Marcus Johansson’s first season with the Buffalo Sabres was an up-and-down affair. Fans were initially thrilled when he opened the 2019-20 season registering seven points in his first nine games. It appeared that his transition to back to the center position (where he hadn’t served consistently since the 2011-12 season) was rather seamless.

It didn’t take long for the 29-year-old to cool off, at times looking out of place as a pivot. Unfortunately, given the team’s lack of center depth, and the coaching staff’s apparent reluctance to move him back to the wing, he remained down the middle for the better part of the year.

In reviewing the line-combination data from Natural Stat Trick, there were actually only six games where Johansson served primarily as a winger. That ratio (exactly 10-percent of his games-played this season) is probably smaller than people realize. He also never served on the wing for more than two consecutive games.

It is important to note that there can be errors in tracking position. That being said, looking at who Johansson’s primary linemates were in each individual contest, seldom did he skate with another player who could have reasonably served as the center in a given game. This tracks with the fact that five of his six most consistent linemates this season all played exclusively on the wing, fortifying NST’s data.

The only potential “wild-cards” were the games he played on a line with Casey Mittelstadt (82:19 total), but the individual box scores indicate that Johansson took a vast majority of the draws in those instances.

The first thing that needs to be made clear is the fact that six games is a very small sample size. It would be irresponsible to try and draw a concrete conclusion based on such a short (and scattered) stretch. In knowing that, we can still look at the data to see if noticeable performance peaks took place during those games.

As previously stated, the contests where Johansson was deployed on the wing were scattered between two games in February, two in January, one in December and one in October. In five of those six appearances, he posted a positive relative xG percentage. Twice in that span, he registered single-game relative xGF percentages of over 20-percent (which is obviously very good).

So, if you came away from this past season saying that Johansson looked better on the wing, the metrics tend to agree. Still, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, the results would have been more analytically impactful with a greater sample.

From a broad perspective, Johansson’s deployment down the middle didn’t result in a massive disparity compared to his previous year-over-year impacts. In fact, his relative xG of .55-percent was actually his best since his 2016-17 campaign with the Washington Captials. In terms of base statistics, his 30-points in 60 games were nearly identical to what he produced last season between the Boston Bruins, and New Jersey Devils.

Aside from his inability to consistently win faceoffs (40.1-percent on the year), Johansson possesses a lot of traits that a centerman should. In terms of zone-exit and entry ability, his strength is in transition. The only problem is that he has difficulty producing real scoring impact. That problem should have been less apparent with a scoring asset like Jeff Skinner as his most consistent winger, but the lack of a legitimate setup man on that line hurt their ability to creating scoring chances once gaining the offensive-zone.

The likelihood here is that Johansson, while moderately effective in his own right, does not possess the ability to consistently create scoring chances. If that’s the case, his inconsistency as the Sabres’ de-facto second-line center isn’t that surprising. If the coaching staff wants to keep him in the top-six next season, a move to the wing might be the best course of action. If they want to leave him at center however, a change in deployment might be their best bet.

In perusing his career metrics, the fact that he has never played in a defensively-tilted zone-deployment seems a bit odd. For a player whose strongest attribute is zone-transition, a high OZS rate would seem to be a suboptimal way to try and get the most out of his skill set.

It would be interesting to see what he could do in a more defensive role, especially since the Sabres only currently possess one defensively talented center right now in Johan Larsson. Though Johansson might not register as many points in that role (not that he scored very much to begin with), his overall impact might actually end up being greater.

While his defensive metrics haven’t been consistently positive throughout his career, they were quite solid this season in a more danger-suppressive system. When you consider that most of his common linemates were net-negative defensive impact players, his individual contributions in that regard were certainly relevant.

This theory was tested to a small extent when Johansson served as a winger alongside Curtis Lazar (his most “consistent” pivot at 71:13 minutes on the year). While deployed with the Rochester call-up, Johansson’s OZS rate dropped down to 43.24-percent. Despite that, their xGF-percentage as a tandem stood at 59.50. It is unknown whether or not he could replicate those numbers as a center (if deployed in a similar fashion), but his success in that role last season (while brief) makes it something worth considering.

At Johansson’s current salary of $4.5 million for one more season, the Sabres may want to get the most offense out of him as they can. If that’s the case, shifting him to the wing and having him serve as a transition asset for an offensively-gifted centerman is likely the best way to do that. It’s either that, or greatly increase the talent of his wingers so he doesn’t have to create scoring chances on his own. Barring some big additions, the Sabres aren’t really in a position to accommodate the latter.

At the end of the day, this is another case of a career role player being asked to both create offense and drive possession. We talk a lot about Ralph Krueger’s failure to optimize his lineup, but the issue boils down to not having enough talented assets. Without additions to the top-six forward ranks this offseason, players like Johansson will continue to be asked to do too much.

Transition Chart courtesy of Charting Hockey

RAPM Chart courtesy of Evolving Hockey