BUFFALO, NY – The Sabers entered the 2022-32 NHL season with the lowest salary cap commitment in the league. General manager Kevyn Adams knows that won’t be the case too often going forward, and signaled as much with a seven-year, $30 million extension for defenseman Mattias Samuelsson.
Samuelsson has only played 54 NHL games, but Adams is trying to be diligent about identifying core pieces of the team while being proactive about getting those players locked up to long-term contracts. Samuelsson, a 2018 second-round draft pick who is 22 years old, made it clear he was interested in being in Buffalo for the long haul.
That mattered to Adams, especially when he looked at the makeup of his defensive core. He knows no. 1 picks Rasmus Dahlin and Owen Power are going to command big-money extensions before long. The same could be said for other young players on the roster like Dylan Cozens, Jack Quinn and JJ Peterka.
So when looking at the big picture, Adams thought it made sense to sign a player who brings something different to the defensive core. Adams doesn’t necessarily consider it a gamble. Eventually, the team has to make decisions on players, and Adams had seen enough from Samuelsson to know what the Sabers have.
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