“Time to take your medicine.”
As kids we probably all heard a parent utter those dreaded words as they approached, spoon and bottle of Rx in hand. If you’re like me, you probably tried to hide or at the very least flee. No way I wanted to down what was sure to be a foul-tasting liquid, even if it was good for what ailed me.
Well, that kind of feels like where our Penguins are these days. Having to swallow some medicine that doesn’t taste good, but ultimately might be the best thing for the franchise.
I’ll be the first to confess I haven’t been very happy with our summer thus far. We bled off three solid hockey players in Cody Ceci, Jared McCann and Brandon Tanev, along with a highly serviceable depth forward in Frederick Gaudreau. Save for the addition of gritty winger Brock McGinn, IMHO we didn’t really replace them. Nor did we add anything resembling a physical presence, as general manager Ron Hextall and Brian Burke all but promised we would. (I’ll give Hextall props for signing top goaltending prospect Filip Lindberg.)
I’d hoped, perhaps naively, Hextall would be able to negotiate the salary cap snake pit he’d inherited from Jim Rutherford and somehow position us for one last run at a Stanley Cup. It now appears those hopes were misplaced. Unless the Pens’ GM has a trump card or two stuffed somewhere up his sleeve, the team as presently constructed is decidedly less than Cup caliber. Especially with Evgeni Malkin poised to miss Lord knows how many games to start the season.
I personally think it’ll be an uphill battle for us just to make the playoffs.
While I’m disappointed in our haul this summer, I do credit Hextall for being prudent and not forcing things that perhaps weren’t there just for the sake of making moves. Case in point, Marcus Pettersson, who apparently has drawn interest from other clubs, albeit at a cost to us either in the form of held-back salary or assets (or both).
Still, it’s taking some time to get used to Hextall’s measured and methodical approach, especially when compared to his predecessor’s shoot-from-the-hip style. How pronounced is the difference? Night and day. Tortoise and the hare. Bugs and Daffy.
Rutherford was a man for his season, in many ways the perfect GM while we were in a position to chase Stanley Cups. No trade was too bold, no price tag too hefty to pay. If it put us a serious shortfall down the road? The cost of doing business.
Hextall, too, is a man for his season. In some ways, the perfect choice to succeed JR. Patient, some would say to a fault. Calculating. Definitely in it for the long-haul.
It’s kind of like replacing a riverboat gambler at the helm with a CPA.
Which brings me to the original point of this article. Although no one in the black-and-gold hierarchy is admitting to it, it feels like we crossed an invisible line in the ice and entered the early stages of a long put off rebuild. That fact that we weren’t able to improve the team over the offseason let alone tread water speaks to it. It’s also clear Hextall doesn’t plan to part with assets, be it young talent or draft picks, to prop the team up in the short run.
All the while he’s making front-office hires to strength the team’s infrastructure.
In a way, it reminds me of when a young Dan Rooney wrestled control of the Steelers from wheeler-dealer coach Buddy Parker back in the mid-1960s and brought an end to the latter’s ruinous practice of trading draft choices for veterans.
It took some time. Ten seasons of mostly losing. But then came those Super Bowls.
While I hope Hextall’s rebuild won’t be as prolonged or bloody, here’s hoping the end results are just as good.
Rick, well said and on point.
Hi Rick,
Hi TOR,
Hex-Stall could also mean: Assessment of the Pens’ current resources (including resources in AHL and ECHL) in order to buy time.
Agree, Jorenz. It makes sense for Hextall to measure his steps and become familiar with what he’s got…especially given where we are cap-wise. It’s just so different than what we’re used to with Rutherford.
Along those lines, an interesting read over on Pittsburgh Hockey Now titled, “Kingerski: Comparing Hextall to Rutherford, Roster Needs, & Physicality.”
Always good to hear from you and read what you have to say.
Rick
Hi Rick,
I’m going to read that article. Thanks for the suggestion.
It is always a pleasure to read your articles!
Hey Jorenz,
I would have seriously preferred the Hextall forcing Sully to use what is already in the system to see if they could buy time. I would have rather the team sign no one this past summer than the players they did – most especially that oxygen thief Dominik Simon. In my not so humble opinion, Legare earned a spot on the team the year he was drafted. He, Bjorkqvist, and Lafferty formed the most effective line in the preseason that year, but between JRs wasteful use of Cap space and Sullivan’s obstinance (or if you prefer stupidity) none of those players made the opening roster and Bjorkqvist got injured in his first couple of professional games in WBS.
In last years QJMHL Legare was the leading goal scorer in the playoffs and Poulin was tied for 2nd. The fact that even most Penguin pundits are already relegating them to WBS doesn’t fill me with any confidence that they nor the Penguins Coaches have a clue. I am not saying that those two kids should be locks for the team, but this team got dumped once again in the first round of the playoffs and Crosby finished 129th in pnts/60 5 on 5 among forwards – no roster spot should be a given.
