It appears the Pittsburgh Penguins are staying true to their word about revamping the fourth line. Tom Kuhnhackl was not given a qualifying offer by the team while Jim Rutherford spoke highly of Teddy Blueger. Not good news for unrestricted free agent Carter Rowney. Riley Sheahan also did not receive a qualifying offer and he will become a free agent on July 1st. The Penguins are not giving up on Sheahan. They will try to sign him. They just didn't want to deal with arbitration that Sheahan was eligible for.
Daniel Sprong and Dominik Simon both signed one-way two-year deals with the team at 750k apiece. Ideally Sprong would play up in the top nine with Simon staying on the fourth line.
Also, it appears the Penguins are being tied to Anthony Duclair
NEW on @pghhockeyNOW: Source with knowledge, social media tip #Pens' interest in free-agent winger Anthony Duclair https://t.co/9R7UEiVqTY pic.twitter.com/tTvclhqaVi
— Matt Gajtka (@MattGajtka) June 26, 2018
He is already going to be playing for his fourth professional team in what will be his fifth professional season. Players who do that usually don't rebound. In this case it is worth the risk. He won't be commanding a lot of money for that reason and he fits the mold of trying to ice four scoring lines. He is a former 20 goal scorer, but eight of those goals that year were on the power play, something he'll never see enough of in Pittsburgh. That said he can skate fast and there is at list a touch of offensive upside that you don't always get when you're focused on grit or whatever magical PK specialists bring.
Duclair would be a clear upgrade due to his shooting and passing skills that the previous guy just didn't have
Duclair on the cheap is one of those offseason moves that you can get done really cheap in July or one you can overpay for at the deadline. No need to throw draft picks away when you can just make an incredibly low risk signing in the offseason that you could get out of easily if it doesn't work.
These are the risks that have upside and the ones worth taking when you already have the hard to get pieces.
Thanks for reading!