Friends, Pen’s Fans, Hockey Fans, lend me your ears;
I come to bury the JR Legacy, not to praise it.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with JR.
Jim Rutherford pulled off some great feats in the ‘burgh, particularly and synergistically with Jason Botterill. Dealing head case James Neal for Patric Hornqvist was the building block of the Cup years. Add to that acquiring Phil “the Thrill” Kessel for a nascent Kasperi Kapanen, flipping Brent Sutter for Nick Bonino, not only finding a way out from under Rob Scuderi and his contract but getting more than useful Trevor Daley in return, and let’s not forget signing Matt Cullen to a steal of a contract and Rutherford built a a champion. Yes, to be sure, Rutherford had a lot of success here in Pittsburgh
Unfortunately, that is all in the rear-view mirror, and will soon be interred with the JR legacy.
Now, our Favorite Flightless Fowl must navigate through the haze, the maze, and the mess that Rutherford leaves in the wake of his tenure as our Pittsburgh Penguins General Manager.
Tarnish began to diminish the luster of the JR Legacy, even before the second of the back-to-back Cups was hoisted. Over the course of the last three seasons, Rutherford has thrown lots of money at marginal or aging players to sign or extend contracts, but rather than locking up Bonino on an extension (as I suggested way back when), when Rutherford would have had a chance to secure him on a more friendly contract, he rested on his laurels and Bonino’s value sky-rocketed out of the reach our Black-n-Gold.
After Cup number 2, the tarnish began to spread rapidly. With Bonino all primed and ready to jump ship, by all accounts, no contract was offered to Cullen and prospect Oskar Sundqvist was traded with the teams first round pick to St. Louis Blues for Pugilist Supreme Ryan Reaves and St. Louis’s second round pick in a knee jerk reaction to P.K. Subban’s less than sportsman like treatment of captain Sidney Crosby. When the smoked cleared from this debacle, the team stripped itself of its 3rd, 4th, and 5th Centers and a draft pick. Reaves was subsequently traded because the Coach didn’t value his skill set and the player he was traded for was in turned traded for a player that has since retired. The draft-pick the team acquired was wasted on a player forced into retirement by injuries. The sum total of the deal, no more Cups, no assets. (Long time Penguin Poop readers may remember that I never liked the trade and wanted the team to keep its draft pick and use it to select Nicolas Hague. I wonder how this team would look right now with Sundqvist and LHD Hague rather than the nothing it wrought.)
As the Three-peat pursuit continued, bad decision followed bad decision further depleting the team of Cap space and assets. I am not going to iterate all of the bad trades and signings, there just isn’t enough space or time. But with all the wheeling and dealing of bad trade after bad trade, the team has nothing really left in the pipeline and doesn’t even have a first-round pick next year. In fact, the Penguins only have a 2nd, a 5th, and 3-7th round picks next season. No help would be on the horizon even if next year’s draft were deep.
Nor does the team have much in Cap space for a while due to the dead money in the Jack Johnson buy-out and the downward dealing of Hornqvist’s $5.2 million for 3 more seasons (who by the way is off to a great start) for Mike Matheson’s $4.875 million for 6 more years; a contract back loaded so the team will actually owe $6.5 million in real money on top of the Cap hit.
Sorry if I am being irreverent to a departing member of our favorite franchise but the evil that Rutherford did will live years and years. The golden era will fade to nostalgia and the team could very well still be digging out from under the Rutherford Legacy.
Odds and Sods
STOP it already with the Malkin hate. Expectation is a horrible thing. Evgeni Malkin, Like Sidney Crosby is not the Crosby of even the last Cup year neither is Malkin the Malkin of yore. Age catches us all. Neither Malkin nor Crosby can carry a bunch of pylons for Wings. The inconvenient truth is this, neither Crosby nor Malkin has a 5 on 5 Goal this season. They both only have 2 Assists 5 on 5 and both of their lines have only managed a measly 3 Goals in the first 7 Games, yet no one is talking about Crosby’s 5-on-5 impotence. (Sorry Mike) I don’t care about the “eye test”, for all of the sound and fury the first and second lines are in a dead heat for mediocrity.
Furthermore, last season, Malkin was the best Center in the league, in almost all categories 5-on-5. No one declines that fast, without injury. However, even last season, when Malkin was on top of his game and best in the league, he didn’t mesh with Jason Zucker. Malkin – Zucker was a waste of ice-time for both players last year and nothing this year has indicated any change.
The real problem isn’t Malkin or Zucker, but Mike Sullivan who keeps insisting on pairing these two polar opposite players. Zucker has a track record of fast starts with fading finishes as the grind of the season wears on. Sullivan is wasting Zucker’s best games pairing him with Malkin as well as saddling Malkin with a line-mate that doesn’t help him. He is not putting either player in a position to succeed.
Finally, Malkin haters, Evgeni Malkin has a full blown No Trade, No Movement Clause in his contract. He isn’t going anywhere unless he wants to go.
End of the Rutherford Era for our Penguins
ByThe Other Rick
Jan 28, 2021
9 thoughts on “End of the Rutherford Era for our Penguins”
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Hi Coach.
Great analysis my friend and balanced as usual. We cannot never forget that Jimmy came to Pittsburgh and was able to convert two back to back championships.For that as you noted we should be appreciative of his talents.
