When NHL free agency opened on Monday, Kyle Dubas and his staff executed on the strategy he laid out before the draft: getting established guys on shorter-term deals who can come in and try to help, and recouping future assets.
Pittsburgh’s President of Hockey Operations and General Manager feels that’s what will allow the Penguins to return to contention as soon as possible, whether it’s this season or the next one. “It's hard to put a timeframe on it, but this is obviously not a strip-it-down-to-the-studs situation here,” Dubas said.
“The people in the room are too good for that. It's trying to use every method we can to acquire future assets that we can then bring into the organization through the draft or younger guys through free agency, or via trade or via waivers that can come in and support the core group that's here.
“What we're not going to do is get into the free agent quick fixes like some of the longer-range things that we've seen today. If we had been in a situation where we had been a playoff team and close to being a contender, we would do that. But I think the appetite here is to try to get the team back into contention for the great players who have been here for so long of a time.”
Instead, the Penguins made the following key moves over the last few days:
* Signing forward Anthony Beauvillier, 27, to a one-year contract
* Signing defenseman Matt Grzelcyk, 30, to a one-year contract
* Blake Lizotte, 26, was the only player who got more than a year – the forward signed for two
* Acquiring forward Kevin Hayes, 32, and a 2025 second-round draft pick from St. Louis – with Philadelphia retaining 50% of his $7,142,857 salary from a previous trade
* Re-signing Emil Bemstrom, 25, to a one-year contract
* Signing forward Boko Imama, 27, to a one-year contract
* Acquiring a 2027 second-round draft pick and a 2025 fifth-round draft pick from the New York Rangers in exchange for forward Reilly Smith
* Re-signing defenseman Ryan Shea, 27, to a one-year contract – and adding two right-handed depth defensemen in Nathan Clurman and Mac Hollowell
“(Today’s) been very different than the last number of years,” Dubas said. “But it's exciting all the same because (director of professional personnel) Andy Saucier and the pro scouting staff and our group have done so much work. We're excited about the guys that we brought in, all for different reasons, and think they all have a chance to have a big impact on the Penguins.”
At this point, the Penguins have a sizeable amount of cap space left – and while team ownership Fenway Sports Group has approved spending to the limit, Dubas wants to be patient and remain flexible in case opportunities arise throughout the summer. “We’re hoping it’ll pay off,” he said. Here’s some more insight from Dubas on the team’s moves.
They hope that Hayes can bounce back after a tough season in St. Louis and return to being the impactful player he was in New York and Philadelphia, and look forward to working with him. Where he slots into the lineup is ultimately up to Head Coach Mike Sullivan, but Hayes will definitely start at center. “I just think it gives us another option there,” Dubas said. “He can start in the defensive zone and drive play up the ice, which gives us another option for a reprieve to Sid and Geno. You have them, Hayes, Lars (Eller), Blake Lizotte… We have a number of guys in that realm, (including) Vasily Ponomarev and Sam Poulin coming. It’s exciting for us to have that competition, especially with some of those guys I named being on the older side.” Dubas mentioned they could move Noel Acciari to the wing, saying he’s probably a little more comfortable there.
That sentiment is the same for Beauvillier, who’s started to become a player that bounces around a bit after spending the first seven-plus seasons of his career with the New York Islanders. “But, when you watch the film and you start to dig into it, that player that was so effective for the Islanders and going back to his draft year and just continuing to get better and better is still there,” Dubas said of the forward, who scored a personal-best 21 goals in 2017-18 and potted 18 in each of the two seasons after that. “We just have to provide the environment for him to show that again. And so, I think he was willing to really bet on himself with a very low-money deal for one year in exchange for the opportunity to come in here and try to earn a spot in the lineup.”
Even though the Penguins brought in Matt Grzelcyk – who spent parts of the last eight seasons with Boston – and didn’t qualify restricted free agent P.O Joseph, which means he is now an unrestricted free agent, Dubas said the door is still open for the defenseman to sign with Pittsburgh: “The situation is fairly complex, in that when you have an arbitration-eligible player, the other players who don’t get Q-O’d impact the arbitration case. If a number of players that are in that grouping don’t get qualified, you put yourself at more risk. As that information came to us as we went into yesterday, we had (director of hockey operations Vukie Mpofu) in constant discussion with his representative. We said, ‘This is what we would do.’ Otherwise we probably wouldn’t be qualifying. They elected to take it. They could test the market out. Initially, with the number of similar players, I thought it would be a slam dunk to qualify. But as the situation changed, you always have to be cognizant of that. We had to change course and use some of that money on Grzelcyk this afternoon.”
Grzelcyk joins a group that includes Erik Karlsson, Kris Letang, Marcus Pettersson, Ryan Graves, and the third pairing Pittsburgh ended last season with: Jack St. Ivany and Shea, both re-signed this offseason. The Penguins are particularly excited about St. Ivany, who showed a lot of promise with his poise.
The Penguins had a number of conversations at the trade deadline about Smith, acquired from Vegas last summer in exchange for a third-round pick, but elected to hold off. After he finished the year with 13 goals in 76 games while moving around the lineup, Pittsburgh decided to go with the trade offer from the Rangers. “It was for the second and then the fifth was essentially the toll for the retention,” Dubas said, with Pittsburgh paying 25% of Smith’s $3.75 million cap hit that goes through next season. “You get to the trade deadline and you look at it, if you're going to move them then, you're just going to get the pick and the retention is expected unless you're a third-party broker. So, that was the decision there to move it across the line. (Now) we have the space, and to get the two assets back after giving up the third was just an asset management thing.”
When asked about his comfort level outside of Pittsburgh’s core group of Crosby, Malkin, Letang and Karlsson, Dubas touched on both Drew O’Connor and Rickard Rakell. He praised the year O’Connor had, an impressive chapter in his great story, and said they expect the 25-year-old forward to take even more steps this season. As for Rakell, coming off an up-and-down season that had a rough start, Dubas said the five-time 20-goal scorer is too good of a player not to bounce back. “I’m confident that he will. I look forward to that happening,” Dubas said. “I can only take the reports from (director of high performance) Marty Lauzon and the performance staff that he’s had a great summer so far, which we challenged him to do when he left. He’s a great pro.”
Finally, Dubas said he’s been in constant communication with Crosby about the direction of the team. “He obviously holds an extremely special place here, so it would be foolish for me not to keep in constant contact with him and let him know what we’re thinking,” Dubas said. “As soon as we bring somebody in, we let him know. He reaches right out to the draft picks. He reached out to the guys here today. For me, it’s important for him especially… when we’re going through something a little different than what everyone has been used to since he arrived in 2005, the key is going to be clear communication and being very open about it and transparent. It would be foolish for me not to. That’s what we do. So far, so good."
