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Buffalo Sabres Good Fit For Cody Franson

By Joseph DiBiase

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Cody Franson became a free agent almost two months ago. He has yet to sign as he is looking for a multi year deal and so far that seems hard to find. Franson is coming off three straight seasons of 1 year contracts, so it’s not hard to see why stability would be one of his top priorities.

The Buffalo Sabres can provide Franson with stability, money, playing time, and a good team.

The Buffalo Sabres could still use a veteran defenseman, especially one that is great on the power play.

Franson is that; he ranks 6th in power play scoring per 60 minutes in the last five years. He would instantly be the best point man on the team. Franson would not need to be a top pair defenseman on this team. He can focus on providing his offensive game and not have to play against the other teams top line.

Franson is still in the prime of his career. He’s not some old past-his-time name that doesn’t have it anymore.

While Franson did play poorly in Nashville last year, and was reduced to a very limited role, he had three straight really good years in Toronto. Last year in just 55 games with Toronto he tallied 32 points. For a defenseman that’s near the top of the league. The years before he had 33 points in 79 games and 29 points in a 45-game shortened season.

While he only had 4 points in 23 games with Nashville, it was largely due to the Predators not using him on the power play and in offensive situations; they had Shea Weber and Roman Josi for those situations.

The Sabres don’t have that caliber of point men, so they can use Franson more usefully.

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Dan Bylsma has a history of working with many offensive defenseman. In Pittsburgh he coached Kris Letang, Sergei Gonchar, and Matt Niskanen to over 40 point seasons. Perhaps Bogosian or Ristolainen could reach that threshold, but I’d give Franson a better shot at it.

Bylsma has also said that he is not afraid to use two right handed defenseman on the same pairing. Considering Franson would make their fourth righty in a projected top six, one righty would have to play on the left side. Mark Pysyk has done it before, so I’d be comfortable with him doing it. Tim Murray was unable to add another top four defenseman that is a left handed shot, so they’ll have no choice but to have an extra righty.

The Sabres reportedly offered Franson a 2 year deal, the perfect term for both parties. Franson doesn’t want another 1 year contract, and Tim Murray is designing his team so that most veteran contracts expire when they need to re-sign their young players to large contracts.

Franson is currently 28 years old and would be 30 at the end of the contract. That would give him two whole years to establish himself as a key veteran the Sabres could keep around moving forward. Or if Franson doesn’t want to stay in Buffalo, he would still be young enough to have opportunities elsewhere.

Money would also work for both sides. I would bet the Sabres have offered Franson more than any other team has. Possibly millions more other teams. The other teams rumored to be interested in Franson’s services include Pittsburgh, Boston, and Columbus. None of those teams have the cap room that Buffalo has.

According to General Fanager, the Sabres still have over $12 million in cap room. They have more than enough room to overpay for Franson. That is, for the next two years. Tim Murray needs to have as much cap room as needed to resign Girgensons, Ristolainen, Reinhart, etc. in two years.

Mike Harrington from the Buffalo News tweeted this bit of information showing that Tim Murray is still pursuing Franson. One would think that this wouldn’t come out unless Franson had some mutual interest, and that was made clearer later by Greg Wyshynski. Wyshynski posted a story saying that the Sabres and Franson were “nearing” the 2 year deal that was offered.

To me, it looks like this will get done. Franson, I’m sure, wants to sign soon before teams exit the offseason and prepare with the rosters they have. I would bet this gets done in the next week.

Next: Buffalo Sabres Captaincy: Brian Gionta

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