Much to the coaching staff and players’ credit, our Penguins don’t get outclassed very often. But, man oh Manischewitz, we sure did last night. The Los Angeles Kings, an intriguing blend of Stanley Cup holdovers and young up-and-comers that may serve as a model for future Pens teams, skated over, around and through us with shocking ease en route to a decisive 6-2 triumph.
No empty-netters to pad the margin of victory or make the outcome appear worse than it was. Plain and simple, the Kings took us to the woodshed.
Although we opened the game flatter than the proverbial pancake, Tristan Jarry made a couple of big saves early. At 4:42, Kris Letang ventured deep into the Kings’ zone and swept the puck in off Jonathan Quick’s skate blade from below the goal line.
Great play. Pens up, one-zip. Business as usual, right?
To quote Arnold Schwarzenegger from The Terminator, “Wrong.” The Kings responded with several wide-open looks. With just over six minutes remaining in the opening frame Anze Kopitar buried one from the high slot off a juicy turnover to knot the score at 1-1.
Stung by the goal, the black and gold responded with some sustained pressure. But Quick, who appears to be reborn at age 36 following several down seasons, lived up to his name while robbing Jeff Carter, Chad Ruhwedel and Evan Rodrigues on Grade-A chances.
With 5:28 to go in the second period, fellow greybeard Dustin Brown beat Jarry on the power play from the side of the net. Abandoned by his defense (John Marino in particular), No. 35 had no chance as Brown was given about a half-hour to switch from forehand to backhand and snap the puck beneath his outstretched glove.
Although thoroughly outplayed, the Pens battled back to tie the score at 2-all early in the third. Teddy Blueger found Radim Zohorna cruising in the slot with a pass out of the corner, and “Big Z” ripped it past Quick. As incredible as it seemed given their lackluster play, our guys had a chance to snag a point or two.
Then the roof caved in. Ninety seconds later Mikey Anderson beat Jarry with a blast from the right point. With our top defensive tandem trapped up ice, Viktor Arvidsson finished off a 2-on-oh (no) with Trevor Moore off the ensuing faceoff. Four-two, Kings.
The blitz continued. Playing the Polish horse cavalry to L.A.’s German Panzers, the Pens yielded a second goal to Kopitar, left unattended by the side of the net, just 73 seconds after Arvidsson’s tally. Three goals allowed in just 83 seconds. Shameful.
Our capitulation complete, we watched while Sean Durzi hammered another shot past Jarry from long range at 18:20 to drive the final nail into our coffin. Mercifully bringing an end to as one-sided an affair in the opposite direction as I’ve witnessed in a long time. Or hope to see again.
Puckpourri
The game was pretty much total domination by the Kings. They ruled in shot attempts (70-49), shots on goal (45-29)…including 20-8 in the second period…and faceoffs (59 percent). Indeed, we were on the wrong side of the puck all night long…especially our ‘d’…which pretty much left Jarry to fend for himself.
Tristan faced down 25 high-danger chances, a staggering number, and managed 39 saves in all. But the ceaseless pressure eventually took its toll.
All but five Penguins finished with a minus. The lone bright spot? The makeshift line of Blueger, Zohorna and Dominik Simon. Each collected a point and finished a plus-two while dominating in Corsi (71.43). Zohorna’s tally is his third in 11 NHL games. I’m telling ya’, this kid can play. Mike Sullivan and his staff need to find a spot for him…even at the expense of an old favorite.
Drew O’Connor (three shots on goal) replaced Anthony Angello. Carter fired off a game-high seven shots, but finished a minus-two. Following an extended hot streak, Sidney Crosby hasn’t scored a point in three games. He has but one goal in his past 11 games, a worrisome trend. Aftereffects of his wrist surgery?
Rodrigues, too has cooled (no points in three). In my humble opinion, he’s being wasted on Sid’s right flank. Although I don’t have the numbers in front of me, E-Rod’s far more dangerous and productive on his off (left) wing or at center.
The Pens (21-10-5, 47 points) are presently in fourth place in the Metro, two points behind the Capitals and five points behind the division leading Rangers. Next…on to San Jose for a Saturday night match-up before finishing our six-game road trip in Vegas on Monday night.
