Sabres Avoid Offer Sheet Dilemma; Add Villalta For Goalie Depth
Buffalo adds veteran minor-league netminder after trading Levi to Edmonton
Video Transcript
Mike, you predicted that this extension was coming.
What do you think of the value both for the player and the team?
Well, I mean, after the playoff that Benson had, it, it was necessary to get him signed to as long a, an extension as possible, and Kekalainen said that at, at the end of the season, that that was their intention.
And he even said it yesterday, he sort of, you know, pr- previewed himself by saying that they were close.
it's a good value.
I mean, it's slightly more than what Josh Doan was paid on a seven-year deal earl- earlier in the season.
I think there's a lot of growth potential in terms of Benson stepping up his offense.
He only scored 13 goals this year.
I think he's a 20 to 25 goal scorer who could probably be in the 60 to 65 point range, and his annoying qualities, especially in the playoffs, are something that are definitely beneficial and make, made him a f- a fan favorite, in Buffalo.
I, I'll, I'll just say though, the, the, the one thing, of course, you have to, you know, sort of go to the negative here as well as the positive.
With the departure of Bowen Byram via trade and now the departure of Alex Tuch, th- that's 44 goals from last season that the Sabres are in the hole with.
Now, Benson will grow, and they have some young players like Helenius and stlund and Cooley who will step up.
But, if they stay with what they have right now, there's a big hole, and they could fall into that group of teams that, not challenge for the Atlantic division title, but will be challenging for a wildcard spot.
So the, you know, Kekalainen i- is, is open to trading some draft capital to add some players, and that might be something that he looks at o- on draft weekend and going into July 1st
