I have a few different takes about next season's roster. I actually think most of what we saw down the stretch should be what we roll with to begin 2024-25. With some changes, of course. But I believe that if the team we rolled out for MOST of this season was the lineup down the stretch, we would have comfortably made the playoffs. That means Joseph-Letang instead of healthy scratching the former because we had to play much lesser talent instead. Ryan Graves struggled for most of this season, but I think he was fine as the third-pairing LD. Too expensive for that role? Of course, but square pegs in round holes don't work either. And now he is coming off a concussion and the team took off without him. He should begin as St. Ivany's partner next season, imo.
And St. Ivany made a major impact in my opinion. Ruhwedel is exactly what Sullivan likes and exactly what Dubas needs to be rid of in order for this franchise to move forward. Ryan Shea? Meh. He is as good as he is ever going to be at 27 going on 28 next year. If they want to re-sign him on the cheap, fine. But Ludvig is younger and brings a different style, and Joseph is far more talented and just needs some love from the coaching staff. To me, I would not change much in terms of defensive personnel. Replace Shea with Graves and have Ludvig as the seventh D-man. We need new coaches to get the best out of this group.
We have to stop trading draft picks to make players go away. That needs to stop A S A P. Players that have positive trade value should be moved, and those that need to bounce back should stay. I believe Graves and Rakell should stay because they need to bounce back. I think this off-season is the perfect time to trade Lars Eller because he only has one year left and is coming off a strong season. Sullivan probably wants him back for sure, so trade him. Dubas needs to become the anti-Sullivan. The yin to the yang. At his best, that is what Rutherford was imo. Make Sullivan uncomfortable behind the bench, that is what we need. He never liked Phil Kessel, but he won with Phil Kessel. I don't know if Sullivan is comfortable with Erik Karlsson, so we need to keep Erik Karlsson. I think Year 2 is going to be a lot better for EK65, and I would not be surprised in the least if he led the Penguins in scoring in 2024-25. 90 points. I would not be surprised.
Up front, the top two left-wingers sold me down the stretch. I hated Michael Bunting with unnatural passion upon his arrival, but he has won me over. He is absolutely perfect for Geno. I don't care how old Geno is. With Bunting on his left side, he can be a point-per-game player again. No doubt in my mind. Is Rakell the right fit on the right wing? I don't think so. I think this is where Dubas needs to act this summer. I think we should bring in a RW to play with Bunting and Malkin. Sam Reinhart is probably the perfect fit, but we might not be able to pull that off. Steven Stamkos, even though he is old for what we want to do, could REALLY improve this power play. He also can take face-offs for Geno on one side, not that face-offs are a problem for this team. We can afford to slip a bit in that area because it was a luxury this season. I don't want to bring in any player over the age of 25 this off-season, but I think we could do an exception for a good fit for Line 2.
I don't want to mess with Crosby's line. O'Connor has more upside than I thought. His size and speed are absolutely perfect for the first line. I never liked Rust on the top line, but he proved me wrong with a strong season this year. I think he fits in better with Crosby and O'Connor than he did with Guentzel. My opinion. Sullivan is loathe to play Crosby will certain players with more upside, so this is as good as we can hope for. And honestly, they looked great down the stretch. Does O'Connor have another level?
The third line is the problem up front. I think we have enough players to fill out a competent fourth line next season. I assume Acciari will be back and assume that Jeff Carter role. I prefer him on the wing but without Carter, Sullivan will absolutely want Acciari down the middle. And I am OK with that so long as there is more talent on his line. We can't have Harkins-Acciari-Nieto, which is probably a Sullivan wet dream of a line. But guys like Puljujarvi, Bemstrom, Puustinen, Poulin et al should be decent there.
We need to not only trade Eller but Reilly Smith too. He is yet another good player who is not a Mike Sullivan player for some strange reason. Plus, I don't think he fits with either Crosby or Malkin. Not nearly as well as the other two LWs. And he only has a year left and has a great rep. Dubas should be able to fetch something for him.
I would like to see Rakell on the third line, with two younger players. And then maybe Acciari centering a fourth line with younger players. That third-line center position is interesting. We now have three internal options that we did not have last off-season, which necessitated the Eller signing. Poulin was coming off a personal leave of absence, so his future was cloudy. Yager was drafted in the first round. Ponomarev was acquired in the Guentzel trade. We should definitely see what we have in these three players before spending more dollars or draft capital via trade. I would like to see Rakell and Bemstrom together. I am a big believer in chemistry, and I have to think two Swedes on a line and two Finns on another line is better than one of each on two different lines. Maybe I am nitpicking, but chemistry is important.
And then there is the goaltending question. I don't think Dubas is tied to Jarry, per se. Yeah he signed him. He also let him test free agency before re-signing him. Dubas felt Jarry was the best goaltender available on the market, and he was probably right. He is also the one who signed Ned, so I don't think he would hesitate to make a change. The main reason to trade Jarry, at least for me, is that he can bring back more than Smith and more than Eller. We might be able to get back into the first round of the draft by dealing Jarry. If we can move on from Jarry, then we should go with Nedeljkovic and Blomqvist. Is the latter ready? Who knows. Nobody knows anything about goaltending and if they think they do, they are usually proven incorrect. I thought both Cam Talbot and Jonathan Quick were done as NHL goaltenders, and they both had resurgences this season. Stolarz had a career season. Alex Lyon continues to defy logic. Where did U-P Luukkonen come from? Etc. With goaltending, there will be ups and there will be downs. There are only a handful of goaltenders that teams know exactly what they are getting year over year.
Biggest change has to come behind the bench. New blood. New ideas. And an entirely different power-play setup.
O'Connor-Crosby-Rust
Bunting-Malkin-Reinhart?
Rakell-Yager-Bemstrom
Puljujarvi-Acciari-Puustinen
Poulin
Pettersson-Karlsson
Joseph-Letang
Graves-St. Ivany
Ludvig
Nedeljkovic
Blomqvist
Reinhart-Bunting-Crosby
Karlsson-Malkin
Bemstrom-Yager-Puljujarvi/Puustinen
Rakell-Letang
I would be fairly excited to see this lineup next season.