Rick
I didn’t see the game last night but listened to it on the radio and by all accounts we sucked. It’s one game
and as I said before you can’t get to high or to low and to be totally honest we were way overdue for this
type of game.
The thing that does worry me is one Crosby’s wrist and two Malkin’s play. Phil Bourque was extremely critical
of Geno last night and the type of game he played. He said he saw the negative parts of Malkin’s game leaking
back into his play and this is exactly what a lot of us were worried about with his return to the lineup. Look
Malkin is a HOF – The one thing I felt was a problem with both Geno and Letang was neither player was willing to
make the necessary adjustments in their games as they aged. To Letang’s credit he’s toned his way down and it’s
been effective and Geno needs to follow suit.
Couple of questions & observations:
1) Does Malkin fit with this team? “Poking the Bear”
2) Does Crosby appear injured? He got crushed in the face-off circle last night.
3) We still had a bunch of regulars out for last nights game. I love the fact their giving the kids a good look and
most of us love Big”Z” but are they ready for prime time and a physical seven game playoff series?
4) I would play Angello ahead of Bjorkqvist.
5) Simon – we’ve seen this act before – he works his butt off his possession numbers are always good and the
numbers people are in La, La land. Let’s be honest Simon couldn’t score on The Other Rick -LOL
“Poked the Bear – again”
I look forward to everyone’s feedback.
Hey Mike,
1) First Bear Response – No Malkin doesn’t fit this team. He is a winner and this team is going to lose. It will not rise back up to truly challenge for a Cup until Sullivan is gone. Until Papa Smurf gets cancelled, this team will always be too small and will get killed in the playoffs.
2) My biggest fear is and has always been that Sid’s wrist injury is threatening.
3) Had the Pens coach been easing these kids into game situations over the last couple of seasons, then your question would be moot. We would know whether these kids would ever be ready and could have moved on from those that wouldn’t be ready. The team has had many opportunities to give some kids some playing time. I called Sullivan out last season on the number of games he could have given Big Z and others time to get used to the NHL in less than important games against weak teams.
4) Yes I too would play Angello over Bjorkqvist but Bjorkqvist, Puustenin, Poulin, Legare, and Bellerive over Simon. If I was WBS’ head coach, I wouldn’t even use him there.
5) My response is 2 – fold here. One in response to stats and one in response to poking the bear,
a) Stats, once again, morons should not be permitted to look at stats. Unless a person has critical thinking skills to understand all of the confounding variables affecting a particular stat, in this case CORSI. they should leave stat analysis up to scientists. Over the course of his career, Simon has a O Zone Start% of 60.4% while his O Zone Face Off% of 56.9%. When the human pylon is on the ice, the Pens start in the O-zone and end up in the D zone. Furthermore, his CORSI drops considerably when Crosby isn’t on the ice with him. It also drops considerably when the score is within 1 goal – up or down. Simon stinks!!!!!
b) No, Simon would never be able to score on me. Actually I was a pretty good Goalie. Simon can only score on England and France. And Rick B. France capitulated after only 2 weeks, when Paris was threatened. Poland fought to the ruin of their Capital.
Sorry, Meant to write Sid’s wrist injury is Career threatening.
The Other Rick
I just want to respond to a couple of your comments. First, all of us know how talented of a player
Geno is and has been for the Pens. The problem I have with him is he refuses to change his game
to compensate for his age. You have to make adjustments. He continues to make the same
mistakes that my Son was scolded for in Pee Wee Hockey – that can’t happen. Second, I agree with
you on Sully regarding size and toughness but the guy can coach and like I mentioned in a previous
comment he would’t be out of work for more than 15 minutes. Third when I referred to Malkin not
being a good fit it had nothing to do with his talent but he has to find a way to blend his game in
with the rest of the team if they want to have continued success.
Also, one last comment as I get ready for the Pen’s vs Sharks this evening. It looks like at least for
now the Pen’s made a good call on Legare and Poulin who have recently been demoted to the
press box in Wilkes Barre.
