Pool Outlook for Pittsburgh

When you have two of the best players in the world, everyone is going to expect big things from those players and the team they play for.  This was indeed the case again for the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 2014 season.

Not winning the Stanley Cup has to be the measure of a successful season and the lack of a championship in 2014 should signal that the season was a failure of sorts.  Yes, there were some individual successes, but it just wasn't enough and the Penguins have instituted some change, both at the management level and the coaching staff.  Out went GM Ray Shero and head coach Dan Bylsma and now former Carolina Hurricanes GM Jim Rutherford takes charge and he is still looking for his new coach.

The job for Rutherford will be to find the correct mix of talent to play with Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, shoring up the defense in front of Marc-Andre Fleury and finding ways to win harder hockey games.  It isn't an easy job, given how tightly held a lot of quality talent has been in the league, as parity has given teams a way to compete financially.  The difference between good teams and great teams has been depth and coaching, something some people would argue the Penguins have lacked since their last Cup win.

As for us poolies, we all love having a taste of the Penguins on our roster, especially the better players on the team, because you know they are good for points, when they're healthy, of course.  There should be no reason for that to change any time soon.

Surprisingly, this is the first year that Sidney Crosby finished atop of the pool scoring rankings.  In 2007, he was the top forward in the pool rankings, but he didn't win the overall title, losing to Martin Brodeur that year.  Nevertheless, Crosby finished the year with 36 goals and 68 assists (104 points) in 80 games, the only player to hit the century mark in the points column.  Even though this is the first time Crosby has been at the pinnacle of the rankings, he has been the 1st pick in many drafts and so he should be.  Any time he is healthy, he has the potential to be great.

Five of the Penguins forwards, including Crosby, finished in the top 75 in overall scoring and even a touch better, when compared to only forwards.  Evgeni Malkin missed 22 games this season and still finished 25th overall in scoring with 72 points in 60 games.  If Malkin can stay healthy, he can dominate as much as Crosby some nights.  Chris Kunitz scored 35 goals and 68 points in 78 games, making him one of the more potent trigger men in the league.  James Neal and Jussi Jokinen round out the top forwards with 61 and 57 points each.

It was somewhat of a rough year for the Penguins blueline, but out of that adversity, came a couple of names to lead the way.  Matt Niskanen was the top scoring defender in Pittsburgh, finishing with 46 points in 81 games, good enough for 13th at the position.  Rookie Olli Maatta impressed many with his 29-point year in 78 games with the club.  Kristopher Letang battled injury and a stroke in 2014, limiting his season to only 37 games, where he still managed to fit in 22 points.  Paul Martin also went through an injury-plagued year, limiting his play to only 39 games, where he was only good for 15 points.

Faith in Marc-Andre Fleury in the regular season was almost necessary, with Tomas Vokoun on the shelf and a relatively unknown Jeff Zatkoff on the bench, but that faith was rewarded with 39 wins, 5 shutouts for 88 points, making him the 2nd best goalie in pool scoring, 3rd overall in points.  Fleury's play in the playoffs will always be questioned, but it sounds like he'll continue to have a vote of confidence, even with the new management coming in.

2015 Pool Outlook

There is a good chance that the supporting cast around Crosby and Malkin may be a bit different, come opening night in October, but you can rest assured that the best players will still be their best players.  The real money is made when you find the new guys that they play with and have a points windfall on late round draft picks.  I would expect Crosby, Malkin and Fleury to go really early, Letang may get some early consideration, assuming he gets all the proper clearance in the off-season to continue.  I am expecting to see Maatta go fairly early in the pool as well, as people try to cash in on some good blueline talent.

Talking about good blueline talent, some of the better prospects in the Pittsburgh system are defensemen and this year, the blueline may find one or two of their bright, young prospects emerge as cost-efficient options.  Derrick Pouliot, Scott Harrington and Brian Dumoulin all are being touted to have some serious upside, so they will be ones to watch this year.  All of them have shown their stuff on big stages before, so the move to the NHL will be somewhat smoother than some.

Free Agency and the Salary Cap

Unrestricted free agency has the potential to really clean the shelves for the Penguins, with some regular roster players and other rental players needing brand new deals, either in Pittsburgh or elsewhere.  Forwards Jussi Jokinen, Lee Stempniak, Marcel Goc, Joe Vitale and Tanner Glass, defensemen Matt Niskanen, Brooks Orpik and Deryk Engelland and goalie Tomas Vokoun are all in need of a new contract.

The Penguins don't have many pressing needs on the restricted free agent front, but Brandon Sutter does head the list and will be a priority for the team, likely with a bridge deal.  Forward Brian Gibbons and defenseman Simon Despres will also get some upgraded priority, I would think.

With all that free agency madness ahead of them, the Penguins will see who would fit best with their 14-man core that they have at the moment, which consists of seven forwards, five defensemen and their 2014 goalies back for another year.  Currently, their cap hit comes in at $55.1 million, which leaves them close to $16 million for nine more players.  Of course, they already have their big guns locked in, so it will be spread out amongst their depth, which shouldn't be too costly.

If Crosby already has Kunitz on his side, then Malkin should be rewarded with a winger to call his own as well.  Enter Nikita Scherbak, also a fellow Russian, plays the right side of the ice and has some dynamic playmaking ability.  The knock on Scherbak appears to be his skating, but if you could likely say the same thing about Malkin and it doesn't set him back much at all.  Although there are some situations where speed can really hurt your opposition, knowing where to be on the ice can be applied in all situations and makes players better.  This is what the likes of Malkin and potentally Scherbak have in common.

If it was enough to win the Cup by just having the best players in the league, there would be no need to play games in the league.  Unfortunately for the Penguins, it has been the playing of the games that has cost them the championships, but that's why they play and why we watch.  As I've said in a couple other outlooks, the real key to Cup wins these days is coaching and depth and those are the two things Pittsburgh are looking for this Summer.

The Penguins are a curious beast.  They have all kinds of firepower, but defensively and the occasional night in goal, they do seem to be liable for an off-night here and there.  They will be able to string wins together, that much we can all be certain about, but it will be that depth that carries the team as far as they will go.  It does sound like change is on the horizon for the Penguins, but how much and how effective it will be is still up in the air.  I don't see the Penguins winning the Metropolitan Division as easily, if at all, under the pretense that guys like Orpik or Niskanen make it to free agency.  An upgrade on the blueline is needed to repeat their regular season performance and if they don't get it, they'll drop a spot or two.