Underwhelming (Penguins)

Things started off interestingly with the acquisition of Reilly Smith. We then got a basic fourth line signing with Matt Nieto. Then came the rush of exciting Erik Karlsson rumors. Then... meh.

I was pretty excited for the offseason and to see what kind of clever plays the Penguins could make with their cap space with either signings or trades and what we got was just so bland. Now, if you want be an optimist the Penguins as constructed today are very likely better than the ones who didn’t make the playoffs last year. Personally, I think the bar was really low and it would have been almost impossible not to improve upon last year’s team.

The lack of offense is what makes this so underwhelming for me. Depth scoring has been the Achille's heel of the Crosby and Malkin era. When they have it, they go on legit runs. When they don’t and have to lean on the top six for everything it never works. This team is still top heavy and currently over the cap. If you want to go all-in on bringing in vanilla forwards with minimal offensive profiles then you have to find the offense somewhere. Ryan Graves is a good player. His career high in points is 26. Brian Dumoulin had 25 points last year. I need more dynamic players with offensive upsides.

Jason Zucker took a one-year deal with the freaking Arizona Coyotes. He clearly wanted to wait out this offseason and try to cash in on the cap going up next year for his long-term deal. A Mikael Granlund buyout and you now have a Reilly Smith and a Jason Zucker. You can’t tell me Zucker wouldn’t take a one-year deal to stay in Pittsburgh if he got his 5M.

Lars Eller? C’mon. If you are going to add players with age, again, target the ones with dynamic offensive upsides. This is one of the most uninspired signings out there.

Last year this team was pretty unwatchable when Crosby or Malkin weren’t on the ice and I don’t think the entertainment value got much better. I have come to terms with things not being Cup or bust anymore, but I’d like to actually enjoy the viewing of the games. See some cool plays being made. This just reeks of a vanilla rudimentary approach and quite frankly it is boring. It is also betting on another year where Crosby and Malkin play all the games and play great. You can’t do that. They need help. They deserve help.

The Penguins after all these moves are still without a competent third line. They are running back another year of having two fourth lines. This was one of the most important tasks of the offseason. Anybody feel better with where they are here?

While the other signings were fine in a vacuum there is one that has a lot of a volatility. Dubas’ make or break move in his early tenure was attaching the Penguins wagon to Tristan Jarry. This was always going to be a difficult scenario. The goaltending market was thin. There’s nothing free agent wise I wish the Penguins would have done. The situation stunk and here we are. This is a situation where there were no great answers. The Penguins had to be proactive here and their last front office was anything but. Unless you were going to offer sheet Jeremy Swayman or trade for Connor Hellebuyck (and then give him a crazy extension) this was always the most likely outcome.

Alex Nedeljkovic should be an upgrade on Casey DeSmith and is 300k cheaper. He is going to have to play more than the 15 games he played last season for Detroit. We know Tristan Jarry cannot be run into the ground because no goalie should be handling those workloads from yesteryear.

I’m not out on Kyle Dubas. I just expected more than what we’ve gotten so far. I expected the depth signings cost less in order to allow the team another aggressive swing. The offseason isn’t over. Although, team is out of cap space and has limited assets so I’ll have tempered expectations now. Expectations which were much higher a week ago. Blah.

Thanks for reading!

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