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The season has ended for the Penguins but the bad news continues to come in. Although, it has has nothing to do with the GM search which has been extremely quiet to this point.
The bad news includes two of the Penguins top young defensemen, both needing to have surgery on their shoulders. Olli Maatta and Derrick Pouliot both needed surgery to repair torn labrums. The recovery time is 4-6 months.
Beau Bennett has also had surgery. His surgery was on his wrist and his recovery time is 4 months.
October is a long ways away and the likelihood that these players miss any game action is minimal, but it still is a major inconvenience for their offseason training programs.
A big part of a young player’s development is what they can accomplish in the offseason while training, this certainly throws a wrench in the plans of Maatta, Pouliot, and Bennett.
James Neal went on the record yesterday with Mark Madden and denied that he has requested a trade from the Penguins. I would still explore moving him if a deal for another top 6 winger happened to fall into the Penguins lap.
Jim Benning was a leading candidate to fill a vacant GM position this upcoming season and he has, it just won’t be with the Penguins. He has agreed to take on the responsibility of building back up the Vancouver Canucks. Does this impact the Penguins? I think so. There is a good chance that the people who angered Ryan Kesler are no longer working with the Canucks organization. Ryan Kesler may not want out anymore and the pieces that the Canucks were looking for may have changed if they do intend to move him. If the Canucks are not going to take part in a full rebuild that includes trading the Sedin brothers Benning’s first item on his to do list should probably include smoothing over relations with Ryan Kesler. Chances are if the Canucks do move Kesler they will have been blown away by the offer. I don’t think the Penguins would be wise to overpay at this point.
The Baby Penguins defeated the Providence Bruins in a wild 7 game series. The Penguins jumped out to a 5-0 lead in Game 7 but had to hold on for a 5-4 win. Brian Gibbons scored one of the nicest goals of the year:
Simon Despres has been locking down top pairing minutes for the Baby Penguins. He has been mishandled by the organization to this point, but this experience is not bad for him. It also bodes well for Scott Harrington and Brian Dumoulin, two other candidates to earn NHL roster spots next year.
Lastly on the Penguins front, Evgeni Malkin has joined Team Russia for the World Championships in Minsk, he was puttin’ on the ritz last game
2-0. Malkin has just undressed Huet. Very tenderly, slowly and with a great attention to detail, Malkin disrobed Huet. #Pens
— Slava Malamud (@SlavaMalamud) May 22, 2014
For those who want to read about Evander Kane Hockeybuzz’s own Pete Tessier has a nice piece from yesterday about him that you can find here
I hope if the Jets are foolish enough to move him that the Penguins are the lucky ones to take advantage of that mistake.
Thanks for reading!
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