There were a couple moments during the past NHL season when many Sabres’ fans and pundits thought GM Kevyn Adams’ tenure running the team was finally coming to an end. The disastrous press conference he held this past December was one instance. Buffalo's failure to make the NHL Playoffs for the 14th straight year, an all-time league record, was another.
Yet, inexplicably, owner Terry Pegula chose not to fire Adams when the Sabres cleaned out their lockers in April. Instead, the team hired ex-Sabre Eric Staal to be special assistant to the general manager and then brought in former Columbus Blue Jackets’ GM Jarmo Kekalainen as senior advisor.
This writer felt these moves were just window dressing to mollify an angry fan base that couldn’t understand why Adams still had a job as GM. A few months later, after the dust settled on the NHL Draft, July 1 trade deadline and free agency signings, two things are clear. Either Adams overruled Staal and Kekalainen’s decisions and suggestions on drafts, trades and signings, or the two new advisors are no more competent than Adams.
Either way, the Sabres aren’t much better off than it was before these new advisors came on board
While their Atlantic Division rivals made some major improvements, the Sabres didn’t do anything special to bring in new talent. By contrast, Buffalo let defenseman Jacob Bernard-Docker go, traded forward JJ Peterka to the Utah Mammoth and picked mostly underwhelming prospects during the NHL Draft.
While ninth-overall selection Radim Mrtka could be a good defenseman in a few years, it’ll take some time for the young D-man to become NHL-ready.
Meanwhile, the Sabres continue in a seemingly endless rebuilding mode, sending new prospects to Rochester in the hope they’ll eventually compete in a Buffalo Sabres’ uniform. At the same time, the franchise keeps developing talent, like Sam Reinhart, Dylan Cozens, Casey Mittelstadt, and JJ Peterka, and then trades them away or lets them go when the team’s incompetent leadership pushes these players to seek a trade.
It's clear that Pegula’s unwillingness to make a change at the top won’t turn the team’s fortunes around and until he does, the Sabres will stay at the bottom of the Atlantic Division and out of the playoffs.
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