One of the more intriguing situations heading into the summer of 2018 will be what the Penguins do with RFA Riley Sheahan. The current Penguins bottom six center came to the team during a midseason trade and certainly helped with the depth issues Pittsburgh was having. Sheahan was able to switch back and forth between a third and fourth line center role and put up his best offensive numbers since 2013-14. How much can the Penguins afford to commit to a player that likely won’t play third line minutes unless there is an injury?
Let’s start with what I think Riley Sheahan did best this past year and that was chip in offensively at 5v5 in a depth role. The Penguins had a hell of a time generating offense at even-strength during the early stretches of 2017-18. Sheahan was coming off a horrendous offensive year with the Red Wings and while you expected somewhat of a bounce back (especially playing behind Crosby and Malkin) I think most people were pleasantly surprised with his results.
Sheahan’s 1.69 5v5 points per 60 was actually higher than Sidney Crosby at 1.67. Only regulars Evgeni Malkin, Phil Kessel, and Jake Guentzel were better (Brassard was too, but that includes Ottawa).
Possession wise Sheahan has been slipping for a number of years and there was no bounce back there in 2017-18
These are relative numbers so you do have to keep that in mind. However, Detroit hasn’t been a beacon of possession like they used to be and he was sliding down every year there. You have to take into consideration that being on a better team isn’t going to help his relative possession numbers, but at the same time they were pretty low even when you do digest all the variables.
Even with the possession decline I believe that the amount of offense Sheahan provided more than made up for it. Sheahan also plays minutes on the penalty kill which is useful because he isn't a complete bum at 5v5. The team would avoid going down the"PK specialist" road where they get a useless player who hurts the team more than they help IE: Tom Kuhnhackl
I suppose the Sheahan situation boils down to what the Penguins want to do with Derick Brassard. A big part of why the trade made sense was that they were getting a cost controlled player for more than one year. I don’t understand the sentiment of wanting to move on from that because he got hurt and never rebounded in the playoffs. He did have a six game point streak prior to the injury and that isn’t padded by being on the first power play unit. I’m in no hurry to move on from the player/contract.
I suppose Brassard could play the wing. I personally still believe Brassard has more value to the Penguins at the third line center spot.
If the Penguins hang on to Brassard that would make Sheahan a luxury item in a fourth line center role. A very nice luxury item for your bottom six. It all depends what the cost is.
Here are some figures from Matt Cane
To see all of Matt’s salary predictions you can go to
this link
One thing about the chart above is that it doesn’t take into consideration Riley Sheahan will need a qualifying offer of 2.08M. I believe that falls in line with the overall values in the chart and I think the Penguins would be fine to offer a two-year deal to Sheahan at that number. The cap is up to 80M and I think it is worth spending the money to get a not-Carter Rowney player in that role. The Penguins have about 4.7M in cap space and could make things work. Jamie Oleksiak and Dominik Simon don’t have great cases for huge raises so while 2M seems like a lot on the surface all that matters is if the team can make it fit under the cap and they can. I would retain the current center depth if possible.
Thanks for reading!
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