But it’s been the last three years that the Pens have started to show signs of a Rapidly declining team.We should never forget that 30 other NHL teams have gone through the same thing… I just hope the Pittsburgh fan base will support a mediocre team that will not go far in the NHL playoffs. Personally I see it as being very shortsighted and it could take 10 years for the penguins to ever reach the glory status They had it this past 10 years.
Whoever the new GM is,he still will not have a first round draft pick in 2022, will still be saddled with several bad contracts, and No Cap space to work with.The real issue for the pens is that there are many teams that are younger, more talented, have more cap space,and are loaded with young talent in their farm systems.
The Pens Will take several years to acquire and develop generational talent that will lead this franchise to another cup.
Does it really matter why Jimmy left? It’s what remains is the problem…Nothing has changed.
Cheers
Jim
Agreed Jim,
The why’s of JR quitting don’t matter. Figuring out how to get good young talent on this team and that is a daunting task. As you say, it may only happen by keeping our Draft Picks; stop selling them for old marginal players in the vain hope of a band-aid to patch an arterial bleeder.
The Other Rick
I have a decent source who is a former player. He’s telling me that management
wanted to move Letang and possibly Malkin but JR refused out of loyalty to
both players. He claims the dis-agreement had been going on for months.
For whatever that’s worth? IMO whoever the Pen’s hire as the next GM has to
have the b_lls to make a blockbuster trade to not only put life into this team but
protect us going forward.
I would have been totally comfortable had Bill Guerin been promoted to take JR’s
place. It will be interesting to see the direction for a new GM.
Hey Mike,
Your source makes more sense than JR wanting to trade Letang. If you remember Letang seemed resigned to the fact that he was not coming back this past off-season, as if he was aware of the push to shed him. I appreciate what Letang has done offensively over the years and his guts, but I wouldn’t have shed a tear if JR had traded him.
Blockbuster trades? JR was never one to shy away from blockbuster trades, but over the last 3 seasons he got the short end of the stick on his block buster trades. However, I am not sure the Pens have enough assets to pull off a block buster trade now. There isn’t much value left. You have to give to get, and we have nothing worth while without stripping away something we need.
I hear you, I would have loved to see JR step down a couple of years ago while Guerin was still here so that he could step up and take over.
Does this mean that you wouldn’t want to see a statue of Rutherford in Pittsburgh?
Hey Pat,
Maybe an effigy but not a statue. Actually, if their is any validity to what Jorenz mention below about rumors to the affect that JR wanted to trade Letang but wasn’t allowed, I might start feeling sorry for him, a little.
Hi TOR!
It has been a long time since I have read an article signed TOR! Very interesting read!
TOR, I just want to tell you that here, in Canada, the news of JR’s resignation is going wild. It became wilder this morning: JR apparently wanted to trade Letang but The Pens ownership said no. This information comes from Colin Dunlap, a radio host for the 93.7 FM in Pittsburgh. He said this on a post this morning: you can’t simply believe JR leaving the Pens was amicable. You can’t believe it. No matter what anyone said yesterday.
I would like to know your thoughts about this quote (Rick Buker, feel free to jump in).
I have always sensed that JR had a different opinion (or philosophy) about the destiny of this team. JR and Sullivan didn’t see eye to eye on the identity or the playing style of the team. He wasn’t so free I guess.
I am really worried about the future of this team. Worried about the lack of transparency, lack of openness and lack of clear direction. And rumour has it that Dale Tallon could be a potential candidate for the GM position. A friend of Mario Lemieux.
It is going to be a bumpy road for a while.
Thanks Jorenz,
I started out replying to Rick Bs post yesterday, but it morphed into this.
My opinion on the quote? I believe it; Maybe not that JR wanted to trade Letang, particularly with all of the injuries on the blue line, I doubt anyone would be dumb enough to trade away a defensemen when they are down to FA like Weber. If they said JR was still smarting over not being allowed to trade Letang in the off season then maybe I would believe it, but I don’t believe even JR would be that foolish to trade a D-man when he has none healthy.
Having said that, If not being allowed to trading Letang was the sticking point, then I feel for JR, Letang needs to go.
However to your question, I don’t think the break-up was amicable, no matter what was said in the media. And if it wasn’t amicable, I hope both sides stay the course on the high road and not break down into a name calling match.
I can’t help but wonder if this all stems from another bad playoff run (getting worse each season) and management not wanting to be seen firing JR but instead making the work environment bad enough that JR chose to resign. Many Companies do that – get the employee to resign rather than fire them.
It was only a few short months ago that ownership said they didn’t want the team spending anything near the Cap limit this season but here we are again (if not for IR people) another season against the Cap. If ownership was pleased with his performance, JR would have still had carte blanche. But JR was not supposed to be spending money like he is – money that is not being used (Matheson).
The JR – Sully relationship? I don’t know what to think about that. All appearances suggest they have different views as for what the team should look like with JR always going out and getting big guys only to have Sully not use them. However, Sully got an extension on his contract. Why would JR extend his contract if he wasn’t happy with the direction of the team.
I hear you Jorenz, I am worried too. The team has appeared to be at odds with itself for several years now, no real direction. I don’t know who the team is looking at as a successor. With a short season and an expansion draft, they need to make a smart decision and make quickly.
Very insightful thoughts, TOR. Thanks for sharing.