Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Talking all parts about the Penguins offseason with Danny (ShireyIrving on Twitter)

Episode Date: September 30, 2020

In the final episode in the month of September, Hunter brought on Danny (ShireyIrving) from Penguins Twitter, who writes for The PensBlog, and they discuss everything about the offseason so far. What were Danny's thoughts on the Hornqvist deal? Has he changed some of those thoughts as it's been about a week since the trade happened? Where does he see Colton Sceviour fitting into the lineup? The two also discuss if the third pairing would be good enough if Chad Ruhwedel would be playing next to Mike Matheson, plus what does GMJR need to do to have this offseason be considered a success to Danny? All that, plus much more on this episode of Locked On Penguins.Support Us By Supporting Our Sponsors! Rock AutoAmazing selection. Reliably low prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit RockAuto.com and tell them Locked On sent you.Built BarBuilt Bar is a protein bar that tastes like a candy bar. Go to builtbar.com and use promo code “LOCKEDON,” and you’ll get $10 off your first order. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Hello, welcome to this episode of the Lockdown Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes. Follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes, follow the shows, Twitter, at L-O-U-U-U-Nescore Penguins. It's the one-year anniversary of when this podcast started, so I just wanted to say beforehand, thank you all to listen to this either every single day or even if it's just one episode. I really do appreciate it, and season two will start tomorrow or Friday, so I just wanted to let you all know about that. But for today, we do have a special guest on the podcast to be his first time coming on,

Danny who does Flaming Hot Takes for Penn's blog as it is in his Twitter. His app is Shiree Irving. Danny, how you doing today, my man? I am doing great, and I am very honored to be here for the big show. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, one year ago today, this all started. So it's a pretty awesome, just this is an awesome day, especially that, you know, we get to bring you on to talk about a whole bunch of stuff that's going on in Penguins Land.

you know, like, let's just get into it. Well, I had the big trade that happened almost a week ago. I think it was a week ago yesterday, a week ago tomorrow, actually, that it first started to break and then it ended on Friday. Patrick Hornquist for Mike Matheson and Colton Severe. Danny, have you come around a little bit on the trade, or do you still have like the same opinion that you had when it first came out? I have given it a lot more thought than the initial knee-jerk reaction.

gave it of, oh my God, what is going on? That being said, the issue was never acquiring, the issue was never trading Hornquist away. The issue was taking on one of the league's worst contracts, regardless of whether that player is as bad as Jack Johnson or not. Because as we've seen, he does have areas of the ice specifically in his transition game where he excels. He puts up points at a high rate for a defenseman. These are all great things. But when you consider the situation they're in and still in some pretty desperate need of help in the bottom six for their forwards and not a lot of money to spend there, especially when you consider that Dominic Simone and Zach Aston Reese are probably going to be injured at the start of next season, it just doesn't

make a whole lot of sense to be taken on that kind of money for a guy who's going to be playing on your third pairing. Yeah, I understand where you're coming from with that. I mean, we all heard the rumors before going into this off season and oh yeah, the penguins want to cut salary. They want to be at around $75 million going into next season so they can add some salary during the season when Jim Rutherford loves to do his deals. But, you know, it kind of seems like Jim Rutherford has put that to bed that he's just been adding salary than losing it. And I mean, he still has to lose some salary anyway because they have to resign Tristan Jari and Dominic Simone and they have to, of course, trade Matt Murray and then who else knows what Jim Rutherford wants to do with this team. And, you know,

I do think Matheson is an upgrade over Jack Johnson, but I do agree with your point as well. That contract is just, it's for too many years, though. Honestly, I'm at the point now where I don't give too much of a shit that it's six years because the Crosby and Malkin are almost going to be retired by that point. So, I mean, the big thing I think is the money, because I think it's, what, 4.8 per season or something like that. It's somewhere in the way. Yeah, he's, he's make it almost $5 million a year. And that you just, regardless of whether he's the best third-paring defenseman in the league or not, when they've got as glaring holes as they do in the bottom six of their forward

group, I don't see how you can justify spending that kind of money on him, especially when you've got, they re-signed Yuso Ricola, what, two weeks ago, three weeks ago, to a million-dollar deal for two years. What was the point of doing that if they're just going to let him wait? waste away in the press box again for another two seasons. Yeah, that's going to be really, really weird. They're just going to be paying him a million for 82 games just to sit in the press box as it's going to be Dumlin Pedersen and then Matheson on that left side and then on the

right side, Latang, Marino and probably Chad Ruudel, though, if they somehow put Jack Johnson on his outside, I may just flip even more shit than I already have. But, I mean, I was going to get into that as well. Do you think a Matheson-Ru-Edle third pairing is able to work? work for the penguins or do you want them to maybe go out and sign someone on the cheap that's an upgrade over Ruehedral because

I think Rueel's salary, is it even a million? I don't even think it is. I think it's around 900 K. No, I think he actually is signed at 700K. So he's basically at league minimum there. Yeah.

