Since the Buffalo Sabres so thoroughly rolled the Toronto Maple Leafs a few hours after Tuesday’s trade deadline, there was plenty of time to wonder about a couple of things.
First, does it even matter who wears the uniforms these days?
Here were the Sabres, already missing a half-dozen regulars and with the reinforcements, in the person of newly acquired Dainius Zubrus, still en route from Washington.
Then Daniel Briere came down with the flu, leaving them without either of their co-captains, since Chris Drury still hasn’t taken the ice since that slightly controversial check by Ottawa’s Chris Neil last Thursday.
And yet, on the road against a Maple Leafs team battling for a playoff spot, the shorthanded Sabres — or at least a collection of recent call-ups wearing the team’s duds — shelled their hosts. The legendary Clarke MacArthur, playing his seventh game in the National Hockey League, scored his second goal and set up two others. Drew Stafford, a grizzled veteran of 23 previous games, scored what would prove to be the decisive goal. Patrick Kaleta registered his second assist in three career games.
The lack of drama also left time to ponder the Martin Biron Conundrum: Would you rather be a well-paid backup on a team with a legitimate chance to win a Stanley Cup, or the starting goalie for the worst team in hockey?
Biron has wanted a chance to start regularly ever since Ryan Miller arrived, but good backup and better teammate for the better part of two seasons. He deserved his shot. The Sabres needed to give it to him in order to make salary-cap space for Zubrus and did so by sending him to Philadelphia for a second-round draft pick.
It sounds like the Flyers will give him every chance to be the goalie they rebuild around.
“It was a big price to pay for an unrestricted guy and we obviously didn’t give up a second-round draft pick with the idea of not trying to sign him,” Flyers general manager Paul Holmgren said. “Hopefully, he will like the direction we’re going and we’ll try to get something done.”
Biron had been in Buffalo for so long – he made his first three appearances in 1995-96, when the Sabres were still wearing their original uniforms and playing home games at the Aud – that it’s difficult to conceive that he’s only 28.
He returned to the minors for several years before playing six games in 1998-99 and replacing an injured Dominik Hasek for half the 1999-2000 season. He only spent three years as the No. 1 goalie, a rather grim period during which the franchise plummeted into bankruptcy under the Rigas family and emerged after Tom Golisano bought the team.
Biron played in nine different seasons, a figure matched only by Hasek and Bob Sauve among Buffalo goalies. Only Hasek and Don Edwards appeared in more games and record more wins.
He also gave the team a voice during the dark days before the lockout and the resurgence after — a high-pitched, meandering voice prone to stream-of-consciousness ramblings at times, perhaps, but one that endeared him to teammates and fans.
It will be strange seeing him wearing orange and black. And you can’t help but wonder what he’ll be thinking as he watches his old team continue playing well after his new one is done for the year.