The Penguins swung a minor trade today with Buffalo. In exchange for defensemen Caleb Jones and Daniel Laatsch, we acquired blueliner Ryan Johnson.
A 31st overall pick of the Sabres in 2019, the 25-year-old Johnson is a left shot who goes 6’1” 195 pounds. He played in 41 games with the Sabres as a rookie pro in 2023-24 and tallied seven assists to go with a plus-3. He registered some decent 5v5 metrics, including a 52.5 Corsi, 56.41 Goals for Percentage and 51.52 Expected Goals for Percentage.
Save for a pair of three-game stints, he’s spent most of the past couple seasons skating for Rochester of the AHL. Like recently acquired Spencer Stastney, Johnson is regarded as a plus-skater. Physical play is not his forte (11 hits in 47 NHL games).
The son of former NHL forward Craig Johnson, Ryan played collegiate hockey at the University of Minnesota.
Jones, 29, made the Pens out of training camp last season and did a decent job skating alongside rookie Harrison Brunicke before suffering a broken foot in the seventh game of the season. Setbacks continued to snowball and Jones never regained his early footing, if you’ll pardon the expression.
A seventh-round pick of the Pens in 2021, the rangy 6’5” Laatsch split last season between the Nailers and Baby Pens in his first pro season. The 24-year-old was one of the few remaining draftees from the Ron Hextall era.
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