No Defense for (or from) Penguins Defense

In football there’s a phenomena known as the “lookout” block. That’s when an offensive lineman, having blown his assignment, turns and yells, “Lookout!” to his quarterback.

I have a feeling the Penguins’ goalies are gonna hear that a lot this season. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Lately I’ve been perusing articles and comments from other Penguins sites and, frankly, am flummoxed and mystified by what I’ve read. Many opinions are quite upbeat about our chances of returning to the playoffs this coming season, citing improved depth as a cause for optimism.

Incredibly, some of these folks even have the chutzpah to knock other teams like the Bruins for signing human road grader Nikita Zadorov. (We should screw up so good.)

Are they seeing what I’m seeing? Our aging core, while still capable, is another year older. Anyone want to lay odds on the chances of Messrs. Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang and Erik Karlsson once again navigating a full NHL slate without collectively missing a game?

If so, I’ll take that action.

Yet the sunny-side-uppers insist we’ve got a shot. If we stay healthy. If new assistant David Quinn fixes the power play. If newcomers Anthony Beauvillier, Kevin Hayes and Matt Grzelcyk (not to mention incumbents Ryan Graves and Rickard Rakell) can bounce back. If our goaltending holds up.

If…if…if…

As the old saying goes, “If ifs and buts were candy and nuts, we’d all have a Merry Christmas.”

Back to my original point. Refurbished or not, I’m especially concerned about our defense. One aspect in particular. We’ve traditionally had difficulty defending our net-front under Mike Sullivan, who prefers puck-movers to stay-at-homers. Hence a blue line corps teeming with speedy lightweights.

In Sully’s hockey utopia, we’ll be inhabiting the other team’s zone most of the time. However, the hard, cold Corsi-based reality is, we have to defend our house the other 48.69 percent of the time. This is where it all comes crashing down, generally around our goalies’ ears.

The following table lists the even-strength defense WAR for the seven black-and-gold defensemen who figure to see at least semi-regular duty, courtesy of JFresh.

No WAR data is available for Jack St. Ivany and Ryan Shea, although it should be noted both were under water (below 50 percent) in virtually every key metric, according to Natural Stat Trick.

Yikes! With the notable exception of Marcus Pettersson, the rest of our defense is under the breakeven mark of 50. Some, like Grzelcyk, Karlsson and Letang, Marianas Trench under.

Then there’s the not-so-small matter of physically defending our crease. (On second thought, perhaps it is a small matter given the comparative lack of bulk among our defensemen.) Only Pettersson and kids St. Ivany and Ludvig show a consistent inclination to keep the net-front clear, and the latter two are anything but a lock to crack our top six.

Translation? Expect lots of long nights (and flashing red lights) for our goalies.

Although you wouldn’t know it by reading my recent articles, I hate to be so pessimistic about our chances. I’m actually a hopeful person at heart who much prefers to be optimistic.

I truly want to believe.

Maybe all I need is a prescription for a pair of those rose-tinted glasses, the kind writers from other sites seem to wear. However, in this case my naked eye doesn’t lie.

I’m just not finding a whole lot to like about our team as currently constructed.

Especially our defense…or lack of…as the case may be.

I need to be clear. This isn’t necessarily on the players themselves, but rather the person who assembled them as a group (cough…Kyle Dubas).

To quote Jessica Rabbit, “I’m not bad. I’m just drawn that way.”