Blues Could Make Huge Splash In Possible Trade With Sabres

Both the St. Louis Blues and the Buffalo Sabres may be very busy ahead of this year's trade deadline as there have been numerous players rumored to possibly be moved on both sides. A pair of players that have more surprisingly been linked to the Blues from the Sabres are Owen Power and Bowen Byram.

The Blues just signed Philip Broberg this season after sending him an offer sheet, but overall, have a very old group of defensemen. As part of a retooling that seems to be going on, acquiring more younger defensemen with some NHL experience seems like the best course of action. Power or Byram would fit right into that need.

On the other side, the Sabres are a very young team and are lacking veterans. Given there is some room to work around the no-trade clauses, the Sabres could bring back a veteran d-man as part of the trade. While it's likelier that Byram gets moved by Buffalo than Power, Power's name has come up in rumors to this point.

The difference here is that Power is signed at $8.35 million AAV for a long time and Byram is a RFA after the season. Both are very high picks in the draft and are talented young defensemen that will be in the league a long time.

It is past time that the Sabres took some big risks and made some progress towards bringing in talent that can help them get to the playoffs. The longer this goes on, the once promising young team is going to go through another cycle of letting talent split through their fingers. The Blues aren't exactly in a great spot, but acquiring one of these two defensemen could be the start of something long lasting.