Over the last few years, fans of the Buffalo Sabres have turned their proverbial heels on several players who have failed to meet expectations. One such entity is Casey Mittelstadt. The widespread frustration with the former eighth-overall pick hasn’t been without merit, but he deserves credit for his improved play during the second half of the 2022-23 season.

Make no mistake – the 24-year-old has certainly fallen short of his draft pedigree. That being said, for an asset whom many fans were willing to ship out for the sake of “addition by subtraction”, he’s making a case for another look next season (the final year of his $2.5 million AAV contract).

Following a predictably rough start to the year while serving on the opposite flank to Victor Olofsson (a player with whom he’s historically struggled), his play since the turn of the new year has been quite good. Let’s take a look at the circumstances that have contributed to Mittelstadt’s best season with the blue-and-gold, and what it could mean for his future with the team.

Overall Impacts

As most of our regular readers know, I like to start by looking at broader numbers before diving into the details. To put it plainly, since the turn of the new year, Mittelstadt’s game has taken off.

Over the past 30 games, the Minnesota native ranks fourth among Sabres forwards with a 48.87% xGF rate at five-on-five. He’s also sixth among Sabres forwards in season-long GAR rate. At face value, his xGF mark since January 1 may seem pedestrian, but compared to his Buffalo contemporaries, it’s impressive and ranks ahead of core players like Tage Thompson, Jeff Skinner, and Dylan Cozens.

Even more surprising is how Mittelstadt’s on-ice scoring numbers rank league-wide. In that same period, his on-ice GF/60 rate of 3.9 at even-strength ranks 26^th in the NHL (among the 352 players who have skated a minimum of 200 minutes).

For comparison’s sake, he ranked 331^st under the same criteria from the beginning of the season until December 31. To say that the turnaround in his game has been drastic would be a severe understatement. The only “problem” is that his xGA marks have taken something of a hit, but not nearly enough to offset the incredible offensive numbers he’s posted as of late.

The Jost-Olofsson Spectrum

So, let’s talk about context. We’ve established that improvement is taking place, but now we must inquire as to why. As previously mentioned, Mittelstadt has historically struggled when placed on a line with Olofsson. It’s not a coincidence that his first-half deficiencies came almost exclusively with Olofsson by his side.

Before the acquisition of Tyson Jost (which we’ll touch on shortly), the two of them struggled to produce offense, and allowed an inordinate rate of chances against, regardless of who was serving as their pivot. Fans regularly lamented Don Granato’s unwillingness to separate the two (and for good reason).

Just when things were at their worst for the Sabres’ de facto third line, Kevyn Adams claimed Jost off waivers. Almost immediately, Jost was placed between Mittelstadt and Olofsson, and the results took a significant and immediate turn for the better.

Hilariously enough, as you can see from the heatmaps above, Jost’s inclusion on their line created a near-exact polar flip in their on-ice results. While Mittelstadt has exhibited recent flashes of success while serving alongside other centers like Cozens and Peyton Krebs, the game-by-game consistency hasn’t manifested yet.

For example, Mittelstadt has held a negative xGF rate in five of the Sabres’ last 10 games according to Natural Stat Trick. He skated without Jost in all five of those games. Conversely, in the five games where his relative xGF rate was positive, only two of them came alongside Jost. The others three were made up of a mix of Krebs and Cozens.

As the Sabres season winds down, I’d like to see Mittelstadt with a consistent and extended sample alongside centers not named Tyson Jost. Additionally, this sample would also need to consist of players not named Victor Olofsson. Only then will we have a consistent stretch of games to analyze the degree to which Jost’s presence has resulted in Mittelstadt’s statistical uptick.

Individual Acumen

Now that we’ve established linemate impact, let’s hone in on the individual. We know that the baseline analytics is better, but which specific aspects of Mittelstadt’s skillset have improved this year?

When perusing Corey Sznajder’s tracking data in my research for this piece, the first thing I noticed was Mittelstadt’s primary shot-assist output. Not only is it impressive, but it’s also actually the top rate on the team. While he has a very low propensity to shoot the puck, he’s excellent at putting his teammates in a position to receive his passes and take subsequent shots.

On a team that predicates most of its offense off the rush, this is a key skill set to have. It would be nice to see him shoot the puck a little more (as I’m sure I am not alone in my memory of Mittelstadt passing up several opportunities to shoot from the slot this season), but being a shot-assist machine certainly isn’t a bad thing.

But wait – sure he has a high rate of shot-assists, but are they resulting in scoring chances? Why yes, yes they are. Only Alex Tuch holds a higher rate of primary shot assists that result in a high-danger opportunity. So, not only is Mittelstadt facilitating shot opportunities, they’re actual quality chances in high-danger areas. That’s a critical factor to consider.

One other minor aspect of his game that has improved is his physicality. That might sound ludicrous, but there is more to a physical approach than just throwing hits around. What I’m referring to here is Mittelstadt’s ability to provide forechecking pressure down low. In that regard, he’s one of the top-five forwards on the team in terms of forecheck pressures on the year.

That’s not necessarily an inherently physical endeavor, but from watching him in games, he certainly seems more willing to take contact in heavier traffic areas this season. In years past, he was often criticized for staying on the periphery of the play, which is something I haven’t seen cited to the same extent in 2022-23.

Most importantly, Mittelstadt is turning into the shot-assist maven we hoped he would become when he was drafted. There are still holes in his game that need to be addressed (primarily his defensive impacts), but on offense and in transition, he ranks either average or better when compared to the rest of the Sabres’ forwards.

Closing Thoughts

From a base statistical standpoint, Mittelstadt is pacing out right around 50 points on the year. If it holds, it will be the best production clip of his career. For the first time, he’s comfortably producing results at above replacement level.

Depending on whether or not his current underlying result holds up through the end of the season, I could see several different outcomes for him as it pertains to his future as a Sabre. As previously mentioned, he has a year remaining on an inexpensive deal.

The Sabres could just let it ride out and see if the improvements continue into 2023-24. He’s also an RFA at the end of the contract, so, in theory, they could let it ride for two more seasons if they wanted to (though that would probably be inadvisable).

That’s one option. Another idea would be to leverage his 2022-23 scoring rate in a trade for a more urgent area of need. With young forwards like Jiri Kulich, Matthew Savoie, and maybe even Isak Rosen all nearing NHL readiness, forward spots are going to be premium real estate on the Sabres’ depth chart within the next 1-2 years.

Retaining Mittelstadt beyond this season could serve as something of a roadblock for a potentially deserving youngster. That said, the Sabres aren’t a team that is averse to letting prospects marinate in the minors for extended periods.

If Adams plans to re-sign either one of Girgensons or Okposo (and graduate a much-deserving Kulich to the NHL next year), retaining Mittelstadt for the last year of his contract might preclude them from acquiring another legitimate top-six winger from outside the organization.

We’ll have to wait and see how the rest of the season (and the offseason for that matter) plays out, but Mittelstadt might be the player with the widest range of potential outcomes heading into this summer. His second-half glow-up only complicates that but, as we always say, too much talent is a good problem to have.

Advanced Metrics courtesy of Evolving Hockey and Natural Stat Trick

Charts courtesy of Evolving Hockey, All Three Zones and Hockeyviz

Photo Credit: Timothy T. Ludwig – USA Today Sports