Salary Cap: Salary Cap + Roster Building | Cap Details + Links in First Post | We can't pay the D this much...

[Peat]

I think if you move Phil you gotta remember too that when we traded him we gave up a late first and Kapanen for him. He's now older, so we might get an even worse package than that for him. Is it really worth trading a PPG player to get a late round first and a prospect that is probably worse than Kapanen?

Or if you do move him for a guy who can play now instead and forget about picks, then you end up with a guy who is - unless we get hugely lucky in terms of fit - going to be worse than Kessel at least in terms of production. Maybe if JR does his research well he gets a guy who possesses the puck well even if we take a production hit in comparison.

The only way I could see in the short term moving Kessel and being better off for it is Guentzel stepping into his PP slot and being able to produce at a similar rate and then the new guy being a good possession player and driving Malkin to produce better at even strength. Both of those are giant ifs for me.

1) If that's the future return then no, we don't do it. But that was when Kessel had his NTC set up to block anything happening; there's little reason to think he's as attached to Pittsburgh as he was to Toronto. A wider market means a better return.

2) If we do this move, its mainly about gambling on better fit and chemistry, and I think there's a legit point of view that you don't need to get hugely lucky to find a much better fit.

 

[Nakawick]

The point of moving Kessel is to get a younger asset(s) back and sign a FA to replace Kessel, like Skinner. So moving Kessel allows you to get assets back and use his cap space toward his replacement. The big part of moving Kessel will be the FA replacement options.

 

[Gurglesons]

Onboard for Kessel, Hornqvist, Maatta out as a start to the summer by JR.

No chance I’m moving Hornqvist.

Maatta I’m 60/40 on.

 

[Gurglesons]

The point of moving Kessel is to get a younger asset(s) back and sign a FA to replace Kessel, like Skinner. So moving Kessel allows you to get assets back and use his cap space toward his replacement. The big part of moving Kessel will be the FA replacement options.

I see no reason why we would sign a UFA.

If we are moving Kessel and Maatta we should be able to get a LW or RW for Malkin and that solves our issues.

McCann - Malkin - X
X - Malkin - Rust

Is perfectly acceptable as a 2nd line.

 

[Nakawick]

I see no reason why we would sign a UFA.

If we are moving Kessel and Maatta we should be able to get a LW or RW for Malkin and that solves our issues.

McCann - Malkin - X
X - Malkin - Rust

Is perfectly acceptable as a 2nd line.

Except that we may not get what we want or need from the team trading for Kessel. 8 teams only, maybe more if Phil allows it. I think the assets plus FA would be the best option.

 

[vikingGoalie]

No chance I’m moving Hornqvist.

Maatta I’m 60/40 on.

Gudbranson and Maatta have the same cap hit. Thus far, gudbranson seems to fit a need better and has arguably been better then him.
So in many ways if I'm figuring out which 4M cap hit I'm getting off the books it's Maatta every time, but let's wait see if that's still the case after the playoffs. I'm guessing the Gud will be an even bigger need for a playoff run, but we'll have to see if this level of play continues...

 

[Sidney the Kidney]

Why do you fill the rumor mill by saying Sullivan wants him moved?

Everything I’ve ever read / heard from Sully sounds like he respects and wants Phil to work.

This is on Kessel. Great player, but he doesn’t fit here and he’s thrown a fit about playing a third line role. (He did this in 2016 as well which is documented in Between the Benches by Custance).

Honestly, Kessel did what we need him to. We now have a better more complete PPG winger and can gain some cap space and continue the shift to getting younger by moving Phil out.

It is a logical move. It’s why Letang is on the block as well eventually if you want to continue to be a contender. Sid and Geno are the only lifers here for what they’ve done for the franchise.

I know I've said this before, but my main concern about moving Phil is now that's one less "elite" producer the Pens will have and I worry we'll go back to being that team from 2010-15 that relied almost exclusively on Sid/Geno because we lack those extra elite producers.

Phil being added changed that dynamic, and while obviously he's struggling, he's still capable of that dynamic. Moving him for lesser pieces means we're going to have to rely on Sid/Geno a whole lot again, and they're getting to the age where they're not capable of being Superman every night.

 

[Peat]

I know I've said this before, but my main concern about moving Phil is now that's one less "elite" producer the Pens will have and I worry we'll go back to being that team from 2010-15 that relied almost exclusively on Sid/Geno because we lack those extra elite producers.

Phil being added changed that dynamic, and while obviously he's struggling, he's still capable of that dynamic. Moving him for lesser pieces means we're going to have to rely on Sid/Geno a whole lot again, and they're getting to the age where they're not capable of being Superman every night.