GO PENS
Hey Mike,
Mike, there are things we agree with and things we don’t – Sullivan is one of the areas we don’t. I don’t separate Sullivan’s allergy to Size and Toughness from any other part of his coaching acumen. If his huberis and refusal to accept that his butter soft teams cannot win once the play gets playoff tough are more than enough for me to demand him being fired. As for Sullivan not being out of work long; maybe, maybe not. The friends of Dan Bylsma said the same thing – they were sort of right. Bylsma missed a season then shuffled off to Buffalo, after only 1 season of unemployment. With Crosby, Malkin, and MAF to cover-up Bylsma’s pathetic coaching ability, that ersatz coach built a 0.668 regular season Pnts%. When he was forced to actually have to coach a team along the US – Canadian border he struggled to a 0.485 regular season Pnts% over the next 2 seasons, finishing 7th and 8th in the division. Next he then spent from June 2018 until May 2021 as an assistant in for the Red Wings and now has fallen further – he is plying his “talents” for the Seattle Kraken’s AHL affiliate, the Charlotte Checkers. Without generational players Bylsma can’t collect an NHL paycheck as a Head Coach and Sullivan may just go the same route sans Sid and Geno.
As for Geno, when he skated with Guentzel and Rust he checked in as the best 5-on-5 forward in the league and raised his wingers game, that was less than 2 seasons ago. It is not that Geno doesn’t fit the Penguins, Sullivan opts to put him in a position to minimize his talents with players that have no chemistry with him. If you say Geno will never win the Selke, I agree. In his first game back, he did hustle back to try and cover for a wandering 7th or 8th level Defensemen (Rhuwhedel) that Sullivan keeps trying to insist is an NHL regular but who was wandering all the way up from the corner to the point chasing the puck rather than playing defense. The bad guys scored on the play, but not because Geno didn’t try. They scored because Rhuwhedel was wandering, Jarry was flopping, and Geno, tried but didn’t know how to effectively handle the Ana forwards. But in his defense, he is paid mainly to play offense.
As for Legare and Poulin, since I have not been able to follow them closely, I won’t comment why their numbers aren’t lighting up the AHL. I do know that Poulin picked up an assist Friday night on Nylander’s goal in a 4 – 3 loss to Lehigh and Legare was a +1, but D’Orio leaked in 3 Goals on 15 shots.
If WBS is trying to defang Poulin and Legare (29 PIM and 18 PIM respectively) to match Sullivan’s Smurf image then that may explain why they aren’t doing well. I am pretty sure Val D’or wasn’t asking them to be Ice Dancers for the Ice Capades.
Also, Zohorna only had 2 more points than Poulin in 1 less game before getting his call up but you say you like Zohorna and want to see more of him. Legare has 4 less points in 1 more game as well and 1 of those points was one of the precious few GWG earned by a baby Penguin. The differences between Zohorna, Poulin, and Legare are hardly staggering and could be attributed to something other than the player – like the players around them or the coaching.
Hey Mike,
Hope you don’t mind my 2 cents.
Malkin is indeed a world class talent. However he is not the Malkin of 2016. He is 35 years old and has a family to consider. I read international media quoting his wife that Geno will return to Russia to play in the KHL once more before he retires from Hockey. That is very important to him. He lives in Russia and he works in Pittsburgh temporarily. Just like Crosby.
So when you ASKED THE EXCELLENT QUESTION , #1 ABOVE,there are several issues to consider.
1. Time is not on Malkin’s side.
2. He will not give up his commitment to play in the KHL for ” a couple of years ” as Russian media has reported previously.
3. I believe he wants to win another Stanley Cup before he leaves the NHL.There is the rub Mike.
Malkin is NOT interested in going to the second or even third round of the NHL play offs and get beaten. It might please the fans but it does nothing for his career goals. He needs another Cup win and this current Pen’s team does not have the talent or any elite super stars in the farm system to help him achieve his goal.
So what is he supposed to do ? What would you do ? Resign a 2 year contract for $ 6.5 million and still know that the 3 million dollar salary cut he gave us will have to go to resign the Goalie or maybe get us a number 4 or 5 d man.
That does not change a thing from his perspective. This teams needs 5 or 6 new players with talent and size to be a real CUP FAVORITE.
