In yet another forgettable season of Buffalo Sabres hockey, the forward trio lovingly dubbed “The LOG Line” was a rare bright spot. Johan Larsson, Kyle Okposo, and Zemgus Girgensons made for one of the most effective fourth lines in the NHL in 2019-20. Often asked to match up against opponent’s top scoring lines, their defensive suppression, and offensive-zone possession metrics were remarkable.

This summer, Larsson and Girgensons are set to become unrestricted free agents. Nearly everyone who is immersed in hockey analytics has seen the arguments (very strong ones at that) for bringing Larsson back into the fold. A divide remains, however, regarding whether or not Buffalo would be wise to extend Girgensons as well. 

As a former first-round draft pick, it’s fair to say that the 26-year-old has fallen short of his anticipated ceiling. Still, his contributions do have value, and depending on his salary demands, it might make sense to retain him on a short-term deal.

Let’s first take a look at Girgensons’ 2019-20 metrics. Overall, his individual impacts are about as neutral as they come. From a shot-share standpoint, he did register a positive relative Corsi of .32 on the year, but his relative xG mark was -.07. As a group, the LOG line’s marks in those categories were 4.47 and 7.38, respectively.

The WOWY data is a little hard to draw conclusions from in this case. Girgensons spent nearly 77-percent of his five-on-five ice time alongside Larsson and Okposo this season. Not surprising, since they were by far the most consistently deployed trio.

In the 154:04 minutes Girgensons skated sans Okposo and Larsson, his metrics took a significant hit. His relative Corsi dropped to -1.88-percent, while his xG percentage remained positive, but did drop to 1.46-percent. Obviously, this sample size is small, and it didn’t come all at once, but it might help explain why his individual 2019-20 metrics look markedly less impressive than his LOG line contemporaries.

Another interesting tidbit is that Girgensons and Larsson actually skated just over 117 minutes without Okposo this season. In that time their xG mark was -10.23 despite seeing an OZS rate increase of nearly 11-percent. This might indicate that the offensize-zone possession success from the LOG line this season had a great deal to do with Okposo’s presence (again, the sample is too small to say for certain).

Without Girgensons, Larsson and Okposo’s relative xG together did decrease a bit, down to 5.46-percent, but remained strong overall. Their relative Corsi decreased as well, which isn’t too surprising considering that Girgensons did generate his fair share of the LOG line’s shots (which we’ll expand on below). This sample was even smaller at just over 60 minutes on the year, so it too means very little, but is worth mentioning for comparison sake.

One thing that can be individualized to an extent, is their respective zone-transition abilities. As a line that was asked to start in the defensive zone over 64-percent of the time, the zone-exit and entry metrics are interesting. Girgensons posted the most impressive zone-exit metrics of the three. Despite creating very few possession exits, he posted a very low exit failure-rate.

Conversely, he struggled mightily when it came to zone-entry, which is a problem for a group that created a lot of their success as a result of not only exiting their own end, but also maintaining possession in transition. Once his line did enter the zone however, Girgensons made his mark in the form of shot contributions.

At the end of the day, this is going to come down to dollars and cents. Given Girgensons’ age and UFA status, there are only a few decent contract comparables from last summer. According to Evolving Hockey’s contract prognostications, they expect Girgensons to earn less than $1 million AAV on the open market (in a flat-cap scenario).

While EH has been scarily accurate in their free-agent contract projections in the past, it would be surprising to see his salary essentially cut in half next season. Similarly aged players like Brett Ritchie and Josh Archibald both signed $1 million UFA deals last summer, and Girgensons is demonstrably better than both of them.

He is only a year removed from signing a $1.6 million agreement (which was probably a slight over-payment in an RFA year), and after posting a nearly identical base-statistical season in 2019-20, he’ll probably seek a similar valuation. In the same model from EH, they project his contract to be closer to $1.5 million AAV over two years if he re-signs with Buffalo, which makes more sense but still seems a shade low.

If for some reason he is willing to come back on a one-year, $1 million deal, then the Sabres should re-sign him. If he expects to approach a $1.8-2 million dollar AAV contract with more than a year of term, Jason Botterill would be wise consider other options.

Who would replace Girgensons in that case? Well, if Ralph Krueger plans to deploy his de facto fourth-line in the same fashion next season, they might have an in-house replacement in pending RFA, Curtis Lazar.

In 38 games with Buffalo this season, he posted 10 points (nearly identical to Girgensons’ base “per-game” production). Analytically, he played in a similarly defensive deployment with an OZS rate of just 40-percent, and managed to post a positive xG mark of .19-percent. While he and Girgensons don’t necessarily possess identical skillsets, his high-energy, physical style could fit in seamlessly.

This season, Lazar’s cap hit was $700,000. EH’s projection currently has him at $813,200 for one year to return to Buffalo. For argument’s sake, let’s say that’s what he wants. While Girgensons is probably a moderately better player, if his demand is roughly double Lazar’s, the Sabres might be best suited to save the money and let him hit to open market.

In what could end up being a compressed offseason, Botterill already has plenty of needs to address. Some might say that’s a good reason to keep Girgensons around, so as not to create another hole. In this case, however, a potential in-house replacement exists and should be considered.

RAPM Charts courtesy of Evolving Hockey

Transition Chart courtesy of Charting Hockey

Corsi and xG Metrics courtesy of Natural Stat Trick