Unless they have big plans to land a bonafide top 6 forward to replace him. Bringing up a prospect won’t cut it.
Alarmed-Project-2679
Ick I don’t like how the buyout breaks down. This sucks
Barmacist
Bad move.
Roguemutantbrain
A few things:
1. Skinner’s defensive play isn’t the only problem. It was bad in 22-23 as well, but he was a strong net positive. It’s his lack of ability to drive and support possession. When his linemates are on and pulling the load for him, Skinner is boppin. If one or both are not 100%, he is a giveaway machine and cannot hold possession.
2. Of course they plan to add to the top 6 this offseason. Adams said it directly. There are too many options that work IMO to think that they won’t. Kane, Buchnevich, Ehlers, whoever comes out of Tampa. Even a guy like Mangiapane would be fine as a second line wing with Benson putting upward pressure.
ZabaDoobiez
Skinner is going to go have a 40 goal season on a contender team, but still end up being -2 by the end of the season. This one definitely stings a bit at first glance but when you break the numbers down, they will be okay without him.
ghl37
Oh of course. Pegula had to sign skinner forever at 9milion a season a few years ago but now he sucks so bad we have to pay him to go away. That is so quintessentially Buffalo Sabres.
We just better freaking be good next year. Tired of this bullshit. I’m a fan since 71 and I’m so disgusted with the never-ending ineptitude I almost can’t stand the sight of our sweater anymore. Great job killing a once-proud franchise, Pegula. 5 more of your players just got their names on the cup as a reward for escaping the disaster you created.
ZeroSto0l
Skinner was a player that was ruined by Krueger for 2 years, he bounced back with Granato though his defensive numbers were awful for all of those seasons. Like u/Rougemutantbrain said when his linemates weren’t at 100 he wasn’t either. I don’t know how many times I’ve seen him turnover the puck on neutral ice, enough to dub it the “skinner special” though.
If the buyout does happen though we either need to sign a solid top line guy, or move Peterka up on line one and sign a 3rd line contributor like an Anthony Mantha or Daniel Sprong.
ScottyOnWheels
So much for between two stalls. It was fun. Poor Cole.
phatsystem
Gotta trust GMKA on this one. I think holding him one more year is the better option on paper and see how it goes. We have the cap space this year to do just about whatever we want w/o the buyout, but the following 2 years will be tough. Limiting the cap hit, perhaps figuring out a trade-deadline trade to a contender with 50% retained (assuming Skinner agreed), or whatever other similar scenario would math out better. I’m also not convinced that Ruff wouldn’t be able to make Skinner a better 2-way player. If his 0% defense went to 25% w/o a major loss in production, could turn out keeping him would have been better.
But we don’t know what conversations GMKA had with Skinner, with Ruff, with his player evaluators, with other GMs, etc. I assume all of that information that we don’t have added up to an answer that made a buyout the better option. I just have no idea how we make year 3 of cap hit work AND add meaningfully to the roster this year AND sign our RFAs.
I think we’re going to have to move on from someone else and rely a bit on some entry level contracts to make the numbers pencil if we do try to add meaningfully this year.
JMR027
If couldn’t trade him, then I’m more than ok with this
bunkbaird
I just bought a Skinner jersey.
OpabiniaGlasses
Hopefully Alex Tuch at least offers to help him move since Jeff took a lot of the heat away from how bad Tuch was last season.
Kevinn_Yeah
That video of Skinner and the guys goofing around at practice really backfired huh
Wallio_
And the rebuild continues……
The-Real-Larry
If they use the cap savings to bring in a legit top-6 forward, good. If this is Terry trying to save a few bucks, bad.
16 Comments
I hope they don’t.
Unless they have big plans to land a bonafide top 6 forward to replace him. Bringing up a prospect won’t cut it.
Ick I don’t like how the buyout breaks down. This sucks
Bad move.
A few things:
1. Skinner’s defensive play isn’t the only problem. It was bad in 22-23 as well, but he was a strong net positive. It’s his lack of ability to drive and support possession. When his linemates are on and pulling the load for him, Skinner is boppin. If one or both are not 100%, he is a giveaway machine and cannot hold possession.
2. Of course they plan to add to the top 6 this offseason. Adams said it directly. There are too many options that work IMO to think that they won’t. Kane, Buchnevich, Ehlers, whoever comes out of Tampa. Even a guy like Mangiapane would be fine as a second line wing with Benson putting upward pressure.
Skinner is going to go have a 40 goal season on a contender team, but still end up being -2 by the end of the season. This one definitely stings a bit at first glance but when you break the numbers down, they will be okay without him.
Oh of course. Pegula had to sign skinner forever at 9milion a season a few years ago but now he sucks so bad we have to pay him to go away. That is so quintessentially Buffalo Sabres.
We just better freaking be good next year. Tired of this bullshit. I’m a fan since 71 and I’m so disgusted with the never-ending ineptitude I almost can’t stand the sight of our sweater anymore. Great job killing a once-proud franchise, Pegula. 5 more of your players just got their names on the cup as a reward for escaping the disaster you created.
Skinner was a player that was ruined by Krueger for 2 years, he bounced back with Granato though his defensive numbers were awful for all of those seasons. Like u/Rougemutantbrain said when his linemates weren’t at 100 he wasn’t either. I don’t know how many times I’ve seen him turnover the puck on neutral ice, enough to dub it the “skinner special” though.
If the buyout does happen though we either need to sign a solid top line guy, or move Peterka up on line one and sign a 3rd line contributor like an Anthony Mantha or Daniel Sprong.
So much for between two stalls. It was fun.
Poor Cole.
Gotta trust GMKA on this one. I think holding him one more year is the better option on paper and see how it goes. We have the cap space this year to do just about whatever we want w/o the buyout, but the following 2 years will be tough. Limiting the cap hit, perhaps figuring out a trade-deadline trade to a contender with 50% retained (assuming Skinner agreed), or whatever other similar scenario would math out better. I’m also not convinced that Ruff wouldn’t be able to make Skinner a better 2-way player. If his 0% defense went to 25% w/o a major loss in production, could turn out keeping him would have been better.
But we don’t know what conversations GMKA had with Skinner, with Ruff, with his player evaluators, with other GMs, etc. I assume all of that information that we don’t have added up to an answer that made a buyout the better option. I just have no idea how we make year 3 of cap hit work AND add meaningfully to the roster this year AND sign our RFAs.
I think we’re going to have to move on from someone else and rely a bit on some entry level contracts to make the numbers pencil if we do try to add meaningfully this year.
If couldn’t trade him, then I’m more than ok with this
I just bought a Skinner jersey.
Hopefully Alex Tuch at least offers to help him move since Jeff took a lot of the heat away from how bad Tuch was last season.
That video of Skinner and the guys goofing around at practice really backfired huh
And the rebuild continues……
If they use the cap savings to bring in a legit top-6 forward, good. If this is Terry trying to save a few bucks, bad.
Skinner to the Leafs confirmed