Quoting: oneX
Think of it this way: Eichel is a player with a neck injury, not a typical injury. Couple that with no direction decided on how to proceed (rehab or surgery) and so you tell me a team that wants to trade for Eichel and have him likely sit out most of the season if not the entire season.
It's alot to give up the assets for this player but then not to have him play? Yeah.. I'm not sure teams want to deal with that.
The sabres want Eichel to get a fusion, 6 month recovery. Eichel wants an artificial disk replacement, 6 weeks to get back to skating. It’s been done on a ton of athletes, even UFC fighters who experience waaay more wear and tear on their bodies. It’s a safe surgery, and there’s 0 reason for Buffalo to be holding him back. It’s literally at a point where they’re doing it out of spite. You should go and listen to Elliotte Friedman’s podcast where he had the surgeon on that would be doing Eichels disk replacement. It’s really informative. It’s literally such a low risk surgery, he gets it, 6 weeks till he’s skating. Then he can get back, if it isn’t fully successful, then he could get the fusion if needed. It’s just a joke the way that Buffalo is handling this.
The team doctors do not have players best interests in mind, there have been many occasions in which they’ve messed up procedures on athletes as well. If I was in charge of a team, I’d have 0 issue bringing Eichel in, allowing him to receive the disk replacement and then go from there. Eichel won’t miss half the season, it would be 1/3 if he needed the fusion.
But I do get what you’re saying. There is so much uncertainty when it comes to Eichel. I guess the good thing about the sabres asking for futures is that you wouldn’t be losing a roster player, and having to wait for Eichel to get back. I totally see why a team would be wary in paying buffalos price.