I travel quite a bit and I attend Sabres road games when I can. No doubt that everything I have ever heard from the outside is that the Sabres mishandled and mistreated Eichel. They might not know all the dirty little secrets that people in Buffalo know, but Perception is Reality. And the reality concerning Eichel is that the Sabres were wrong, and are incompetent to let a player of that caliber, who was under contract, get away.
The message they sent to NHL players was that we don't care what you think about your well being, we know better.
On top of that Robin Lehner also did a lot of damage with his comments.