C Matt Savoie, LW Zach Benson
A: C Noah Ostlund, RW Isak Rosen, LHD Ryan Johnson
B (High Ceiling): LW Viktor Neuchev, LHD Nikita Novikov, RW Jake Richard, RHD Vsevolod Komarov, RHD Gavin McCarthy, LW Alex Kisakov, G Topias Leinonen, LW/RW Viljami Marjala
B (High Floor): RW Lukas Rousek, LW/RW Prokhor Poltapov, RHD Maxim Strbak, LW Brett Murray, C/LW Anton Wahlberg, LW Brendan Biro, C Tyson Kozak, RHD Zach Metsa, G Scott Ratzlaff, LHD Mats Lindgren
C:LW/RW Linus Weissbach, RW/LW Filip Cederqvist, C/RW Aaron Huglen, RW Olivier Nadeau, LW Ethan Miedema
Long Shots: LW William van Barkenow-Lofberg, LW Joel Ratkovic-Berndtsson, LHD Sean Keohane, LHD Norwin Panocha, RHD Albert Lyckasen, C Gustav Karlsson, LW/RW Stiven Sardarian, C Matteo Constantini, C Jakub Konecny, C Linus Sjodin
What does your Sabres prospect tier list look like? Drop it down in the comments.