Top 3 Buffalo Sabres who must improve in December 2022
By Sion Fawkes
The Buffalo Sabres are near the basement of the Atlantic, and three players must step up their game to help them dig their way out.
The Buffalo Sabres, despite residing so close to the bottom of both the Atlantic and the NHL, have a young team full of budding stars, literally from the first line down. But there are also a few players who have wildly underachieved.
Two of the players listed below still have enough time to turn things around. One, however, might just be out of chances. Let’s meet this tumultuous trio.
Player #1 – Peyton Krebs
In 19 games this season, Krebs has a measly three points, a minus-five, 12 shots on goal, and a faceoff win percentage of just 37.3%. He’s been one of the worst, if not the worst forward on the team, and that includes Casey Mittelstadt.
Multiple times this season, opposing teams caught him out of position and capitalized, and you saw it occur last Sunday against San Jose. The solution? Head coach Don Granato placed Krebs between Zemgus Girgensons and Kyle Okposo to try and create a spark.
It worked, so perhaps if he keeps Krebs there a while, we will see some improvement from the 21-year-old. That’s assuming the second-year forward doesn’t end up in Rochester first.
Player #2 – Jacob Bryson
The Buffalo Sabres, overall, haven’t been terrible in the plus-minus department. Unless your name is Jacob Bryson, who sits at minus-14. He actually started the season well, with a Corsi and Fenwick in the 60% range, if you remember correctly. But Bryson has since fallen to the wayside.
One reason stemmed from injuries to the Sabres defensive rotation. During that trying stretch, Bryson proved he was nothing more than a third-pairing defenseman in this league. Once the unit got healthy and Bryson returned to the third pairing, he has since looked better. Now, he just needs to keep it up.
Player #3 – Casey Mittelstadt
Ironically, Casey Mittelstadt hasn’t played as poorly as many believe, but that’s not really saying much. He looked good on the power play and there are games where he simply does not lose faceoffs. That’s where the party ends, however.
A former eighth overall pick in his fifth full season with the Buffalo Sabres, everyone expected more from Mittelstadt, and he just hasn’t shown it. How bad has he been lately? The guy has just two shots on goal in the last four games, zero points, zero blocks, and zero hits.
Must Read. Rasmus Dahlin is going to strike fear in opponents. light
As much as I hate giving up on former top ten picks, I speak for the Sabres faithful when I say it’s time to get this guy out of here. And trade him while he still has value.
(Statistics provided by Hockey-Reference)
Article Source: Observations: Sabres’ prolific offense, improved team defense earn 6-3 win by Lance Lysowski
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