A lot of things have gone wrong for the Buffalo Sabres over the last decade and a lot of them have plainly been the organization’s fault.

However, the way things have gone with Jack Eichel, their No. 1 centre, now former captain and potential savior as recently as March, is like if you were doing a scathing parody of how an incompetent, woebegone organization handled a seriously injured player handled the whole situation.

First, there’s the flat refusal to let the player pursue the treatment option he wants, to the point that he became so angry with the team that he demanded a trade. Now, there has been plenty of talk about, “Why won’t the Sabres just let him get the surgery he wants, especially if they’re going to trade him anyway?” 

The answer, as has been exhaustively drawn out this summer, is that this is a surgery that has never been done on an NHL and could therefore end his career. Theoretically.