Last season there were a few big moves that dramatically altered the path of the 2015-16 Pittsburgh Penguins. It started with Jim Rutherford making a coaching change replacing Mike Johnston with Mike Sullivan. It continued with personnel moves which complimented Mike Sullivan’s up paced tempo. Those moves included trading Rob Scuderi for Trevor Daley and moving the slower David Perron for a much speedier Carl Hagelin.
Carl Hagelin became an integral piece of what was the HBK line. It was the best “third… line in the NHL and caused matchup nightmares for the opposition who had to choose between using their best defensive players against Crosby, Malkin, or HBK. The Penguins hadn’t had this kind of three pronged approach since the departure of Jordan Staal.
Carl Hagelin’s tenure with the Penguins last year could not have gone any better. He was driving possession and was also producing offense at a better clip than any point of his career.
Fast forward to this season and the offense has dried up and considerably so on the goal-scoring front. In 37 games during the regular season Carl Hagelin had ten goals last year. In 38 games this year it is down to five with two goals coming in his last three games.
Where should realistic expectations of Hagelin be set after seeing him at his peak and then his sample this season?
Here is a comparison of his regular season sample when he arrived in Pittsburgh last year and what his sample is so far this year in the regular season
He is down from career best hot streak, but he is in line with his career sample on the possession front and the expected goals front. He is still a good player. His offense is significantly down from last year and is lower than his career average. He could be experiencing a cold streak. His larger sample speaks to him having a higher ceiling than what he has provided so far in 2016-17.
His goal scoring is down, but that has never been the driving force of his game. He has a career high of 17 goals which is what the Penguins got out of Chris Kunitz each of the past two seasons.
If the expectation is for Hagelin to perform like he did during the Penguins Stanley Cup run last spring you will be left disappointed. If the expectation is that he remains a player capable of driving play and approaching top six offensive levels then he is pretty much where he has always been. It remains a good trade for the Penguins and they should be able to receive good value on his cap hit into the future.
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