With the movement of the Atlanta Thrashers to Winnipeg, talk of realignment is going to be a pretty popular topic over the next year. Last week, Bettman reportedly proposed a major change that would create four divisions, rather than the current six. The proposed divisions would include the East, South, Midwest and Pacific. While realignment is certainly necessary, a four division structure would present some major problems. First off, there are currently only 30 teams in the NHL, which would mean two divisions would be comprised of 8 teams, while the other two would have only 7 teams. This leads to a sticky situation with both scheduling and playoff seeding. The standard 6 divisional games, 4 conference games scheduling structure is going to have to be thrown out the window and with uneven division sizes, it's going to be tough to replicate. Another problem is the suggested playoff format, rewarding the top four teams in each division. Under the proposed system, teams would be given a distinct advantage for playing in smaller divisions as they have one fewer team to compete with for a playoff spot. I've also heard suggestions of putting the two larger divisions in the Eastern Conference, which also would result in an unfair balance for teams fighting to reach the post season. Finally, restructuring the divisions is going to weaken divisional rivalries by reducing the number of games teams play against each other each year. 

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The season is nearly upon us and most fantasy leagues are getting underway (that is, if yahoo can ever feels like cooperating), so lets take a look at how the Sabres stack up from a fantasy perspective.

*Disclaimer: In no way do I claim to be a "fantasy expert" so I take no responsibility for your likely 11th place finish.

Note: Rankings refer to their positional ranking and may vary from league to league based upon the scoring settings. As some of these lists seem rather questionable, don't put too much faith in them.

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Krytime had an interesting question asking how the Sabres defensemen compared with the rest of the league in terms of offensive output. I was pretty curious too and couldn't find anything online so I wrote a quick script and here are the results:

Points by Defensemen
CHI 177
PHO 172
PIT 170
WAS 166
NAS 158
SAN 156
PHI 154
ATL 154
ANA 147
VAN 147
DET 145
TOR 143
BUF 137
COL 135
CGY 130
MON 129
LOS 129
BOS 128
STL 124
COB 123
NYR 122
MIN 121
CAR 121
OTT 120
FLA 107
NJD 104
DAL 104
NYI 103
TAM 100
EDM 88

As you can see, the Sabres rank 13th overall in defensive scoring. The Sabres aren't exactly known for putting up 4-5 goals a night so I suppose this doesn't seem to far off. The Devils, currently the league leader in goals against, rank near the bottom of the pack. Like the Devils, the Sabres play a defensive-first style, but at least our defensemen appear to be able to provide an offensive spark as well.

Goals by defensemen
PHO 43
NAS 37
CHI 36
WAS 35
VAN 34
ATL 33
PIT 32
SAN 32
ANA 30
MON 29
LOS 29
CGY 29
TOR 29
OTT 28
DET 28
NYR 27
NJD 26
COB 26
COL 26
PHI 26
STL 25
BUF 25
CAR 24
NYI 24
BOS 24
FLA 23
TAM 22
DAL 22
MIN 18
EDM 17

When it comes to strictly goals, the Sabres rank 22nd in the league, which is not surprising considering the personnel we have. Of those 22 goals, Myers accounts for 10 of them or roughly 45%. I can't wait to see what that might be like in a couple years.