So I would conclude by saying that in the big picture Malkin has to be moved and in that package we need to be sure that we get a great return for him! High prospects, high draft picks and a replacement center with talent and a decent salary. (Maybe the team he gets traded to will hold some salary.) I can only hope.
Of course I realize with his Contract nothing happens unless he wants it to !!
Thanks for the great comments above. I am interested to hear your response Mike .
thanks
Jim
Hey Jim,
Hope you don’t mind my 2 Cents to your comment.
I do like Malkin. Offensively, he has been the second best Center this team has ever had, 3rd best offensive player. But I am a Pens fan over any single player. If Malkin does want to chase another Cup before returning to the KHL I get it and I won’t hold him from that goal. As I said I like Malkin and would give him what he wants. However 2 things.
1) I don’t believe a whole lot that I read in the media, nor do I believe a spouse always knows their significant other’s heart. Often times significant other’s try to manipulate one another through words spoken to third parties and always the media reports whatever it pleases (truth be damned) to stir the pot (poke the bear) to create controversy and readership.
2) If Malkin does want out and wants to go to Fla and Fla wants him, as all the media sewage would like us to believe, then make it worth it for the Penguins. If Fla wants Malkin, I want Anton Lundell. If you recall, I wanted the Pens to find a way to trade up to get him when he came out in the draft. He has 21 points in 33 GP including 1 Short Handed Assist and is a +12 right now.
Fla gets a proven Playoff performer to lead them to a Cup if they truly are in Win now mode. And our Pens get a young top 6 Center that can score and play both ends of the rink.
However, Smellivan still has to go!!!! to truly be a contender. His stupidity of unidimensional Smurfs will always condemn this team to regular season passable play and playoff pathos.
Jim
Happy to get your thoughts. I understand everyone wants Malkin, Letang and Crosby to retire as
Penguins but in this era that’s more of a rarity than the norm.
I personally don’t see Malkin’s body holding up for another 3 or 4 years. He struggles right now to
stay injury free. If the Pen’s really want to renew Malkin or Letang’s contract it should be a one
year deal followed by a team option on a 2nd year. This has to be a solid business decision by
Hextall and to lock either player up on a 3 or 4 year deal would be death.
As far as trading Malkin – as much as you and I would like to think we would get a great return I
doubt it would be better than a couple of really good prospects or possibly a 1st rounder and a
prospect and that would probably be generous. Malkin will turn 36 in July and with him wanting to
return to Russia to play one year deals are really the only viable option at this point. I don’t see any
team giving up anything substantial knowing his intentions to leave for the KHL.
I would also use the same approach with Letang. It doesn’t make good business sense to give him
more than a 2yr deal and I would consider moving him if the offer was right.
Jim we need a bounce back game vs the Sharks tonight. I know you’re not going to win them all and
Lord know’s we were due for a bad game but I didn’t like our loss against the Kings because it was due
to a lack of effort. We can’t have a repeat performance tonight. GO PENS
Hey Rick,
Quick (not Jonathan Quick but quick none-the-less) history lesson; Polish Cavalry attacking German Panzers is Apocryphal. Yes, Poland, like Germany, France, Russian, and several other countries still fielded a horse Cavalry in 1939. However, like most of their neighbors Polish Cavalry was shifting to Mechanized Cavalry; TKS tankettes, and 7TP and 7TPjw light tanks. However, the bulk of the German armor were Pz Is and IIs which were inferior to the far more modern Polish 7TPjw. There were precious few Pz IIIEs and Pz IVDs. THerefore, almost all of the German Pz were destroyed fighting Poland. That is why the Sitskrieg happened. Germany had nothing to fight with while they rebuilt its destroyed armor.
Now to our Penguins; Sorry the game was way to late for me to watch. I had to be up at 3:30. Since I didn’t see the game, I can’t say anything positive about Sullivan’s decision to keep a completely unbalanced line of Guentzel-Crosby-Rodrigues together – 3 Lefties on 1 line when you have several Righties on the roster, including a big guy (Carter). Their ineffectiveness doesn’t surprise me any, given how unbalanced that line is.