(I know I keep harping on how in effective our star has been, but we still have people thinking this is 2015-2017 when he was a 2 x Conn Smyth winner. The team can’t get better looking in the rear view mirror.)
I have said it before and will say it again, I would love to have a coach that would give legitimate shots to Legare, Poulin, Zohorna, Angello, Bjorkqvist, Hallander (now), and even Bellerive and not simply hand McGinn, Heinen, Rodrigues, or Heaven forbid Simon a roster spot because they were just signed, are veterans, or are friends or illegitimate relatives of the coach or a star player.
Hi TOR!
“Oxygen thief”! TOR, you are THE specialist of hockey idiomatic expressions! :o) I still don’t understand why they brought Simon back!! It puzzles me!
I have the chance to live in Eastern Canada and very close to teams playing in the Q (nickname for the QJMHL). I saw Poulin and Legare a few times and I really like their potential. Legare is relentless and pretty gritty. Poulin is a very good two-way forward, can play physical and can be quick to retrieve the puck along the boards. They are both hard workers. My biggest fear is that they might end up in Sully’s doghouse because of one unfortunate mistake. I agree with you TOR: if you don’t give the opportunity to your prospects to play, it means that you are not competent enough to manage your assets.
On point.
Sorry Rick,
Kingarski and Sticker Shock – sorry, I don’t buy it. As you, yourself pointed out, Nick Ritchie ($2.5 Mil) Cap Hit vs McGinn ($2.75 Mil). Hextall saves $.25 Mil. Over the last 3 seasons Ritchie averaged 1.74, 1.86, and 1.45 Pnts/60 5 on 5 while McGinn has only averaged 1.35, 1.26, and 1.44 pnts/60 5 on 5. So, Ritchie would not only have been cheaper in $$$ but more productive. The problem is Ritchie is also much bigger (6’2″, 230lbs) vs McGinn (6’0″, 187).
Brandon Saad (6’1″, 206) was only $1/75 Mil more than McGinn, and his scoring was certainly even higher.
Kingarski’s explanation of sticker shock is significantly below adequate for me.
Clever title Rick,
This team may need a bit of a Hex put on the rest of the division to sneak through the season without it turning into a Hindenburg disaster. I can hear Herb Morrison now “Oh the humanity!”
I do want to say one thing, JR + Botterill did work some magic at the beginning of their tenure. In short JR was never the man for a season, JR – Botterill was a tandem for a season. JR sans Botterill dug the grave the team is buried in.
As for “Hex-stall”, the jury is still out. I was very hopeful when he was hired but that optimism has been slowly fading as he and Burke have so far failed in making this team harder to play against. This team may never have been as small as it is now.
Hi Coach,
Small, older and no longer intimidating . When the Brain trust of the Islanders said of Crosby “we never worried about him shooting the puck….we knew he would always pass it,”that about says it all. This team is past its prime and we all know it. They have no Cap space as we said before but also now it must be very clear to everyone that the rest of the leagues players also know the Pen’s are NOT true contenders anymore.
Why did Brandon Saad chose to go to the Blues and not play in his home town ?? He must have felt that the Blues had a better chance of winning the Cup. Obviously being able to play with SIDNEY had no sway on him . That is my point Coach. Saad should be in a Pen’s sweater. But he chose not to.
The rebuild has already started but nobody told Ownership yet. But the league has!! Almost every team is improving and we have no cards to play. Only thing ownership can do is resign Letang and Malkin and go on pretending that Play off window is still open.
Cheers
Spot on Jim,
Saad and the rest of the league know that this team has gone the route of JR’s Hurricanes. There is no upside for Saad to come home.
Quick note on Crosby, last regular season he posted his lowest Shots/60 minutes 5 on 5 of his career (7.31) as well as his iHDCF/60 (3.41). That easily explains why his Points/60 5 on 5 checked in at 129th in the league last season among forwards. Trotz wasn’t the only one who knew Sid wasn’t shooting the puck and they clogged the passing lanes.
He got a little better in the shot dept in the playoffs, 11.97 but he had an abysmal S% of 5%.
This all leads to a discussion for another time
AgaIn, give it time — Hextall’s only been on the job for7 months. Give him a season, then judge.Dennis
Hi Dennis,
I am still willing to give this tandem (Burke – Hextall) time, as you say it is still less than a year and I can see an end game that eventually makes the team stronger. However, it gets harder and harder to reconcile the stated position of getting bigger and harder to play against with the moves the team has made so far and the lack of movement right now.
Perhaps we are spoiled with how open JR was and how everyone could pretty much see all of JR’s attempted trades as well as his failures. Hextall on the other hand doesn’t let his left hand know what his right hand is doing, making it frustrating now.
