You Asked And I Answered: Twitter Mailbag (Penguins)

Penguins

You Asked And I Answered: Twitter Mailbag

By Ryan Wilson

Jul 13, 2015 • 11:12 am

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There isn't much in the way of Penguins news lately so I took some questions from Twitter and are answering them on the blog. Let's begin.

For me the ideal fourth line moving forward should be trying to find more players who can make plays with the puck. The Penguins (and the entire league) should be trying to get away from the concept that a fourth line needs to be some kind of "energy line" that is predicated on body checks delivered long after the puck is already gone. You can play guys like Craig Adams that have absolutely no ceiling or you could attempt to play guys like Conor Sheary and see if they work out.

The way the Penguins roster is shaking out it looks like Sheary could be on the left side and Beau Bennett could be on the right side of the fourth line. That is light years ahead of having Tanner Glass on the left side and Craig Adams on the right. As for the fourth line center some believe that Oskar Sundqvist can take that spot, but Penguins General Manager Jim Rutherford is on record saying he is looking for a fourth line center.

Signing Stephen Weiss to a cheap one year deal coming off his buyout would be intriguing if the Penguins were looking to go the "four scoring lines" route.

The Eastern Conference pick is easy for me, the Buffalo Sabres. They could be adding as many as four quality top six forward options this year. The new additions are Jack Eichel, Ryan O'Reilly, Evander Kane, and Sam Reinhart. That still leaves Matt Moulson and Tyler Ennis. The bottom six grouping isn't so bad either with David Legwand, Zemgus Girgensens, Jamie McGinn, Brian Gionta, and Marcus Foligno. The issue for the 2015-16 Sabres will be on defense. Rasmus Ristolainen and Mark Pysyk are promising defensemen moving forward. Zach Bogosian needs to start playing like a top four defenseman with big minutes as opposed to a bottom pairing defenseman with big minutes. Carlo Colaaiacova is an under the radar signing that should work out if he can stay on the ice. If Buffalo were to add somebody like Cody Franson it would really go a long way in their playoff hopes.

I'm not sure Dallas qualifies as a sleeper team but I see them realizing some of that potential people saw in them last year. Tyler Seguin, Jamie Benn, Jason Spezza, Patrick Sharp, Ales Hemsky, Cody Eakins and Valeri Nichushkin make for very formidable top six forward options. Two of those eight players will be playing in the bottom six joining Cody Eakins.

Much like Buffalo Dallas' success will be predicated on how well their defense grouping plays. Trading Trevor Daley appears to be a loss on the surface but he was Dallas' least effective defenseman last year. Dallas has over 6M in cap space so they could make a run at a player like Christian Ehrhoff.

Penguins General Manager Jim Rutherford has spoke about needing more cap space and these three players are the most ideal players to move when talking about saving that cap space. The market for Brandon Sutter wasn't nearly as strong as they predicted. Rob Scuderi isn't the most ideal trade target for other teams. Chris Kunitz is coming off of a poor season by his standards as far as his tangible offense is concerned.

According to War On Ice the Penguins have 3.14M left in cap space. That includes Tim Erixon's 600k on the big club and that does not include signing a fourth line center, Conor Sheary's 667k and re-signing Beau Bennett. Assuming that it will cost ~2.667M to fill those spots that leaves a little under 1.2M of wiggle room in cap space assuming Erixon will be sent down. Last year the Penguins found themsevles in a predicament that left the team playing with only five defensemen late in the year. Is ~1.2M enough of a buffer zone?

Obviously Scuderi's contract is the most ideal to move. And as I have said in the past just because a player has a no movement clause doesn't mean they will enforce it. Players have the option to waive it.

Look for something to happen with one of those three players. The team needs to find more space somewhere.

The team had discussions with Santorelli early on in the free agency period but there is nothing out there to suggest those talks have continued (at least anything that I have seen/heard). Looking at it from Mike Santorelli's vantage point you would have to think he would want to pursue a third line center role and with Brandon Sutter still on the Penguins roster that just isn't going to happen. It is also very likely that he will be getting a raise on his 1.5M salary from 2014-15. Tough to find a role and cap space for Mike Santorelli with Brandon Sutter still on the team.

Even-strength hockey is as important as it ever was. Power play opportunities have dwindled and are even lower than they were during the years leading up to the lock out. I wrote a piece for Hockey Prospectus about the decline of power plays and its impact on scoring at both the team level and the player level. You can find that here

Until they start calling more penalties general managers should be trying to acquire the best 5v5 players they can (one might make the argument you should do that no matter what).

Pittsburgh doesn't have the cap space to accommodate him right now even if there was mutual interest. The fact is that Ehrhoff is a very rich hockey player these days and he has the ability to be patient when making his free agency decisions moving forward. I could see Ehrhoff continue to sign one year contracts while trying to chase a Stanley Cup. He may have some teams in mind and wants to see how their roster plays out during the summer time. He will land on a good team somewhere and if he can stay away from getting concussions/other injuries he will be a very good player for that team.

Lee Stempniak is one of those players who for whatever reason gets type casted as a throwaway bottom six depth player but his underlying number speak to him being an above average bottom six player. He is great value at 1.5M or less and is far from a liability. Teams looking for responsible depth should be considering him as an option.

