{"id":313,"date":"2016-09-02T15:15:38","date_gmt":"2016-09-02T19:15:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/?p=313"},"modified":"2016-09-02T16:49:59","modified_gmt":"2016-09-02T20:49:59","slug":"zemgus-girgensons-signs-one-year-contract-with-buffalo-sabres","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2016\/09\/02\/zemgus-girgensons-signs-one-year-contract-with-buffalo-sabres\/","title":{"rendered":"Zemgus Girgensons Signs One-Year Contract with Buffalo Sabres"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/g\/girgeze01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Zemgus Girgensons<\/a><\/strong>, 22, signed a one-year deal, worth $1.15 million, with the <strong>Buffalo Sabres<\/strong>. Girgensons was one of two restricted free agents; the other being <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/r\/ristora01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Rasmus Ristolainen<\/a><\/strong> who is yet to sign a contract.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Very excited to be back for another season with the Sabres! Thanks to everyone for all the\u2026 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/FqInstpOta\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/FqInstpOta<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Zemgus Girgensons (@zemgus94) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/zemgus94\/status\/771465501809795072?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">September 1, 2016<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><script src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" async=\"\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Zemgus Girgensons Signs One-Year Contract with Buffalo Sabres<\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Girgensons was the 14th overall pick in the 2012 NHL Draft. He joined the Sabres\u00a0in the 2013-14 season. Since then he has scored\u00a070 points in 202 NHL games. Girgensons scored\u00a0just seven goals 18 points in 71 games last season. He struggled to find his way under new Sabres coach <strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/b\/bylsmda01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dan Bylsma<\/a><\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Zemgus has grown into a solid two-way player since beginning his career,\u201d said <a href=\"http:\/\/sabres.nhl.com\/club\/news.htm?id=892025&amp;navid=DL|BUF|home\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Sabres general manager Tim Murray<\/a>\u00a0via the team website. \u201cWe hope to see him continue this positive trend and find a consistent role within the club this season as another young player to grow with our group.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>In 2015 he was the leading vote-getter for the NHL all-star game. \u00a0That total came largely via a push from fans voting in his native Latvia.<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">After three seasons with Buffalo, this might be Girgensons last chance to prove himself \u00a0as a contributing NHL player, and top-nine producer; instead of a player stuck on the fourth line or in the press box.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Girgensons was a restricted free agent, whose rights were retained by the team due to the qualifying offer submitted in June.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<\/p>\n<div class=\"getty embed image\" style=\"background-color: #fff; display: inline-block; font-family: 'Helvetica Neue',Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif; color: #a7a7a7; font-size: 11px; width: 100%; max-width: 594px;\">\n<div style=\"padding: 0; margin: 0; text-align: left;\"><a style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/513530410\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><\/div>\n<div style=\"overflow: hidden; position: relative; height: 0; padding: 66.666667% 0 0 0; width: 100%;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" style=\"display: inline-block; position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; margin: 0;\" src=\"\/\/embed.gettyimages.com\/embed\/513530410?et=xcPZ5azeTVJLcxEPOgCULA&amp;viewMoreLink=on&amp;sig=qCsNDm5HHCpkZNjWSYWMawR2RQ5ZXykIvGSPB0Ai2wA=&amp;caption=true\" width=\"594\" height=\"396\" frameborder=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p style=\"margin: 0;\">\n<\/div>\n<p>ANAHEIM, CA &#8211; FEBRUARY 24: Zemgus Girgensons #28 of the Buffalo Sabres skates to the puck during the second period of a game against the Anaheim Ducks at Honda Center on February 24, 2016 in Anaheim, California. (Photo by Sean M. Haffey\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Zemgus Girgensons, 22, signed a one-year deal, worth $1.15 million, with the Buffalo Sabres. Girgensons was one of two restricted free agents; the other being Rasmus Ristolainen who is yet to sign a contract. Very excited to be back for another season with the Sabres! Thanks to everyone for all the\u2026 https:\/\/t.co\/FqInstpOta &mdash; Zemgus Girgensons [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1628,"featured_media":318,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[34,3],"tags":[112,182,37,184,38,183],"class_list":["post-313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-sabres","tag-ahl","tag-buffalo-sabres","tag-hockey","tag-latvia","tag-nhl","tag-zemgus-girgensons"],"modified_by":"Zachary DeVine","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1628"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}