Rick
It definitely feels like a rebuild but if this was the case why wouldn’t they move Letang
for a couple of prospects and in the process get a 7mil dollar cap relief. To me, it sends
mixed messages in the direction the organization is heading. Also, it wouldn’t align with the
McCann trade or hanging onto an aging Carter. From my perspective, it’s putting us in no
man’s land. If I’m Crosby I’m asking Mario what the hell are we doing? This pretty much
seals his fate for having a chance at another cup. Last year’s team IMO just needed to be
tweaked sprinkle in some toughness a physical D-Man, improved goaltending and we have
a shot at Lord Stanley it’s not like we were miles away “I don’t get it !! Like you said if Hextall
doesn’t have something up his sleeve we can expect to sit out the 2021-22 playoffs.
Hey Mike,
I share yours and Rick’s frustration but to me it doesn’t feel like a rebuild just yet, at least not an honest rebuild.
I do get the McCann trade. As I have written before, I have heard from someone who has ties to both the Pens and Panthers orgs, McCann is a locker room cancer, much like Sprong. What was said is that he has an enormous ego and that nobody really wants to skate with him. Since I am not in the locker room, I can’t say that rumor is true, but with the limited time McCann was given in the top 6 despite his shot and speed, I can believe it.
However, if the team was in rebuild mode, what I don’t get is protecting Carter or Matheson and leaving Tanev unprotect. If the team were rebuilding, then they don’t need a 36 year old center. They would be better off giving on the job training to a young center. As for Matheson, if the team was rebuilding they also don’t need him. He may not have been as bad as I feared he would be in the way of giveaways but he certainly has not played like a $6.5 million man and losing his salary would be just as needed as losing Letang’s salary – assuming the Kraken would have taken him.
On the flip side, keeping Tanev would have been a serious boon or molding young kids into knowing what it means to make it hard on the opposing players. Furthermore, Tanev had a fairly reasonable salary, $3.5 Million isn’t that high for what he brings. The only complaint anyone could make was the length of the contract but even that wasn’t all that serious. His leadership would be assured to help the kids develop.
I also don’t feel as if they have really tried to set the team up for near future success. Nick Ritchey would have been a far, far better signing than McGinn, assuming Hextall would have tried signing him. And if the Pens were really that attractive of a team and Hextall has tried to sign Ritchie, he would have. So I am left wondering does Hextall want to win this year or not or has the luster of wearing the Pens sweater gotten tarnished.
It also seems to me to have been a good financial idea to make a play for Saad. Since Mario said the team needs to get to the 3rd round to break even when they are up against the Cap, Saad could have gone a long way for paying for his salary in merchandising; I know a lot of Pittsburghers that would have bought a Saad jersey in every variation that team had. With as quiet as Hextall moves maybe he also tried to sign Saad, but that brings up the question of has the team lost its luster?
The more I look at the moves, the more I can see an attempt to get the number 1 overall pick, or at least get a chance at it.
No one knows how the moves NYR, NJD, PHI, Car, NYI, and Was will shake out. Last season, before the puck was dropped, I worried that the rest of the division would have been far better. Fortunately, all those teams tanked and with a bit of scheduling luck the Pens were able to breeze through a very weak division. However, this season, the rest of the division may have really gotten better in the case of NYR, NJD, and Phi and Car, NYI, and Was may have limited their losses. At this point of the preseason I could see them finishing anywhere between 4th and 7th and 4th not necessarily equaling a playoff spot.
Hey Mike,
I share your sentiments about last season’s team and that we were about three bricks shy. As you stated, a power forward, a physical defenseman and a goalie. And I, too, wished we’d found a way to add at least some of those elements without subtracting for what we already had.
However, in looking at our cap numbers prior to the expansion draft, I confess I was wondering how in God’s name Hextall was going to accomplish it. JR really did leave us in a bad spot, cap wise.
Like you, my rub with Hextall is the players he brought in with the $$$ he had. I would’ve made muscle a priority. Obviously, Hextall didn’t (Heinen, Rodrigues, Simon).
Dan Kingerski of “Pittsburgh Hockey Now” thinks Hextall had planned to upgrade until he got sticker shock in free agency, forcing a change in plans. But I agree. It almost feels like we’ve taken a weird, middle-of-the road course. Not really committed to a rebuild (I’m sure ownership doesn’t want to use that word for fear of alienating the fan base) but obviously not improving team, either.
As much as I hate to suggest this, it reminds me of the Pirates’ “aiming for .500” approach under Huntington back in 2016. The nucleus was there to continue a playoff run, and they chose not to invest.
Of course Hextall’s hands are tied to an extent due to the cap…and also ownership’s stated desire that players like Malkin and Letang finish their careers in Pittsburgh (I think Mario regrets that Jaromir Jagr didn’t finish his career as a Penguin).
It places Hextall squarely between a rock and a hard place.
Rick