Having Phil means you're relying on Geno to be Superman every night in terms of getting the puck and then scoring though. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

 

[Gurglesons]

I know I've said this before, but my main concern about moving Phil is now that's one less "elite" producer the Pens will have and I worry we'll go back to being that team from 2010-15 that relied almost exclusively on Sid/Geno because we lack those extra elite producers.

Phil being added changed that dynamic, and while obviously he's struggling, he's still capable of that dynamic. Moving him for lesser pieces means we're going to have to rely on Sid/Geno a whole lot again, and they're getting to the age where they're not capable of being Superman every night.

Are we not relying on Geno right now? Do you think Phil opens up opportunities in that line more than he hurts it?

 

[ChaosAgent]

Gudbranson and Maatta have the same cap hit. Thus far, gudbranson seems to fit a need better and has arguably been better then him.
So in many ways if I'm figuring out which 4M cap hit I'm getting off the books it's Maatta every time, but let's wait see if that's still the case after the playoffs. I'm guessing the Gud will be an even bigger need for a playoff run, but we'll have to see if this level of play continues...

I feel like we need another PMD and more turnover of our D-corp in general. At the same time Gudbranson has done pretty well, JJ is entrenched for better or worse and if I squint hard enough I can see Pettersson developing into a pretty good PMD himself.

So in summation, Maatta for sure out and probably EG, if we want to bring someone else in.

I haven't watched enough of the Leafs, but what do people think about Gardiner?

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

Why do you fill the rumor mill by saying Sullivan wants him moved?

Everything I’ve ever read / heard from Sully sounds like he respects and wants Phil to work.

This is on Kessel. Great player, but he doesn’t fit here and he’s thrown a fit about playing a third line role. (He did this in 2016 as well which is documented in Between the Benches by Custance).

Honestly, Kessel did what we need him to. We now have a better more complete PPG winger and can gain some cap space and continue the shift to getting younger by moving Phil out.

It is a logical move. It’s why Letang is on the block as well eventually if you want to continue to be a contender. Sid and Geno are the only lifers here for what they’ve done for the franchise.

I agree with you. Though I don't think Sully would lose any sleep if Phil left. Sully's a no nonsense, do you job and shut your mouth kinda guy. Phil is like the antithesis of that. I do agree that he respects Phil and wants him to do well, but I also think Phil drives Sully up a goddamn wall every single game. Imagine being the kind of coach Sully is and seeing Phil overtaken by his frustration on a near shift by shift basis all season.

 

[ZeroPucksGiven]

The point of moving Kessel is to get a younger asset(s) back and sign a FA to replace Kessel, like Skinner. So moving Kessel allows you to get assets back and use his cap space toward his replacement. The big part of moving Kessel will be the FA replacement options.

MAJOR assumption believing that specific FA player wants to play for you and at whatever value ($$ and term) you have budgeted for him

So you trade Phil and have all this extra cap space but no talented player slotted to replace his production.
The front office would be eviscerated (and rightfully so) for such a maneuver.

 

[Riptide]

Just doing some quick mental math, I don't think moving ONLY Maatta gives the Pens enough cap room for next season.

It should. Without Maatta we have 9 forwards and 5D/2G signed for next season totaling 75m even. Then we need to sign Pettersson, Reese, Blueger Wilson/13F, 14F and a #7D. If the depth guys get 700k (league min) that's 2.1m. So now we're at 77.1m with MP, Reese and Blueger to sign. You can probably get all 3 of them signed for ~4-4.5m. Which would give us around 400k-1m in cap space with a 82m cap.

Guentzel - Crosby - McCann
Rust - Malkin - Kessel
Simon - Bjugstad - Hornqvist
Reese - Blueger - Wilson/X
Wilson/X - XXXXX

Dumoulin - Letang
Johnson - Schultz
Pettersson - Gudbranson
XXXXX

Murray/DeSmith
Total: ~81m

 

[Riptide]

Why do you fill the rumor mill by saying Sullivan wants him moved?

Everything I’ve ever read / heard from Sully sounds like he respects and wants Phil to work.

This is on Kessel. Great player, but he doesn’t fit here and he’s thrown a fit about playing a third line role. (He did this in 2016 as well which is documented in Between the Benches by Custance).

Honestly, Kessel did what we need him to. We now have a better more complete PPG winger and can gain some cap space and continue the shift to getting younger by moving Phil out.

