there's three different ways for buffalo to respond to that trade. no, hell no, or f no.

I could be wrong, but I’m pretty sure Alex Tuching loves it in BUF and they love him, so I just can’t see it happening. Would be nice though.

Buffalo says no and you can get a little more for Zucker

Buffalo isn't trading Tuch.

Tuch is basically untouchable
He’s about to be named the Buffalo Captain

And even if he was available,
those pieces just wouldn’t be close to getting it done
Not one of them would be of much interest to us

IS he about to be named captain though?

Yeah
And even if he wasn’t, we still wouldn’t consider moving him for a package like this

No, of course not, was just confirming that he's the Sabres best candidate for the captaincy

Okposo & Girgensons currently wear an “A”
It won’t be either of them with just 1 year left on each of their deals

Some think it could be Dahlin
But after the tire fire Eichel was, i highly doubt we name another youngster Captain
Tuch seems to be the best choice for us

For sure, Tuch checks off a lot of boxes that you'd want to have in a team captain. I do wonder though if the Sabres will be ready to contend before the end of his contract though

Especially since Pittsburgh isn’t interested in giving Buffalo what Tuch is actually worth that trade doesn’t happen. They only want to give the garbage they don’t want anymore. Of course everyone knows that he’s Buffalo‘s next captain, but they also happen to forget that he was the demanded piece in return for Jack Eichel. If he’s not in the trade it simply doesn’t happen. Partly because he was the only forward that doesn’t have a no trade clause, but he fits all the needs Buffalo actually has too.

Depends what u mean by “contend”
For the playoffs?
Sure, maybe even next year
For the Cup?
We’ve obviously got a ways to go. It depends on how all this young talent we have develops

Where’s the comp for Zucker?

Yeah, I meant the cup. Definitely see a playoff contender in the not too distant future, but cup contender, yeah, that's quite a bit further away

Hard to say when- or even if- we’ll get to that point
Definitely putting together a good base of young talent though
Pretty loaded actually

For sure, just depends on how they develop like you said