Buffalo Sabres 2023-24 Player Outlooks: Jacob Bryson

With Buffalo Sabres hockey returning on September 15th with the Prospects Challenge the time has come for 2023-24 player outlooks.

Jacob Bryson kicks off the Buffalo Sabres 2023-24 Player Outlook Series, even if it’s highly unlikely he will be playing in a blue and gold uniform this season. But since Bryson is, for now at least, still on the team and would be ranked at the bottom of my list of players who were in Buffalo full-time last season, he gets the distinct honor of being Lucky Number One.

Before we dive into what will come of Bryson in 2023-24, let’s look back on his past performances with Buffalo. Bryson saw 38 games and scored nine points during the shortened 2020-21 season, attaining 43 blocks, 32 hits, and an on-ice save percentage of 91.4% at even strength and 91.7% at 5-on-5.

Bryson looked as though he was improving following the 2020-21 season, with 73 blocks, 55 hits, and 10 points in 73 games. The team’s on-ice save percentage, however, dipped with him on the ice at even strength and 5-on-5, jumping to 90.0% and 90.3%, but other than that, the arrow seemed to be pointing north.

Jacob Bryson regressed with the Buffalo Sabres in 2022-23

Come 2022-23, however, Bryson’s performance tanked, and he saw time in just 59 games, often because he was a healthy scratch. Buffalo’s on-ice save percentage tanked to 87.7% at even strength and just 88.0% at 5-on-5, respectively, and his average total ice time dipped from 18:20 in 2021-22 to just 14:35.

He had 69 blocks, increasing his blocks per game mark from 1.0 to 1.16 per game, but his overall aggression bottomed out to just 34 hits. Bryson struggled, and things got so bad that it allowed Kale Clague to step in and get an extended look.

Now in 2023-24, Bryson is still part of the Buffalo Sabres, but my outlook for him is that he will spend the season in another uniform. The only question is, where? At this time, I’m finding it difficult to pinpoint who would want him on their roster, and it’s likely he would be part of a trade package instead of general manager Kevyn Adams just straight up trading him for a late-round pick or less unless he had no other choice.

And that’s a wrap for our first 2023-24 player outlook of the year. Next, we will preview one of the projected lower-end prospects over in Rochester who are signed with the Buffalo Sabres. And throughout this series, we will cover one player a day, slowly working our way to the top of the main roster and prospects pool, finishing the week of September 15th.

(Statistics provided by Hockey-Reference)