I think Matheson Ruehiel pairing will be just fine truth be told Matheson's probably one of the better third pairing D-Men in the league but again that just

loops back to the contract and the term on that deal but we've already gone over that I don't know that they need to go out and get a right-handed defenseman but I also know especially with the penguins

the injuries that this team has and I don't know that any of the left-handed defensemen they have are all that suited to play on the right side and that includes Matheson yeah it's just it's gonna be interesting to see you know how many minutes they give him I think in the season because we all know they tried to shelter Jack Johnson even though that didn't really work for some reason they played Justin Schultz week too many minutes and then they basically just badmouthed him on their his way out for I do not know why they decided to do that but I mean I just wonder if they're actually going to shelter him or are they

They're just going to kind of like, you know, play him 15, 16 minutes in night or something. And I don't mind Chad Roodle at that number six spot. I think he can do a perfectly fine job. I remember reading that Jacques Martin, you know, told, I think Josh Yoia, a couple of their media members that he was their best defenseman for portions of last season. I think he can move the puck up the ice fairly well. I know his offensive game is, it's okay, but, you know, he's also fine in his own zone. I mean, I would prefer Matheson on the third pairing than spending all this money, like to go out and sign Chris Tanniv, for example, who has been linked to them on a five-year, $25 million deal. That would have been, but I think a lot worse than getting Matheson, to be honest with you.

Yeah, no doubt. And the Chris Tanev rumors were just absolutely ridiculous. We've been hearing nonstop about how the penguins are trying to cut salary and get younger. And despite the Hornquist trade, it doesn't really look like that's the case anymore. But it just doesn't make a lot of sense to go out and get a guy like that who doesn't have really any offensive upside. He's always been touted as a pretty good shutdown, right-handed defenseman. But the fact of the matter is that he's been pretty garbage the past couple of years, and they were going to shell out a lot of unwarranted money to get him. So I guess it's better that they gave that to Matheson, who's got a lot more offensive upside and is younger.

But I really struggle to understand the direction of this team on a week-to-week basis. Yeah, Jim Rutherford is always, I guess the word for him is like a wild card. You know, you just never know what he has up his sleeve. It's been a lot of negative these last couple years, though, which is the moves that he continues to make. But yeah, I agree with the Chris Tanna take. His underlying numbers are not kind to him these last couple of years, especially defensively. I mean, he was once, I think, a defensive specialist and had some pretty good elite suppression numbers.

But then, you know, these last couple years, as he gotten older, they just kind of tanked. And, you know, I think Ryan Wilson of hockey buzz, but a couple tweets out like last week about, you know, him with Quinn Hughes and then him without Quinn Hughes on the ice. Yeah. Quinn Hughes was carrying him way too hard. did it was the difference was just it was a stark difference i mean i think the possession was like 57% with hughes and then without him it's down to like 45 or something like that it was just like yeah the problem with guys like chris tanev is that they are already on the decline

before anybody figures out the actual value that they kind of have so when you've got a shutdown defenseman he's not sexy you don't see him making big play You don't hear his name because he's not putting up big point totals. But then people start to notice the little subtle things here and there and the chatter around him. And then all of a sudden, just like Mark Edward Vlasic, you've got a guy who the narrative around him is that he's a shutdown defenseman when that hasn't been the case in three, four years. Yeah, it's just, it would have been like a total peak Jim Rutherford move, though, especially in free agency. He loves to throw out all this term. and then you know you have the storyline, Danny.

