Buffalo Sabres Player Projections: How Do The Top-4 Blueliners Rate?

Are the Buffalo Sabres top-4 blueliners good enough to get this team into the playoffs?

Here at Sabre Noise, we have been working hard to project how the Buffalo Sabres forwards will perform in 2016-17.  So far, we have covered what we feel will be the most common third and second-line forward combinations, but before we get to the first line, we wanted to turn our gaze to the Sabres’ blueline.

There is not any doubt that the Buffalo Sabres will have a far more potent offense on their hands next season, thanks to the addition of Kyle Okposo, the (hopeful) return of Tyler Ennis and the development of Jack Eichel and Sam Reinhart.  But if fans are optimistic about Buffalo’s forwards, they are probably equally skeptical of the Sabres’ blueline, which remains pretty much unchanged.  Yes, the Sabres traded Mark Pysyk to the Florida Panthers in exchange for Dmitry Kulikov, but on paper this trade was a complete wash at best, and possibly a step backwards for the Sabres.   Time will tell, but this much we know: trading Pysyk did not bring the puck-handling LHD that many fans were hoping for into the 716.

The Players: Buffalo’s top-4 defensemen

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2015-16 stats: 21-75-96, a combined -18 on the season

Obviously, when it comes to figuring out how well the Buffalo Sabres top-4 defensemen stack up against their competition, looking at their offensive stats is just a piece of the puzzle.  You also have to take into account that Kulikov’s numbers (1-16-17, +8) came as a member of the Panthers, when he was mostly used as the third defensive pairing along with Erik Gudbranson – asked to score a lot, Kulikov was not.

That being said, the NHL currently favors teams who own puck-moving blueliners who can carry the puck up ice and contribute on the offensive end.  The Stanley Cup Champion Pittsburgh Penguins got 124 points out of Kris Letang, Olli Maatta, Trevor Daley, and Brian Dumoulin last season, with those four players contributing another 36 in the postseason.  If you think Buffalo’s top-4 can come close to producing those types of numbers, you are the most optimistic optimist on the face of planet Earth, my friend.

Of course, if you really want to get depressed, just consider this: what Pittsburgh’s top-4 produced paled in comparison to the top-4 of the San Jose Sharks, who saw Brent Burns, Marc-Edouard Vlasic, Justin Braun and Paul Martin combine for an amazing 157 points during the regular season, with another 48 in the playoffs.  Not one of San Jose’s top-4 blueliners scored less than 20 points during the 2015-16 regular season; meanwhile, Buffalo only had two blueliners, Risto and Bogosian, top 20.

But again, there is more to playing defense than just scoring, even in today’s NHL.  For sake of comparison, then, I have created HERO charts over at Own The Puck that compare each of Buffalo’s top-4 defensemen to the top-4 defensemen of the Sharks, just to see how the Sabres compare to arguably the best defensive corps on the NHL.  Of course, if you wish you can head to Own The Puck and compare the Sabres’ blueliners to those of any of the remaining 28 teams in the NHL.  I simply chose the Sharks to illustrate how far off the Sabres are to being considered an elite defensive team, but if your definition of elite does not include the Sharks, feel free to do your own research!

The HERO Charts

The Sharks have two possession monsters in Burns and especially Vlasic, and those two are also leagues better than any of Buffalo’s blueliners when it comes to generating offense.  As the HERO charts really illustrate, the Sabres simply do not have even one complete defenseman in its top 4; instead, the team has Ristolainen, who generates offense very well for a player his age but is still a mess in the possession game, and McCabe, who is strong in shot suppression and helping the Sabres retain possession of the puck, but still needs to find his offense.

Obviously, the Sabres still own a young blueline – the average age of its top 4 is 23.5 years of age, compared to the more experienced Sharks, whose average age among its top-4 defensive pairings is 31.  These comparisons, therefore, are not meant to make Sabres fans panic; rather, comparing these top-4 defensive pairings shows you how far the Sabres still have to go in what is a natural progression.  Learning to play defense at an elite level in the NHL takes much longer than it takes to learn how to play offense (although let’s face it, neither are exactly easy!), so while the Sabres offense is set to explode over the next few seasons, it is going to take a little longer for Buffalo’s defensive corps to develop into something that will resemble an elite, playoff-ready squad.

Next: Sabres Player Projections: Jack Eichel

Again, it might no be fair to compare the top-4 defensemen of the Buffalo Sabres to those of the San Jose Sharks – but who said the NHL is fair?  If the Sabres wish to compete for Lord Stanley’s Cup in this day and age, it is going to take more than some hard-hitting blueliners and a potent offense.  The entire reason the Florida Panthers traded both Erik Gudbranson and Dmitry Kulikov was to bring in puck-handling defensemen such as Pysyk and Keith Yandle, because the writing is on the wall: smart, offensive-minded defensemen who rely more on positioning and smarts than sheer brute strength are the key to success in this league any more.  The Buffalo Sabres are not even close to owning a playoff-caliber blueline, but their top-4 defensive pairings are far from a train-wreck and will hopefully make great strides toward becoming playoff-caliber in the 2016-17 season.