NHL
BUFFALO, N.Y. — The Buffalo Sabres have filed for team-elected arbitration with restricted free agent defenseman Bowen Byram, according to Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman.
Byram did not elect for arbitration by the player deadline of 5 p.m. Saturday, but the team had until 5 p.m. Sunday to elect for arbitration. This means Byram is no longer eligible to receive an offer sheet. Sabres general manager Kevyn Adams had previously said the team planned to match any offer sheet and said that’s why the team is sitting on roughly $12.8 million in salary cap space.
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Electing for arbitration does not prevent the Sabres from signing Byram to an extension or trading him. But once the arbitration hearing is set, that will put a deadline of sorts on those talks. Because the team elected arbitration, Byram and his agent will get to determine the term on the salary the arbitrator decides. Byram can choose either a one- or two-year deal. That’s significant because taking a two-year award would allow him to sign a deal that walks him right to unrestricted free agency.
If another team trades for Byram, that team can still negotiate a long-term contract with him as long as the trade happens before Byram’s arbitration hearing. The Sabres hadn’t made much progress in contract talks with Byram, who hired Darren Ferris as his new agent this offseason.
Byram, 24, set a career high with 38 points this season and played 82 games for the first time in his career. The No. 4 pick in the 2019 NHL Draft won a Stanley Cup in 2022 with the Colorado Avalanche. The Sabres acquired him at the 2024 trade deadline in a deal that sent center Casey Mittelstadt to Colorado. Byram spent a lot of time on the Sabres’ top defensive pair with Rasmus Dahlin last season.
But Byram, a mobile left-handed defenseman, doesn’t have a path to a lot of power-play minutes on Buffalo’s roster. Dahlin (who makes $11 million per year) and Owen Power ($8.3 million per year) are two lefties ahead of him on the Sabres’ depth chart. That role, along with the fact that Byram is looking for a big-money, long-term extension of his own, helped created this stalemate in negotiations.
Adams has said repeatedly that he is willing to trade Byram if the right deal is available, but is not interested in trading Byram for future assets. He wants players who can help the Sabres win this season. That has limited the list of teams willing and able to make such a trade.
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Adams also said he has no problem bringing Byram back. The GM views Byram as an elite defenseman who can help the Sabres. By electing for arbitration, Adams ensures that this potentially messy contract negotiation won’t extend into training camp. According to AFP Analytics’ offseason contract projections, Byram is worth roughly $5.2 million on a one-year contract. That’s a useful starting point for estimating his award.
Both sides in the arbitration case will be able to bring evidence supporting their salary estimation. That evidence can include games played, tenure with a team or in the league, statistics to define performance, leadership qualities and comparable player compensation from other restricted free agents. In team-elected arbitration, the award is binding.
That means the Sabres still have options here. They could trade him before or after the arbitration hearing. They could also sign him before the hearing. And by electing arbitration, they’ve ensured that at the very least, an arbitrator will decide what salary Byram will play for in Buffalo for the next one or two seasons. Once the hearing date is set, we’ll have a better idea of when this situation could reach its conclusion.
(Photo: Maddie Meyer / Getty Images)
Matthew Fairburn is a staff writer for The Athletic covering the Buffalo Sabres. A graduate of the University of Missouri, he previously covered the New England Patriots and Buffalo Bills for The Athletic. Prior to The Athletic, he also covered the Bills for Syracuse.com. Follow Matthew on Twitter @MatthewFairburn
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