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Wanting Penguins to lose out doesn't make you a bad fan |
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The Penguins are back in action tonight where they will be in St. Louis to take on the Blues. We are in the final stretch of games with Sidney Crosby’s record in the rear view mirror. The focus now turns to the standings tracking where both the Penguins and Rangers are.
There’s nothing to gain standings wise with victories. That is factual. It is independent of the players and how hard they will be trying. However, winning is losing. If you’re older than a middle school student you already understand the dynamic at play. This is an entertainment product that goes through ebbs and flows throughout the years. Pittsburgh fans have been blessed with some of the most absurd talent this league has ever seen over the past 40 or so years with a minimal amount of time bottom feeding. As someone who has followed the Buffalo Bills for my entire life I’m here to say that these meaningless wins don’t do anything but compromise the ability to navigate out of harder times. They won’t be remembered fondly, or at all. It’s OK to want the team to lose for the greater good. It doesn’t make someone a bad fan.
Increasing the probability of getting better assets is really the only thing left on the checklist for the season. It may come in the form of using the actual draft picks to select players. It may also come in the form of trades, because it sounds like that is something Dubas is willing to do this offseason.
Hockey boss Kyle Dubas considers getting the Penguins back into playoff contention and beyond an urgent priority, which means he is willing to trade draft picks for young, NHL-ready players. The tricky thing is that those players aren’t all that available. Still, sometimes teams sour on players and covet draft picks and cap flexibility, making young talent available. Dubas will pounce if and when that happens.
Players aren’t always available, but if they were you’d want some decent assets to throw around. The losing at the end of the season would improve the caliber of assets the Penguins would have to spend.
So, with those 11 draft picks, don’t be surprised if you see Dubas get aggressive on draft night in Los Angeles. He’s done a good job of adding quantity to the Penguins’ farm system. At some point, he’d like to focus more on quality.
To get quality you need to be closer to the top of the draft.
Dubas doesn’t seem to be against the idea of using offer sheets to lure restricted free agents to Pittsburgh this summer, but I still wouldn’t bet on it. I haven’t heard the Penguins are targeting any restricted free agents, and I don’t see Dubas making that kind of move just yet.
I’m not against offer sheets as a general rule. I think it is an underutilized tactic by the upper echelon and mid-tier. When you’re near the bottom like Pittsburgh it gets a little more tricky. While the Penguins may get the Rangers 1st round pick as compensation for the Pettersson trade they would not be able to use that in an offer sheet. You can only use your own draft picks for such a move. I don’t think the Penguins are going to willingly take themselves out of this:
There’s a prize in the 2026 NHL Draft, and his name is Gavin McKenna, the best prospect since Connor McDavid. Teams will be hesitant to trade away their 2026 first-round picks because of the possibility, slight or not, of getting lucky and landing the top pick. Here’s the compensation tiers from last year:
Any meaningful target is likely to cost a 1st round pick(s) and given Pittsburgh’s luck in lotteries I think it would take quite the situation to get Pittsburgh to go down this road. The offer sheet path seems like it will make more sense at a different stage of the rebuild, at least for me.
Here’s to Sid getting some points tonight in a Penguins loss.
Thanks for reading!
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