Sabres acquire veteran winger from Blue Jackets

The Buffalo News’ Lance Lysowski confirmed that the Buffalo Sabres acquired Eric Robinson from the Columbus Blue Jackets. This was originally reported by Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman. Robinson, 28, is in his seventh season of NHL play, after signing with the Blue Jackets as an undrafted free agent in 2018. He’s since totaled 266 career NHL games and 82 career points. The details of the trade are not yet certain, although Lysowski reports that Robinson won’t join Buffalo for their Thursday matchup against the Boston Bruins.

Robinson has appeared in seven games with the Blue Jackets this season, scoring one goal and recording a -3. He has also played in nine AHL games and scored four points. It was Robinson’s first appearance in the AHL since 2019-20, as the veteran winger has been a fixture of Columbus’ lineup over the last four seasons. He recorded a career year in the 2021-22 campaign, scoring 10 goals and 27 points in 67 games. He followed it up with 12 goals and 24 points in 72 games last year.

Robinson is a New Jersey native who played four seasons at Princeton University from 2014 to 2018. The Nashville Predators invited Robinson to their training camp ahead of the 2015-16 season and signed a professional try-out contract with the team ahead of the 2016-17 season. He also briefly signed with Nashville’s AHL affiliate, before opting to return for his senior season, where he set a collegiate-career high of 31 points in 36 games and earned an NHL contract with Columbus.

Eric Robinson is set to become an unrestricted free-agent on July 1st and carries a $1.6M cap hit this season.