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The Pittsburgh Penguins will be taking on a hungry Minnesota Wild team tonight. The Wild are in the thick of the playoff race in the Western Conference and are currently holding down the top wild card spot. They have a four-point lead on Phoenix and will be looking to add to their point total to secure their playoff berth. Meanwhile, the Penguins are pretty much locked into their playoff position, as they locked up the Metropolitan Division the other night and there is no chance to catch Boston for the top seed in the conference.
Tonight’s game will include a matchup against former stalwart from the Penguins' third line, Matt Cooke. Cooke and the Penguins decided to part ways after five productive and drama filled season with the Penguins. The combination of the lower salary cap and the stigma attached to Cooke were driving forces behind the left winger leaving Pittsburgh.
But the question is, do the Penguins miss him?
The answer is not black and white, either. The Penguins certainly miss him in their lineup considering the bottom six has been a train wreck this year. It has drastically changed how head coach Dan Bylsma has been able to utilize his players this season.
Keeping Cooke would have had a direct impact with how cap space was allocated and would have impacted the presence of other current Penguins players, namely a guy like defensemen Matt Niskanen.
Lets see how Bylsma’s player usage has had to change from last year to this year.
Here is the player usage chart for Penguins forwards from 2012-2013:
You can see that Cooke and Brandon Sutter were thrown to the wolves. Their possession numbers aren’t great but it is at least a little bit understandable considering they were both receiving minimal offensive zone starts and clearly playing against the best of what the opposition had to offer. By doing so other Penguin forwards benefited.
This allowed Sidney Crosby to match up against some easier competition.
As impressive as Crosby has been this season his offensive output was even better last year. His points per game average in 2012-2013 was 1.55, this season it is 1.32.
Why did he see a drop in 2013-2014?
This season Crosby has had to absorb the shutdown role because Bylsma does not trust his bottom six forwards to do anything, and it’s a good strategy because they can’t do anything. Everybody in the Penguins top six is receiving tougher matchups than the bottom six forwards. Even with incredibly sheltered minutes the bottom six forwards still can’t be productive in the possession department.
You can see that both trade deadline acquisitions are improvements over what the Penguins had, both Marcel Goc and Lee Stempniak have been productive and I believe both players should play on the third line in the playoffs when Goc is healthy.
In a nutshell the Penguins do miss the ole No. 24, Cooke. If he was on the roster he could slide into that LW role with Goc and Stempniak and the Penguins would have themselves a pretty good third line. One that could eat up the hard minutes and free up Sidney Crosby.
The problem with keeping Cooke was mostly money related, though.
If the Penguins kept Cooke they almost certainly would have been forced into moving Niskanen. I would hate to think where the Penguins defense core would have been this year without Niskanen. There just wasn’t enough money to go around this year; you would have to rob Peter to pay Paul.
The Penguins certainly miss Matt Cooke in the 2013-2014 season, but moving forward they should have the resources to adequately upgrade the third and fourth lines.
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Here are the results from the poll the other day
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Hockey Hurts podcast for 4/4/14 is up and on iTunes, myself and Cameron Walsh discuss some topics from around the NHL including the Penguins. Here is the iTunes link
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