It is a logical move. It’s why Letang is on the block as well eventually if you want to continue to be a contender. Sid and Geno are the only lifers here for what they’ve done for the franchise.

While this is true, the issue is that we probably do not have another Kessel replacement in the system. And while it's possible that we could trade for a young skilled 35/40pt guy who has potential to be more... the question is would said player make us a better team now or in the near future then what we have with Kessel today? And the answer to that is almost certainly no. Not a deal breaker, but it would then make it a tough move to move Kessel if we're making the team worse. However if we feel that between said young player and guys like Simon, Reese, TB, McCann, etc that we could replace him by committee then perhaps the cap savings and futures/assets we got for him would overcome us making the team worse in the short term.

We're mostly looking at it as fit/asset management. I highly doubt that's how Rutherford is looking at it, and honestly I do not fault him for that.

 

[Riptide]

1) If that's the future return then no, we don't do it. But that was when Kessel had his NTC set up to block anything happening; there's little reason to think he's as attached to Pittsburgh as he was to Toronto. A wider market means a better return.

2) If we do this move, its mainly about gambling on better fit and chemistry, and I think there's a legit point of view that you don't need to get hugely lucky to find a much better fit.

Re #1. Even if Kessel doesn't expand his list (and I'm skeptical that he would), him at 6.8m with a 82m cap vs 6.8m/8m with a 71.4m makes a big difference. Even more so that he's now no longer seen as someone you "can't win with". I mean you're talking about 9.5m/11.2% of the cap vs 8.2% in terms of cap percentage.

 

[molon labe]

I agree with you. Though I don't think Sully would lose any sleep if Phil left. Sully's a no nonsense, do you job and shut your mouth kinda guy. Phil is like the antithesis of that. I do agree that he respects Phil and wants him to do well, but I also think Phil drives Sully up a goddamn wall every single game. Imagine being the kind of coach Sully is and seeing Phil overtaken by his frustration on a near shift by shift basis all season.

 

[Riptide]

The point of moving Kessel is to get a younger asset(s) back and sign a FA to replace Kessel, like Skinner. So moving Kessel allows you to get assets back and use his cap space toward his replacement. The big part of moving Kessel will be the FA replacement options.

We would have to move a lot more then just Kessel to accomplish this. Right now just moving Maatta should solve our cap issues for the season. If we want to sign someone who makes more than Kessel, we would have to find a way to A) trade Kessel without bringing back additional assets and B) move someone else to accommodate the raise that someone like Skinner would get. And we'd need to get a replacement for the player we just traded.

So while I think it's possible that we could see Kessel moved, I think that anyone who's dreaming of bringing in another high end skilled winger via FA is living in a fantasy land. At best we get one of the 2nd tiered guys (Eberle, Nyqvist, Hayes, Mojo, Dzingel, Donskoi, Ferland, etc). And all of those guys are going to cost something in the 4-6m range.

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

I don't know how treacherous moving Phil is from a "how do we replace him" standpoint, to be honest. There are multiple avenues potentially available, through trade as well as free agency, with some really great options out there. It goes without saying that nothing is a sure thing, but Phil's situation has become a near must-act one, so JR's sort of forced to try this summer. The difference this summer is that there seems to be guys available who would fit in well. Skinner's slump may affect his asking price this summer. A guy like Zucker could be on the chopping block for a Minnesota team that will look to make changes this summer. Panarin's going to be out there, and I think he'd be absolutely dynamite with Geno. I'm sure there are several other notable guys on teams looking to make changes as well.

I just think there are options. Phil's a really good player still, that much is obvious by the guy having what amounts to be a miserable season but still being a PPG guy. I think we can get a solid return for him in a deal, if not a significant roster player who can come in and help now, then some high value futures we can use to acquire aforementioned player.

This feels like the summer a decision has to be made regarding Phil, and it just so happens to coincide with a summer that has an abnormally high number of great options available to replace him.

 

[Riptide]

I haven't watched enough of the Leafs, but what do people think about Gardiner?

Very good puck mover, questionable defensively. Prone to make huge mistakes at terrible times. But is very good in transition. Toronto fans are ready to run him out of town, but will miss him a ton once he's gone (they're already noticing it when he was on IR). But apparently he has a bad back (can't remember why he was on IR). He's also going to get north of 6m, so he's not really someone we can afford - and looking at LD guys we might be interested in, I honestly can't see all that many that we'd be able to afford even if we moved JJ+Maatta.

Rutherford is going to have to get very creative if he wants to make drastic changes to our blueline.