Oh, yeah, well, the TANF brothers will be reunited. It's just like, nobody cares. I really... Oh, God. I roll my eyes so far in the back of my head when I read anything about brothers linking up or, oh, the coach of this team coached this dude who's on the trading block back when he was in juniors,

like there's probably something there. No, there is not probably something there. And please stop writing that bullshit. That's probably the best way of saying. Unless it's like Daniel or Henrik Sidene, I'm not interested. That's just honestly how I look at it. Before we get to the next segment, I do have to talk about this book, Danny, from the best-selling authors of The Daily Stoic, comes the ultimate Stoicism Guide to Success,

resilience and virtue to accept what you cannot control and adapt to what you can. A philosophy sports team across the country are successfully adapting lives. of the Stoics, the Art of Living from Zeno to Marcus Aurelius is available now where other books are sold. Okay, Danny, so the other part of the trade that we forgot to touch on was Colton Severe. Where does he fit in in this lineup? I think right now he's probably Jared McCann's right winger because, I mean, I have no idea what the hell they want to do on that third line. They need to get a pulse on that third line just because Marlowe was a corpse, horn, that, just that whole line with Marlowe and Hornquist with McCann was just very

what's the word I'm looking for just I know yeah that's probably the best way to say it what do you do there do you put him on that line to start and to see what they can do I think you have to I'm pretty sure they're going to keep the Blugher Taneb Tsar line together

whenever Aspen Reese gets healthy enough I think they really really want to keep that fourth line intact. So that leaves Severe is your third line right wing. I don't know where else he'd go. He's obviously not a guy that's going to play top six minutes. I don't want him attached to Crosby or Malkin's wing. But on the flip side of that, I don't really want him attached to McCann's wing either, because as we have learned over the course of the past season, is that McCann could really benefit from a guy who's going to drive offense a little bit, and I don't know that Severe's that guy.

He's historically had some somewhat positive effects on generating offense, but he's never had a full season where he was an above-average finisher. According to Hockey Viz's finishing model, he's been below average or average every season of his career except for 2013-14 when he only played 26 games. Interesting. So I actually, I did not know that. So, you know, that's perfect. You learn new stuff every day on this podcast, Danny.

So I very much appreciate that. But, I mean, yeah, they kind of don't have a choice right now. I mean, they could at some point if they add another forward. Maybe they moved Kasperi Kappan down to McCann's wing. I'd want to see that, to be honest with you. But Jim Rutherford and Mike Sullivan seemed to think that Captain can play in the top six. I'm not so sure about that. I remember you wrote that article for Penn's blog detailing, you know,

what Gisbury Capon brings to the table now. At this point in his career, you know, he was playing a lot of the top six minutes, I think, on the Matthews line. And then he kind of was relegated down. So, I mean, I think, you know, McCann and Cappan would be pretty interesting, I would say. But then on his left wing, maybe when healthy, you put Dominic Simone there. but of course Simone's not going to be available when a season starts because he had the shoulder surgery. So you might be looking at Sam Lafferty, though. I think some people in this fan base are a lot higher than Sam Lafferty than I am.

I just don't think he brings a lot to the table offensively, even though I think he's somewhat okay defensively. Yeah, I agree with you on that. I think he had, what, nine points in his first 10 games or something when they called him up last year. and I think he might have set expectations a little high for people. He definitely has a lot of individual skill. He's a pretty shifty skater, especially when he's in transition. He's got an okay shot.

I remember there was a game against the Capitals where he sniped one past Holbeen. I was like, holy hell, where did that come from? Yeah, I was gorgeous. But the fact of the matter is that the Penguins did, absolutely nothing in terms of creating offense or scoring goals with him on the ice. And with the current state of their bottom six, I just don't know how, I mean, their whole bottom six right now, they've got McCann in a defensive line and not a whole lot of goal scoring that I'm seeing. And I'm,

I guess I'm still sitting here kind of hoping that they're going to flip Severe to somebody else, but I'm probably a fool for sitting here and waiting for that to happen. Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen. I know he only has a year left on his contract before. Is he a UFA after it, or is he an RFA? I think he might be a UFA. I'm not to have to go. He'll be a UFA after next season.

Okay, yeah. I was wondering which one it was, but I was leaning towards the UFA because he's already like 26 or something, so I think he would have already been an RFA in this league. So, I mean, my guess is he probably walks after this year anyway. I mean, I don't expect him to contribute. too much offensively to the team.

But, you know, who knows, you could really surprise me with that. But Dan, before we do get to the next segment, I did want to bring this up. I think you, me, Jeff, a couple others on Penguin's Twitter, have been pretty high on bringing Craig Smith to Pittsburgh. I don't know. He would be a great fit here.

