It's not hard to acquire a decent-enough 2C, at least not compared to the platonic ideal of wingers that we seemingly require for Sid & Geno now.
Geno played wing before and he did it quite well. Plenty of centers have adjusted to playing wing. It's not like wings can't be the primary playmakers on their lines. See Patrick Kane.
Geno as center has a finite shelf life IMO before he hurts you so much defensively that you can't justify it anymore. COVID or not, Jason Zucker or not, Geno's defensive deficiencies are catching up to us.
I really disagree that it'll be easier to find a good 2C to play with Geno than it'd be to find a LW. Centers are always more expensive. It took us like 4 years to fix the hole Bonino left, and we never did from the outside--Blueger just grew into the 3C role. Tons of assets and time thrown into the fire for no result. We just got lucky one of our prospects eventually worked.
I just don't see how it makes sense. If you can't afford a winger to play with Geno, you're not going to be able to afford a center to fit the bill either. Circling back, I still don't see the problem being anything other than Geno's lack of confidence. If he can't make it work with the top-6 wingers he's got to play with, then I don't know what to tell ya, cuz we don't have the assets to land anything better.
If you wanna ship out someone like Petts or Dumo for a winger, I doubt he'll be as good or better than what we have available, and that's going to take precious time. If you want to flip those guys for picks/prospects, then flip
that for said winger, still, clock's ticking.
We're not in a great spot when it comes to flexibility. We've gotta roll with what we've got, hope for the best, and that's that. The time for tinkering and that kinda thing is past, imo.