The Buffalo Sabres are wasting the talents of a franchise player.
That is the story according to ESPN’s Greg Wyshynski, in a new piece that asked writers to pick which top-20 scorer they would build a team around.
Although three of the five writers who contributed to the piece selected Auston Matthews as their franchise player, with one vote for Anze Kopitar thrown in there, Wysh made this argument in favor of Eichel:
In his past 70 games, Eichel is nearly a point per game player (0.97) on an abjectly terrible team. He’s got the talent to be one of those centers — like Matthews and McDavid — who can be a lethal goal scorer and an inventive playmaker.