kipwinger

The more I think about this deadline the more frustrated I get. What was the plan when signing all these free agents? To make the playoffs and try to win a round or two? Or wait and see what happens and then sell them off at the deadline? Because if you're trying to make the playoffs (and create a winning culture) then he sure as h*ll should have bolstered the weak spots in the lineup. And if the idea was to sell for picks then he should have bitten the bullet and sold. What he told the team was, "I don't have enough confidence in you to spend a 3rd round pick on some reinforcements. But I'm also not throwing the towel in because I'd like to see us win...just not enough to do anything to improve the odds of it". The deadline is the absolutely last opportunity to commit to an organizational direction. The league gives you 75% of the season to figure your team out. The front office either doesn't know what this team is, or they don't strongly care enough whether it wins or loses to commit to one direction or the other. Every player on the roster knows it too. If you're a UFA on this this team right now why would you buy in? Managment didn't. These guys are all thinking about next year from here on out. And if you're a core piece it's just more of the same, the losing losers lose again. Managing any organization, but especially a sports team, is as much about psychology as anything else. The front office just told the entire team, we don't really care what happens either way. So why would the players? I'm expecting a serious tumble down the standings over the remainder of the season.

That'll happen when you lose the only good center you've had on the team since Henrik Zetterberg retired.

Lalonde: Maybe the best trades are the ones you don't make. Isn't that right Steve? Seider: YOU'RE LITERALLY KILLING ME YOU F*CKING TW*T!!!!!

I mean, every single fan regardless of whether you wanted the team to buy or sell came away today feeling completely deflated. Why would the team feel any differently? They all look at their phones all day long too. "Hey Alex, thanks for saving our season by goaltending your ass off. As a show of thanks we're not doing to bring in a competent backup or anything so here's hoping you're ready to play the next 20 games in a row". "Hey Kaner, I know you're 49 years old and have a bad hip. I know you were probably hoping for a night off on the back to backs and a little rest before the playoffs but would it be okay if you were our entire offense instead?" "Hey Larks, I know you've been playing hurt for 3 seasons in a row because we refuse to acquire a competent 2C to shoulder some of the load. If it's not too much to ask do you think you can hustle back and save our season?" "Seider my man, you look tired. I know you've got the hardest usage of any defenseman in the league but you're just going to have to buck up. At least you're not playing 30 minutes a night against MacKinnon...yet"

Good news, this was one of our "games in hand" on Tampa too. Yippy This is humiliating. Second game this week I've turned off. Night gents.

At the very least have Berggren ready to go for the game tonight if you're not going to do anything at the deadline. Something to give the boys a little pick me up. These guys played there asses of for two months, they're looking at their phones all day long wondering what the GM is going to do to get them some help, and instead he trades away the toughest dude on their team. Pretty anti-climactic. No wonder they're playing flat. Trevor just asked SY "what kind of message does it send your team when you don't make a move" and Yzerman stuttered like an absolutely fool.

I'd agree with you if we went into the deadline kicking everyone's ass. But we limped in with four straight losses and our best player out for two weeks. I think these guys needed something. Instead it just comes across as SY essentially saying "I never cared about this season anyway". This team is flatter than f*ck. Tell me they didn't have the wind taken out of their sails today.

What better way to let your team know you have no faith in them than to let every other team in the division improve while you stand pat. Good call Steve. Also, can we learn to f*cking pass or no? I know I've been beating this drum all season long but watch how we pass. We don't even attempt to pass tape to tape. Nada, just the ol' Jonathan Ericsson special...fling the puck into space and hope one of your guys gets to it first.

Yuck. I get the feeling you were rubbing your belly when you posted that. You should be on a government list somewhere.

Must be he assessed the team's needs much differently than I did. I figured we could use a scoring center, a right handed defenseman with some bite, and a power forward. We don't have any of those things in GR.

SY literally said Kane was his deadline acquisition during his presser. I could not possibly have chortled harder than I did.

I think they both suck, but we need a center that could maybe score one day. We have exactly one of those guys and he's on IR. In Larkin's absence we have 4 centers that will combine for less than 100 points this year and 17 wingers who are less than 6 feet tall and are best described as "heady" and "creative". Meanwhile, we've got Tampa and the Islanders breathing down our necks. Woohoo. Edit: Also, don't get ahead of yourself. There's absolutely no reason to think that Ryan Johansen doesn't also like cocaine. I'm 100% sure he'd like it if he tried it anyway.

Agreed, and it's not like SY has shown an unwillingness to gamble on substance abusers from Washington.

Kinda Legwandish, but not really. We gave up a top organizational prospect for him (Jarnkrok) at the time. I'm not suggesting that. But I'd have given serious consideration to Johansen or Kuznetsov considering the low asking price. Again, you could turn around and waive them in a few weeks if you don't really want them. Their salaries are low enough that it wouldn't have hurt us in any meaningful way.

I think there's an argument to be made for standing pat, but if we go on a slide because we don't have a competent center at the top of the lineup then that decision becomes a lot less tenable. We're in a battle for the playoffs right now and it would be a big screwup to both not sell AND miss the playoffs because you didn't shore up a position of need.

I imagine he wears thongs already.

At this point I'd acquire Johansen for a 5th round pick, play him for two weeks until Larkin is healthy and then waive him if necessary. We're not going to hold our playoff position steady with Joe Veleno as a top line center. We saw what that looked like in December.

We can absolutely acquire any two or even three impact players we want. We have all the assets and cap space a team could want. I think Devin Little is suggesting we don't want to spend assets to acquire players when we've got impact talent ready in the AHL. I sorta agree, except that we need a center and a RHD. Neither of those things apply to Berggren and Edvinsson. Also, Devin Little is a bespectacled ferret.

I expect him to go late in the day. If Chad Ruhwedel has a market then so should Holl. But he'll be a last minute deal. I dunno, maybe they just figured if there's a market for him now then why wait?

Clearing cap space to sign RFAs in the summer.

For the last few days I've been trolling Pens fans about how Dubas is a hack and that trading for Erik Karlsson was a PR move to make him look good and accomplished nothing else worthwhile. I was resoundingly criticized. Who needs the 1st round pick, they said, when we're not rebuilding. Now they've just traded a younger, better, more valuable player for three mid level prospect, a depth scorer on a bad contract, and a conditional 1st because Dubas has concluded it's time to rebuild. My heart is so full right now.

True. And I hope. I really enjoy imagining Ansar Khan and Helene St. James pitfighting for the right to break the Berggren call-up story.

Maybe, but he doesn't really solve the "missing our top center" problem and they've always known what he was vis-a-vis Kostin. Here's hoping he plays opposite Raymond on Compher's line, but I suspect they'll put him on the 4th line with puds to start.

This is a relatively minor gripe, but why wait to call up Berggren now? If you weren't going to move him and you think he can help the team why not call him up last week, or when Kane was injured, or any other time it might have been helpful?

Dubas sucks. He galaxy brained this like he always does. If he'd just taken a first and a middling prospect (the standard return for every quality rental) then he'd have been fine. But he didn't want picks as much as prospects (he said so) because prospects are a surer bet. But because of that, nobody is going to give good ones for a rental. So he talked himself out of a good pick, but also out of a good prospect. A+ work by the wunderkind.