Let’s Play Penguins GM 2022: Part 1

A couple of years back, I played armchair GM and offered my not-so humble opinions on what then Pittsburgh Penguins GM Jim Rutherford should have done in the off-season. If you go back to the summer of 2019 and look, I really wanted Rutherford to raid the European ranks for some good young, inexpensive talent, rather than shop the old high-priced veteran market of the NHL Unrestricted Free Agents. The 3 biggest desires I had was for the black-and-gold to sign Ilya Mikheyev (Wing), Oliwer Kaski (Right-Handed Defense), and Adam Reideborn (Goalie).

Rutherford instead chose to sign Oula Palve (Center) and Emil Larmi (Goalie). At the time I quipped that it would be funny if Mikheyev that turn out to be the next Artemi Panarin and Palve the next Sergei Plotnikov. Mikheyev was having a pretty strong inaugural season until he broke his wrist, had a slight drop off after that but turned in a good season this past year potting 21 Goals (G), including 4 Short Handed Goals (SHG), and 32 Points (Pnts). While those are not Panarin numbers, Palve never even laced up the skates once in the NHL. At least Plotnikov played a bit in his first season.

As for the other 3 players I wanted, Kaski was signed by the Detroit Red Wings (AHL affiliate – Grand Rapids Griffins) but struggled there. Before he could settle-in to North American hockey he was traded to the Carolina Hurricanes (AHL affiliate Charlotte Checkers). In Carolina, he started to get acclimated to the AHL. Unfortunately, for his North American hockey aspirations, Carolina was and is deep on Defense. He ran back to Europe and the KHL to Avangard Omsk. He had that thundering point shot that our Penguins haven’t had in quite some time.

Reideborn never did come to North America. He jumped from the SHL to the KHL where he had some real success with Ak Bars Kazan for 2 seasons, but last season had an off year with CSA Moskva.

That is the past. More recently (after game 7), our friend Rick Buker and I were talking, about what our Penguins should do, going forward. With a bit of a slow down with my clients – wanting to vacation, I figured I could play armchair GM again. So here goes….

The Penguins RFAs: First things first

Our Penguins have a boatload of Restricted Free Agents (RFAs); Niclas Almari, Justin Almeida, Jordy Bellerive, Kasper Bjorkqvist, Alex D’Orio, Jan Drozg, Danton Heinen, Kasperi Kapanen, Cameron Lee, Alexander Nylander, Pierre-Olivier Joseph, Will Reilly. In all, our Penguins have 12 RFAs. I tender qualifying offers to all except possibly Almeida and D’Orio.

Don’t mistake those Qualifying offers with me thinking any or all those players will ever make the NHL Roster. I just would want to keep them in the system for 1 more year while I garner other prospects to improve the pool. And in some cases (Heinen, Kapanen, Joseph), if anyone wants to pluck an RFA from our roster, they will need to pay us. I would not give up any of those players for free. Our Penguins have lost far too many players with the team realizing no return over these last few seasons and may yet lose a couple of others (Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang) without compensation.

Getting Cap Space to maneuver.

Before looking at the Unrestricted Free Agents, a plan to clear Cap space must made. I trade Jason Zucker, Brian Dumoulin, and Chad Ruhwedel.

Mike, please understand, I don’t want to disrespect Zucker. Even though he hasn’t really put up the numbers everyone envisioned, a lot of Zucker’s frustrations would seem to be from misuse of his talents. As I illustrated in a reply to Rick B, metrics would seem to indicate that Zucker should have been playing with the Captain, Sidney Crosby. So, please follow my idea.

To push forward my deals I would use the rights to my RFAs, Heinen, Kapanen, and Joseph, to sweeten the deals, if I had to package something.

I won’t wait for those trades to take place, I will bury Zucker and Dumoulin in the minors and dare some club to pluck them off waivers. If they don’t get claimed, I can then trade them as the deadline approaches.Let’s face it, all a team has to be is within striking distance at the trade deadline, they don’t need to be challenging for the Presidents Trophy.

However, I may not need to wait that long. In an article by Jon Lane on the NHL website, it appears the Ottawa Senators could possibly be persuaded into trading the 7^th pick in the draft for a top 4 Defensemen. The article states that they may be looking for a steadying hand back on their blue line to guide their youngsters into the next generation.

Looking at their roster, they could also use a real NHL calibre Left Wing (LW).

And lo and behold, according to Capfriendly they have a little over $23 million in Cap Space. My first call would be to Ottawa to see what kind of deal I could strike. I would definitely start with the idea of that 7^th Pick. To get that pick, I would also be willing to flip them my 1^st round pick plus those 2 players, but I would ask for at least one of Ottawa’s 2 – 2^nd round picks, since we traded our away.

I would even throw any of my RFA’s into that pot if they could get me into a top 10 pick.

I could then use that pick to garner one of the draft picks I was talking about (surely one would be available). In order of preference, I would look to grab 1A) Juraj Slafkovsky (F, Slovakia), 1B) David Ji?i?ek (RHD, Czech Republic), or 2) Šimon Nemec (RHD, Slovakia), 3) Conor Geekie (C, Canada).

If I didn’t have to swap 1^st round picks but got an extra No. 1 pick,  I would look to pluck any of the above players who may have slipped to my normal draft position, or if they are of the board I would then look at taking; 4) Isaac Howard (LW, USA), 5) Seamus Casey (RHD, USA), 6) Pavel Mintyukov (LHD, Russia but playing in Saginaw), 7) Ivan Miroshnichenko (LW, Russia).

I wouldn’t waste my number 1 pick on a USA kid or a Russian kid right now. Most of the prospects from the US have committed to college already. With Russian players, I do have interest in Mintyukov and Miroshnichenko, but I would be fearful of not being able to get them over here to North America any time soon.

How much Cap space did I save?

Looking at the numbers of the players and their Cap hits (in the table below) I would have between $25.818158 and $35.108158 in Cap space, depending on if I can trade Zucker and Dumoulin, (and Ruhwedel?). before the start of the season or if I have to bury them and only get the small break of a buried contract. (Since Ruhwedel’s contract is below $1 million I can bury the contract)

How would I spend that Cap Space: if I were GM?

This post is long enough, I will go through position by position to rebuild the team I just broke down n later installments.

Odds and Sods

• After 79 Games Played (GP) in 4 frustrating seasons, Juuso Riikola has left the Penguins. The Finnish Defenseman returned to Europe. Next season he will be plying his trade for IK Oskarshamn of the Swedish Hockey League (SHL). I guess that is 1 less decision I have to make.