To borrow from an old Tom Petty classic, the Penguins are free fallin.’
Losers of four in a row, they’ve plummeted not only to the Metro Division cellar alongside the Flyers but the infernal regions of the NHL, outpacing only the woeful Blackhawks and Canucks.
Although the quality of our next foes has eased slightly, the black-and-gold has traditionally never had an easy time of it on the West Coast, where they’ll take on the Kings, Ducks and Sharks.
To put it bluntly, we’re in dire straits.
As for securing a playoff berth?
I’ll use former Saints coach Jim Mora’s time-honored rant as a response. “Playoffs!? Don’t talk about playoffs! You kidding me? Playoffs!?”
Indeed, barring a miracle turnaround, about the only thing to root for now is for our Pens to finish poorly enough to secure a top-five pick (or better) in the upcoming draft. And, yes, there is a projected franchise player who’ll be eligible, 17-year-old, right-shot, puck-moving defenseman Landon DuPont, who’s currently a freshman at the University of Michigan. Son of Micki DuPont, who briefly played for the Pens back in 2006-07.
I can’t help but think, privately if not publicly, POHO/GM Kyle Dubas is fine with the direction the team is tanking…er…taking. Perhaps even thrilled.
Far be it from me to have a suspicious nature. However, I can’t help but think he’s set the team up to fail. Maybe it wasn’t completely intentional—Dubas did add what appear to be some promising pieces for the future in forwards Hendrix Lapierre and Nick Robertson and especially emerging defenseman Kaedan Korczak. However, for every right move there was a corresponding misstep (Andrei Kuzmenko, Trevor van Riemsdyk). And the sum of the parts he’s assembled clearly isn’t adding up to a successful hockey team.
The Pens are eventually going to need a top-five pick (or two or three) before all is said and done. Especially when franchise icons Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang ride off into the sunset and sidekick Erik Karlsson moves on to greener pastures.
Securing a player of DuPont’s pedigree would certainly make for a fine start, as well providing a most necessary building block.
If this is the course the Pens are on, and at this stage it appears to be set in stone, I have one request. Bring up kids who appear to have nothing left to prove in the AHL like Rutger McGroarty and Avery Hayes and give them a defined role. If it means clearing out a couple of veterans and/or fringe players to make room, so be it.
Better to start finding out what you’ve got in the kids than to waste the season losing with guys who aren’t going to be part of the team’s future.
Make the pain of this season count for something.
The quick and dirty answer is yes, Dubas is a sniveling coward employing a passive-aggressive tactic to create an atmosphere in which Sid, Geno, and Letang don’t want to take part so that they either don’t want to re sign or request trades. He has to know that he will look like the biggest horses backside even if doesn’t trade them but turns down their public offer to re sign. He is garbage and is the biggest raod block to this team. I do not want him incharge of a rebuild. He has already shown what his ideas are. He was just as culpable to the Leafs’ problems anyone else in Toronto as our Penguins look exactly like those Leaf teams and the black and Gold at its best last season was only a middle of the road team getting wiped out in the first round.