PITTSBURGH (93.7 The Fan) – Try as hard as you want, blame as many separate people as you want, there isn’t one person who you change that immediately makes the Penguins a Stanley Cup contender.
The Pens didn’t turn into a non-playoff team overnight. If you were watching, there were clues everywhere. The most glaring of them was the four straight seasons not getting out of the first round of the playoffs. Yes, the Pens got in, but they haven’t been a factor since the year after their last Cup.
You can get fooled by last season as the Pens would have won the Rangers series with an NHL goalie. New York made it to the Eastern Conference Finals, the assumption is the Pens would have as well. Maybe, they were playing well before the injuries, but it may be a stretch.
GM Ron Hextall, he came in after Jim Rutherford suddenly quit. We don’t know the reason Rutherford left, but he didn’t leave a cupboard full of young players. Rutherford did what he thought was best, he played for now and was willing to use young players and draft choices as chips. Understandable, they were trying to maximize having three all-time players. Eventually, there is a price to pay for going all in. The Pens are starting to pay.
What we don’t know about Hextall is what his marching orders are? At one point, President of Hockey Operations Brian Burke said the goal is to win another Cup and still be good when eventually the Big 3 move on. That’s nearly an impossible task, think of how the Pens built their two dynasties-getting really bad and drafting really high.
Most of the trades-acquiring Jeff Petry, Jeff Carter, Mikael Granlund speak to just trying to win now. But they never made the big move involving high draft picks, that is trying to light both ends of the candle.
In a salary cap sport, it is so difficult to maintain greatness. That is why the playoff streak was so celebrated. The system works against you being good year after year. None of the six division winners from 2013 made the playoffs this year. The top four teams in the Metropolitan Division five years ago all missed the playoffs (Washington, Pittsburgh, Philly, Columbus) this season. It’s difficult to keep it going.
Mike Sullivan isn’t blameless, although I don’t know how much better this roster would be with another coach. When you brought back the core of the team, keeping the head coach made a lot of sense. You can question the freedom he continues to give his power play. You can wonder why he doesn’t play a different style with the types of players he has. Why didn't he play Ryan Reaves or want Ian Cole gone? It’s easy to fire the coach, but unless you are really confident in landing someone much better, change for change sake doesn’t seem to apply in this scenario.
Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin can still play at a high level. What you notice with players aging, it’s harder to play at a high-level night-in and night-out. The Pens dressed a dozen players who were 30 years or older against Chicago. Over a quarter of the Pens roster for that elimination game was 35 or older. Not all have aged as gracefully on the ice as Crosby, Malkin and Kris Letang.
How about the Fenway Sports ownership group? We, forget the media-the fans, have never heard from them. Obviously, they want to win, but how bad? Is hockey success a priority for this group from Boston? Will they spend to the cap ceiling? Willing to make front-office changes? Do they have a short and long-term plan?
This was coming. It shouldn’t be a surprise. How do they come out of it-everyone thought Detroit would keep winning, they haven’t. Chicago will bounce back they still have Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews. The Blackhawks didn’t. The next couple of moves are critical, not just for next year, but building that foundation to be great again.