Jack Eichel traded to Vegas Golden Knights

At long last, the Jack Eichel saga is over.

According to sources, the Buffalo Sabres agreed in the overnight hours on Thursday to trade their injured former captain to the Vegas Golden Knights in exchange for Alex Tuch and Peyton Krebs, as well as a 2022 first-round pick and 2023 second-round pick. Buffalo will also send Vegas a 2023 third-round pick.

The first-round pick heading to Buffalo is Top 10 protected by Vegas, a necessity given the uncertainty of the injuries in their lineup.

The trade’s completion was first reported by Sabres radio analyst Andrew Peters; details on the return were first reported by TSN’s Darren Dreger.

A trade call with NHL Central Registry was pending on Thursday morning to iron out all of the details.

As part of the trade process, the Golden Knights achieved a level of comfort with Eichel’s surgical method of choice and will allow him to undergo artificial disc replacement surgery in the coming days.

While there is no firm timetable for Eichel’s return, given the unprecedented nature of the operation for a player set to resume NHL-level physical contact, Eichel could resume skating as soon as eight weeks after surgery and could be playing for the Golden Knights within three to four months.

That would seemingly sideline Eichel for Team USA at the 2022 Beijing Winter Games, but an appearance in China has not yet officially been ruled out.

In fact, potential Olympic participation was just one part of the push from Eichel’s camp for an exodus in the days leading up to the deal. There was imminent need for Eichel to undergo surgery given the status of his injury, which lingered on since March, and new agent Pat Brisson of CAA Sports threatened to file a grievance by the end of this week – which appeared to help move the deal along.

Neither the Sabres, nor Eichel or the National Hockey League wanted a protracted, bitter and complicated legal battle to rage on for the next number of months, especially given the uncertainty as to which side would prevail. The Sabres held the upper hand according to the Collective Bargaining Agreement, but Eichel had gathered countless medical opinions supporting his chosen path preparing for a potential case.

Eichel, 25, has four years remaining on his contract with a $10 million salary cap hit. A full no-move clause kicks in for Eichel on July 1, 2022.

Thursday’s trade ended a tumultuous era not just for Eichel, but the entire Sabres organization.

There was great hope in Buffalo when the Sabres selected Eichel at No. 2 overall in 2015 after that season’s tank-a-thon fell a few ping-pong balls short in the Connor McDavid sweepstakes. Eichel showed promise and consistency early in his career, a certain electrifying ability in his game to draw fans out of their seats, helping him earning an eight-year, $80 million deal out of his entry-level contract.

Eichel was the Sabres’ franchise centerpiece.

But a rift began to develop between Eichel and the Sabres after years of mediocrity, missed playoff appearances and a failure from the organization to build anything resembling a contending team around him. Eichel seemed to carry the weight of the Sabres’ organization on his back on the ice. Despite the lack of support and team success, Eichel was still nearly a point-per-game player in Buffalo, finishing with 355 points in 375 games as a Sabre.

Eichel’s tenure took a turn after suffering a neck injury that limited him to just 21 games in 2020-21 — a year that saw him score two goals and 18 points, among the worst point production of his career. His last game in a Sabres uniform came on March 7th. Eichel missed the remainder of the 2020-21 season and after failing to come to an agreement with the Sabres on the medical approach to repair his neck, reported to training camp in September and failed his medical evaluation, further icing the relationship.

On Aug. 27, with the situation lingering on, Eichel fired his long-time agent in Peter Fish and hired Brisson to help spur his exit from Buffalo.

Sabres GM Kevyn Adams announced on Sept. 23 that the team had stripped Eichel of his captaincy, signaling the formal end of the Eichel Experience in Buffalo, the true culmination another six weeks in the works.

What remains unclear is whether the return now for Buffalo is any better than what was on the table in June or July as other teams circled around Eichel in the offseason.

Sources say the Calgary Flames, St. Louis Blues and Carolina Hurricanes were also in the hunt for Eichel. The Flames, off to a hot start, were believed to only offer futures-type assets in the transaction. St. Louis and Carolina never appeared to be as far down the track as Vegas, the Golden Knights franchise in desperate need of a true No. 1 center to help get them over the playoff hunt.

With Tuch gone, the Golden Knights are left with just five players from their inaugural 2017-18 roster: William Karlsson, Jonathan Marchessault, Brayden McNabb, Reilly Smith and Shea Theodore.

Tuch, 25, is a Western New York native who can consistently score 20 goals a season on the wing. He is under contract for four more seasons at $4.75 million, which removes the worry for Buffalo to have to re-sign him – though like Eichel, Tuch is out for a few more months after undergoing offseason shoulder surgery.

In Krebs, 20, the Sabres acquired a center who has been projected to become a lower case version of Ryan O’Reilly – yes, the same franchise cornerstone Buffalo watched win a Conn Smythe Trophy in 2019 as playoff MVP after trading him to St. Louis months earlier. Krebs was the No. 17 overall pick in the 2018 NHL Draft.

The Sabres will now have three first-round picks in 2022, including the pick for Eichel, their own, and the one obtained from Florida in the Sam Reinhart trade last summer.

Both Buffalo and Vegas will also have salary cap considerations in light of Thursday’s trade. With no salary retained from either end, both the Sabres and Golden Knights will have tricky situations to monitor in the coming weeks and months – Vegas in their quest to activate Eichel’s $10 million cap hit once healthy, and Buffalo in their dance within dollars of the salary cap’s $60.2 million floor.