 

[Gurglesons]

Very good puck mover, questionable defensively. Prone to make huge mistakes at terrible times. But is very good in transition. Toronto fans are ready to run him out of town, but will miss him a ton once he's gone (they're already noticing it when he was on IR). But apparently he has a bad back (can't remember why he was on IR). He's also going to get north of 6m, so he's not really someone we can afford - and looking at LD guys we might be interested in, I honestly can't see all that many that we'd be able to afford even if we moved JJ+Maatta.

Rutherford is going to have to get very creative if he wants to make drastic changes to our blueline.

One additional thing about Jake is he was why Schultz was initially drafted by Anaheim.

Might be one reason we could get him, but it likely means we have to move out Maatta and JJ which is just unrealistic imo.

I would love him here. He’s a fantastic d man that is a scalegoat in Toronto and him and Schultz would be a seriously legit 2nd pair behind Dumo - Letang.

N

 

[Gurglesons]

While this is true, the issue is that we probably do not have another Kessel replacement in the system. And while it's possible that we could trade for a young skilled 35/40pt guy who has potential to be more... the question is would said player make us a better team now or in the near future then what we have with Kessel today? And the answer to that is almost certainly no. Not a deal breaker, but it would then make it a tough move to move Kessel if we're making the team worse. However if we feel that between said young player and guys like Simon, Reese, TB, McCann, etc that we could replace him by committee then perhaps the cap savings and futures/assets we got for him would overcome us making the team worse in the short term.

We're mostly looking at it as fit/asset management. I highly doubt that's how Rutherford is looking at it, and honestly I do not fault him for that.

I honestly think it comes down to the Maatta thing.

We have too many natural RWs. We already lost Sprong because of it. With our need for cap, the development of Jake and Rust into 20+ goal guys and the addition of Bjugstad and McCann as additional 20 goal potential players here it just does not make sense to keep Kessel. Unless for some reason they finally decide to run Jake - Crosby - Kessel as L1.

It is either Hornqvist or Kessel and at this point Hornqvist does so much more on each line.

 

[Big Friggin Dummy]

I also think Hornqvist is more important to the power play than Kessel, which is saying a lot because Kessel's been great for us with the man advantage. Hornqvist can also comfortably slot into any of the 3 RW spots in the top-9, whereas Phil seems to be Geno or bust for whatever reason. Sully won't play Kessel with Sid, and Kessel's made it clear he's not overly happy playing on a third line. There are just too many factors that point to Phil being the guy on his way out, and I'm not sure either party will be too broken up about it (meaning Phil or the organization). It just feels like it's time, Phil has run his course. He's been phenomenal for us and was hugely important in the back to backs, but it is what it is.

 

[ChaosAgent]

Very good puck mover, questionable defensively. Prone to make huge mistakes at terrible times. But is very good in transition. Toronto fans are ready to run him out of town, but will miss him a ton once he's gone (they're already noticing it when he was on IR). But apparently he has a bad back (can't remember why he was on IR). He's also going to get north of 6m, so he's not really someone we can afford - and looking at LD guys we might be interested in, I honestly can't see all that many that we'd be able to afford even if we moved JJ+Maatta.

Rutherford is going to have to get very creative if he wants to make drastic changes to our blueline.

Thanks for the run-down. I'm not opposed to going with a cheaper option to replace Phil in the top-6 (even internal, like Simon or Bleuger) and having the bigger acquisition come on the blue-line if that's what it comes down to. I know we bristle about our $ spend on defense but sometimes a PMD is more important offensively even if that isn't their explicit position.

...I wonder what Buffalo would want for Sheary if we wanted him back (ducks).

 

[NMK11]

I was always really hesitant about moving Kessel. The more I think about it and the more it's talked about here, the more I think it's probably the right thing to do. Move out Kessel and Maatta, get a top 6 winger that fits the team more and stock up some picks, and go from there. Would still like to get another puck mover on the blueline, but I'm resigned to thinkng JJ and Guds are both going to be here at the start of next year so gonna go with the D we have.

 

[Riptide]

One additional thing about Jake is he was why Schultz was initially drafted by Anaheim.

Might be one reason we could get him, but it likely means we have to move out Maatta and JJ which is just unrealistic imo.

I would love him here. He’s a fantastic d man that is a scalegoat in Toronto and him and Schultz would be a seriously legit 2nd pair behind Dumo - Letang.

N

I think we'd probably have to move out more than those two. That would give us 7.25m, and only around 3-4.5m to sign JG. Like I said, things will get really interesting if Rutherford wants to make drastic changes to our blueline, because we'll end up seeing a lot more than just 2 of Maatta/JJ/EG moved.