Another interesting point, Papa Smurf pulled out Angello, put in Pylon Smurf and the team lost. Yes Pylon smurf was a +2, padding his stats, but the team lost. Just saying
Hey Other Rick,
Thanks for setting me straight on WWII history. Obviously, I bit hook-line-and-sinker on the apocryphal account. As we discussed, I guess it was actually German air superiority that tipped the balance. But I digress.
As Mike said, every team serves up a stinker once in a while. And it’s easy to overlook that we’re playing without a host of regulars…Heinen, McGinn, Rust, ZAR and Zucker to be precise. BUT…there are causes for concern. The defense was God-awful last night. Throughout our winning streak, we were able to keep opponents back on their heels with our forecheck, which hopefully will continue once we get everyone back and healthy. But the Kings (and the Stars) were able to turn the tables on us and pressure our defense down low. Needless to say, we didn’t hold up very well.
The total lack of physicality drives me nuts, but other teams play that way, too. The era of stick-on-puck instead of knock-’em-on-their-arse defense. Still, I would make getting a physical d-man who can play a priority, although I can already see Sullivan turning his nose up at such an addition.
I’ll wrap-up by saying that cracks have definitely appeared in our armor…ones that could cost us come the postseason…especially against a fast, grinding opponent that can pressure our ‘d.’
Rick
Rick,
One of the reasons I am not too excited about this team is the inverse of what you use as an excuse for our clunker last game, a host of players being out. Our Penguins aren’t the only team that is suffering from players being out. In fact several of teams we played during our winning streak were also without important players. Our Penguins winning streak didn’t impress me because it was against low end teams (except for the Caps) all with players out. If we excuse our team’s loss because of players being out, we have to acknowledge many of our victories were less than impressive as well.
My concerns are these;
1) Back-up Goaltending. DeSmith has been inconsistent at the best of times, abysmal at other times..
2) As Mike mentioned Crosby’s Wrist. Right now, even though he has been skating with Guentzel and Rust a lot and when Rust is not in Rodrigues. Crosby is on pace for his lowest 5-on-5 shots/60 of his career (7.05). Right now his 5-on-5 points/60 ranks 81st among forwards with 200 or minutes played (2.13), while Guentzel checks in at 7th in the league at 3.29, Rust at 11th with 3.15 and Rodrigues at 62nd with 2.27. Sid isn’t carrying his line, his line mates are carrying him. How many shots did he pass up last night? Three forwards x 32 teams puts Sid barely in 1st line territory.
3) Simon, ZAR, and Zucker getting any TOI at all. Simon’s 5-on-5 Pnts/60 is 252nd in the league among Forwards. However, his D Zone starts per 60 5 on 5 are among the lowest in the league for Forwards at 66th (6.12). ZAR is better than Simon defensively but his Pnts/60 lands him at 277th. And I am sorry Mike, I do believe Zucker can still be an effective Forward but out west. He can’t blame Malkin this season. His Pnts/60 of 1.34 checks in at 247 despite having even lower D Zone starts than Simon (5.51) checking in at the 42nd lowest D Zone starts among Forwards.
4) Opponents are only hitting our Penguins 25 times per 60 minutes right now. Over the last 3 playoff seasons those numbers were 43, 38, and 43. I honestly don’t see these D-men surviving.
5) Starting Goaltending. With no back-up Goalie, I worry about Jarry being able to play nearly 70 Games. And until he proves he can play in the playoffs (assuming the Pens make the Playoffs), now under Chiodo’s Tutelage I will worry. He is the least of my 5 worries, but I still worry
Hi Rick,
Take a look over our shoulders buddy….There a lot of teams starting to move up. Boston,Colorado,Vancouver,Calgary and Edmonton will wake up too. ( They have way to much talent ). Add in Columbus and Detroit….and we can not forget Washington is playing injured as well and they were forced to play the kids like we were in 2016. Now they have a center man, a d man ans a winger who will probably stay with the big club when they get healthy.
We are not guaranteed a thing here yet Rick. We lose a goalie ,or 1 of 2 defense men and we are sunk.
