The Dubas Plan: Stockpile Draft Picks for Our Penguins

I can not tell a lie.

Well, actually, that’s not true. I can tell a lie. It just never works out very well when I do.

All silliness aside, I more or less pirated the idea for this article from Hooks Orpik over on Pensburgh, who does an excellent job of summing up our current collection of draft picks in his article, “Cody Glass trade highlights Penguins’ summer of “something for nothing.”

Hooks correctly identifies Kyle Dubas’ focus on acquiring draft capital, with all other concerns (such as genuinely improving the team) secondary or even tertiary. If a player such as Kevin Hayes or Cody Glass happen to come along as part the package…bonus.

Dubas has, indeed, added impressively to our heretofore meager stockpile of draft choices. He added a third-round pick from the Blues (through Ottawa) in the 2025 Entry Draft and the Blues’ second-round pick in the ’26 draft for Hayes. The Wild’s third-round pick in ’25 and the Preds’ sixth-rounder in ’26 came in the Glass deal.

Earlier in the summer, he acquired a pair of picks from the Rangers (5^th in ’25, 2^nd in ’27) for Reilly Smith. The Rangers’ fourth-rounder in ’27 came in last spring’s deadline deal for Chad Ruhwedel. The Sharks’ third-round pick in ’26 was part of the Erik Karlsson blockbuster.

To digress, here’s what our bingo card looked like for the ’21 through ’24 drafts.

Round	’21	’22	’23	’24
1	None	1	1	None
2	1	None	None	2
3	None	None	1	None
4	None	1	None	1
5	1	1	1	None
6	None	2	1	1
7	3	None	2	2

 

Needless to say, there were more holes than a hunk of Swiss cheese.

Again, borrowing heavily (okay, stealing) from Pensburgh, compare that with our stockpile of picks for the ’25, ’26 and ’27 drafts.

Round	’25	’26	’27
1	1	1	1
2	None	2	2
3	3	2	1
4	1	1	2
5	2	None	1
6	1	1	1
7	1	1	1

 

A pretty impressive turnaround, eh?

Of course, possessing a slew of draft picks doesn’t guarantee a cache of future NHL talent. According to a study conducted by John Barr on Soundofhockey.com for players drafted between 2000 and 2012, here’s the probability of draftees playing at least 50 NHL games by round.

Round	Percent (%)
1	82
2	44
3	32
4	24
5	23
6	20
7	14

 

Still, it’s a lot better to have the picks than not. To borrow from an old Bill Withers’ tune, “nothin’ from nothin’ leaves nothin’.”

In the late ’90s and early 2000s, then-Pens GM Craig Patrick and chief scout, Greg Malone, turned a sinking franchise around by drafting brilliantly, unearthing the likes of Colby Armstrong, Paul Bissonnette, Daniel Carcillo, Erik Christensen, Alex Goligoski, Tyler Kennedy, Ryan Malone, Matt Moulson, Brooks Orpik, Michel Ouellet, Max Talbot, Rob Scuderi, Joe Vitale and Ryan Whitney, mostly in the later rounds. To say nothing of franchise pillars Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Marc-Andre Fleury.

An extraordinary amount of talent gleaned over a relatively brief period of time.

While it may be too much to hope for, perhaps Dubas and his staff will enjoy similar success.