To be honest I think he will do great with either Sid or Geno. My gut feeling is that he will start out with Sidney Crosby but Mike Colligan wrote a very nice and very detailed piece about how he thinks Malkin is the better fit. You can find that here

I think this would be really interesting if Perron was with Sidney Crosby for the entire year and Beau Bennett was given consistent time with Evgeni Malkin for all 82 games. However, Bennett's injury past has kept him from being a reliable option and he is more likely to start on the fourth line rather than get top six minutes even if he is healthy. By default I have to go with David Perron. It is a big year for Beau Bennett and a full offseason of training should go a long way to help him get stronger (also losing that knee brace)

Perron-Crosby-Hornqvist Kunitz-Malkin-Kessel Plotnikov-Sutter-Dupuis Sheary-?????-Bennett

Maatta-Letang Cole-Pouliot Dumoulin-Lovejoy Scuderi-Erixon

That question mark could be Oskar Sundqvist but until he comes to camp and shows he belongs when playing against other NHL players I can't place him in there.

There was a time where the better bet was to actually take Tiger Woods against the field. Jordan Spieth is creeping up into that territory. I odn't think he is quite there yet. I am going to take the field. My pick for the British Open will be Rickie Fowler. He was also my pick for the US Open and missed the cut (sorry Rickie). Fowler's last two years at major championships have been very impressive. His run on Sunday at The Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass this year was total boss mode.

Columbus may be the most improved from last year but that has more to do with players not being injured rather than what they have added to the roster.

I believe Washington has done the best and is the most improved. Adding both Justin Williams and TJ Oshie was excellent and should really help alleviate the pressure on Alex Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom.

I thought it was an underwhelming return for Patrick Sharp. I say this knowing that it was going to be tough for them to get high caliber assets back when the whole league knew he was going to be traded. However, by trading for Trevor Daley and Ryan Garbutt they don't really save a ton of cap space in this deal (only 3M). As mentioned in an earlier answer Trevor Daley was Dallas' least effective defender. His dCorsi impact of -286.35 was literally the worst in the entire NHL.

Phil Kessel has never scored 40 goals in an NHL season. Phil Kessel will be 28 years old when the season begins. Historically a player's goal scoring prime is in the early to mid-twenties. However, he is no longer riding shotgun with Tyler Bozak. Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin should in theory get the most out of Phil Kessel even though he is past the classic timeframe for prime goal scoring years.

I believe a fair over/under for 2015-16 Phil Kessel goals should be set at 39.5 and I am taking the over. Next year should be Kessel's first 40 goal season in the league.

I don't know when but I do believe the Arizona Coyotes will move. Three new cities that I think will be getting teams will be Las Vegas, Seattle, and Quebec City. Considering the NHL desperately wants expansion fees rather than see relocation I don't know how this all shakes out. Fact is that the Coyotes have 0% chance of success in Glendale. It was very short sighted to build a new arena in that location and is the root of all of the franchises problems.

Fortunately for me I live in the northeast and Phish schedules a lion's share of their shows in that geographic area. The furthest I have traveled to see them was the 12 hour drive to Limestone, Maine for the IT festival in 2003. Conveniently on the way through Portland, Maine there was a free concert in a city square that featured moe. which broke up the trip nicely.

This summer I lucked out again as the band's Magnaball festival is only an hour and twenty minutes away at the Watkins Glen International Speedway.

Not trading Derrick Pouliot in an effort to acquire a top six winger. This was a real concern of mine and Jim Rutherford did a great job avoiding it. I did not think it was realistic to land a player like Phil Kessel with salary retained without including Pouliot.

1. This is very subjective so I don't believe there is a wrong answer. For me I still can't get enough of Jaromir Jagr. His speed isn't where it used to be (obviously) but his mannerisms in puck protection and vision are still great to watch. Sidney Crosby is electric when he is healthy. As for the Western Conference it is tough to not like Patrick Kane with the puck on his stick. Vladimir Tarasenko is another guy who I go out of my way to watch as well.

2. Brian Dumoulin is more NHL ready at this juncture and that is what the Penguins need. I view Scott Harrington as a player who will have a limited offensive impact and he will need to get better postionally in order to be a successful NHL player.

3. Buffalo Sabres

I think Buffalo can get into that 85-90 range especially if they add one more competent defenseman. Edmonton is a difficult team to peg but I see improvement for them as well. I think they will get better than 30th ranked goaltending and their defense corp. with Darnell Nurse and Andrej Sekera should be improved. I think they will get in that 80 point range but won't make the playoffs because of the conference they are in.

I think Vancouver is definitely going to fall out of contention for the playoffs. Calgary was a terrible possession team but they made moves to address that, namely Dougie Hamilton and Michael Frolik. Vancouver was trending in the wrong direction and since then have traded their better goaltender (again), extended Luca Sbisa and Derek Dorsett, and traded for Brandon Prust. They did nothing to get better in an always improving Western Conference.

In the east I think Ottawa will be hard pressed to make the playoffs again. Florida and Columbus are primed to make a run at playoff spots and somebody is going to have to miss out to accommodate. My pick is Ottawa

Move Brandon Sutter's 3.3M

Thank you to everyone who participated.

Thanks for reading!

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