There is a lot of hockey to be played yet and WE are at a major disadvantage. We have NO CAP SPACE to buy any new talent where as many of our competition do.. Plus President Brian Burke said the pens were all thru trading away first round picks to get a 20% chance to win a cup..This month will be very interesting for our team.
Jim
Sobering thoughts Rick…
Once again the Kings are not a team we should be worried about if you go by the numbers. But that is the thing. Hockey is NOT played by the numbers…But on the ice. This should be a wake up call for all to see. A really fast, big, physical team with an elite NHL caliber goalie and three lines of qualified players can take us apart. Same with the last three years in the play offs Rick.. The very same thing happened.
Our defense can not stop the BIG forwards and a mobile defense corps. They wear us down.
I was surprised how good the Kings were Rick but again that is dictated by the opposition they play.
One game does not make a season but this could be the canary in the coal mine… I wonder what the Brass will do ???
Your thoughts buddy …. I know Coach will have lots to say…
Thanks Rick
Cheers
Jim
Hey Jim,
I didn’t get a chance to see the game. I had to get up way to early this AM. But you are 100% right, this Kings team is not a scary team. I am not so sure how Hextall and Burke are looking at this. They said they were going to bring more snarl to this team but I haven’t seen it. I can’t help but feel like Mugatu from Zoolander – Am I taking crazy pills here, this is the same look Penguins; Blue Steel, Le Tigre, it is the same look!!!!
What in the name of Wide World Sports possessed Smellivan to pull out Angello in favor of Simon?
But in the end, the black and gold defense will be their Achilles Heel. There is no true top paring. worse, there is no depth. All we have is effectively a middle pairing with a bottom pairing and a whole bunch of 7th thru 10th Defensemen. The closer and closer we get to the playoffs and then the playoffs, when teams hit and cut off time and space, they will crumble.
I am getting tired of writing it. I want Hextall to be a seller at the deadline. I want him to admit the obvious, the team Sullivan and JR constructed cannot win.
Hello anonymous..Thanks for responding..
.I fully agree with you that the Pen’s should be sellers in February. Will it happen ?
Probably not but there is hoping that the Fenway group that just spent apx 900 million to buy the Pens will force the issue.
I get the idea of loyalty to your players and everyone would wish that Geno,Sid,and Kris could all retire as Penguins, but the business model for the NHL has changed.The flat salary Cap and now Covid are real issues to consider moving forward. Please understand that i want to see Sid lift the Cup this year. But being a realist that will not happen. with out serious changes to the roster…and we have no $$$$ to do it. Selling is the only way !
Cheers
JIM.
Hey that was me the Other Rick, I just forgot to type my name in before I hit post.
I like Sid and Geno, but am ambivalent about Kris.
Right now the ideas I have are these,
1) Zucker, Kapanen, and POJ for Boeser, Podokolzn, and at least this coming Vancouver first round pick. If JR paid 1st round picks for Zucker and Kappy once, he will do it again.
2) Matheson to Seattle for Giordano and we get out from under his contract.
3) Letang to anyone willing to give up a 1st round pick, preferable some who will finish in the bottom 10 this season or the bottom 2 next season.
4) Rodrigues to a fringe team thinking that they need a Center to lift them up. Aim for their 1st round pick and hope they fail so I can have 2 or 3 picks in the top 15.
5) Resign Geno to a team friendly 2 or 3 year contract.
6) I may even be talked into flipping Podokolzn or Boesser for another 1st round pick as well.
Still would love to find 1 more 1st round pick in this coming draft.
Hey Jim,
Yeah, this is the second time on the road trip that a team with some size, speed and ability has turned the tables on us and exposed our defense. And, as you so aptly pointed out, neither the Stars and Kings are an upper-echelon team.
The only thing I can say in our defense (no pun intended)…we were missing Heinen, McGinn, ZAR, Rust and Zucker. That’s a lot of speed, ability and forecheck to have stashed in mothballs.
But I am concerned about our defense and their unwillingness to take the body. I know that’s not what they’re taught to do or how they’re coached these days. But sometimes you just have to knock someone on their keister. Or at least get in the way a la Ian Cole.
Marino, in particular, seems loathe to put the body on anyone.
Rick