{"id":483604,"date":"2026-03-03T22:43:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-03T22:43:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/483604\/"},"modified":"2026-03-03T22:43:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-03T22:43:10","slug":"the-player-not-expected-in-possible-robert-thomas-blues-trade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/483604\/","title":{"rendered":"The player not expected in possible Robert Thomas Blues trade"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nhl\/buffalo-sabres\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Buffalo Sabres<\/a> are attached to St Louis Blues center Robert Thomas in the <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/tag\/nhl-trade-deadline\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">NHL trade deadline<\/a> rumor mill. <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nhl\/nhl-stories\/nhl-rumors-blues-robert-thomas-trade-asking-price-astronomical-sabres-heat-up-push\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">St Louis is expected to ask for a haul from teams for both Thomas<\/a> and Jordan Kyrou. For Buffalo, that could include multiple first-round picks. But The Athletic&#8217;s Jeremy Rutherford reports that the Blues <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/jprutherford\/status\/2028926224995938379\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">won&#8217;t be getting<\/a> Bowen Byram from the Sabres.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Blues had interest in Buffalo D Bowen Byram last summer, but I\u2019m told he\u2019s not expected to be part of a potential Thomas deal,\u201d Rutherford reported.<\/p>\n<p>Byram started his career with the Colorado Avalanche before he was traded to the Sabres. Last offseason, <a href=\"https:\/\/clutchpoints.com\/nhl\/buffalo-sabres\/sabres-rumors-buffalo-trade-bowen-byram\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Byram and Buffalo had a standoff amid his restricted free agency<\/a>. That ended with him signing a two-year deal worth $6.25 million, which ends with him hitting unrestricted free agency.<\/p>\n<p>Since the standoff, the Sabres have changed general managers. So there is no guarantee that Byram and Jarmo Kekalainen would not be able to reach a long-term deal. Byram and previous GM Kevyn Adams were unable to before he was fired. There were a lot of trade rumors around Byram in the summer, but he won&#8217;t be going to the Blues.<\/p>\n<p>If the Sabres want to trade players to the Blues instead of a second draft pick, Byram would have been a great fit. But other options include Peyton Krebs, Zach Benson, or top prospect Konsta Helenius. Landing Thomas will be expensive, as he is a 26-year-old center under team control. But the Sabres are drawing a line.<\/p>\n<p>The final hurdle for this deal will be Thomas&#8217; full no-trade clause. If he does not want to go to Buffalo, he can deny the trade. But Buffalo may sound better than the Blues, who are headed into a full-scale rebuild. Can the Sabres pull off the deal of the deadline?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Buffalo Sabres are attached to St Louis Blues center Robert Thomas in the NHL trade deadline rumor&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":483605,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5120],"tags":[71,229,5,4,107,548,534,84,5285,5284],"class_list":{"0":"post-483604","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-st-louis-blues","8":"tag-blues","9":"tag-buffalo-sabres","10":"tag-hockey","11":"tag-nhl","12":"tag-nhl-rumors","13":"tag-nhl-trade-deadline","14":"tag-st-louis","15":"tag-st-louis-blues","16":"tag-stlouis","17":"tag-stlouisblues"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116167665813149365","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483604","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=483604"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/483604\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/483605"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=483604"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=483604"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=483604"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}