Put him on the third line with Jared McCann. Much needed offense. He scored 20 goals. A number of seasons down in Nashville. Good defensively as well. I would love to see it happen, but I just don't think they have them. money to get it done. What's your take on that situation? Yeah, you and a lot of other people,

I'm sure, are well aware of how we feel about Craig Smith at this point. He would be a great addition to the Penguins lineup, and I would even argue that if they could figure out a way to get him, I would probably stick him in the top six instead of Cappan and leave Cappan on the third line with McCann because, like you said, I think they could do some good things together. But as far as obtaining Smith, I just don't see how the penguins are going to make this happen. They've got just barely

over $6 million in cap space. They still need to resign Jari. They still need to resign Simone Lafferty. Don't think I'm missing anybody off the top of my head. I think that's it. But I mean, that's going to take up a lot of that money, and unless you

move a couple of guys, I don't think they want to move Taneb. No way. There's no way they move his salary. So then that leaves you with Johnson, Severe, and Ricola to clear up $4 million.

Depending on evolving hockey's got his contract projection at 4.4 million for three years. And they're pretty spot on with those kinds of things. So I would imagine that his contract will be in that ballpark. But I don't see

anyone else that they would be willing to move on from. I mean, they're not going to turn around and flip Matheson, are they, to free up money? No way. Yeah, so I would love it. I just don't see how it's going to happen. That being said, if they could find a way to make it happen, they would be getting a steal of a player. They would get him at a really good value. He's ranked in the 93rd percentile and goals above replacement over the past three seasons, which is ahead of guys like Barzell, Shifley. So he's been real good and he's going to sign a deal for probably less than what he's actually worth.

But as far as the penguins are concerned, they've got other things they need to be worried about. Yeah, I agree with you. I think evolving hockey had him at what, their contract four years, 3.5 per season or something like that. I think I'm not to double check on that. They've got them at 4.4 per season for three years. This is most likely contract. Yeah, I had it backwards. I thought it was four for 3.5, not three for 4.5.

So my mistake on that. But, yeah, I mean, I think you're right. He's probably going to sign for less than $4 million per season. And whatever team that gets him, you said, that's going to be a steal. He provides 20 goals, scoring ability, basically every single season. He did that a lot of seasons in Nashville, just his play-driving ability. I remember you sent me that article that I think that Predators SB Nation site published. And yeah, yeah, he is really, really.

good and he's a player that the penguins could desperately need but yeah they're just they don't have the cap space to do it unless they really clear out some salary which is just pretty unfortunate and we're going to talk about more more about cleaning out some salary in the next segment but before that danny we have to talk about built bar there are six new amazing flavors a few of them are cookies and cream caramel milk brownie and carrot cake the bars are covered in 100% chocolate they're soft and easy to chew that you can lose or maintain weight while indulging in a healthy delicious treat one of my favorite flavorers is still the peanut butter run 19 grams of protein 180 calories five grams of sugar five grams of net carbs you can get a free cooler with purchase while surprise last you can go to

billbar dot com you use promo code locked on and you get $10 off your next order that's locked on for the promo code for $10 off at bill bar dot com okay so Danny i'm kind of just at the point now where I'm ready for the mat murray trade just so it can clear up some salary cap space anyway and hopefully maybe they can convince a team to take on Jack Johnson's salary. Pierre Dorian, if you're listening to this, it would be very much appreciated because you really don't have a team going into next season with any players signed. So, I mean, I want it done by the draft so that the penguins can focus on other issues like resigning Tristanjari and, you know, figuring out their defense and maybe adding a forward.

But, I mean, what do you realistically see the penguins getting for Matt Murray? And, I mean, this is probably an obvious question, but would you take a lesser return if they can package Jack Johnson with Matt Murray? Yes, I would take absolutely nothing in return or a seventh round pick if a team were to take Murray and Johnson as a package and just leave it at that. I would be completely fine with that. But realistically, I don't know that that's going to happen. And I really thought heading into the offseason that their best chance of moving Johnson was utilizing that first round pick that they have.

But, you know, they turned around and sent a giant package to Toronto for Kaepinan to get their guy. And, you know, I'm optimistic about what Kaepinan will do. But they certainly paid a hefty price for it. And when you weigh, you know, whether or not teams are willing to take Johnson on to get Murray, I really think that they should have hung on to that pick to at least try and leverage that a little more? Yeah, I agree.

I mean, especially because it was a top 15 pick. I mean, the Penguins really have not had a top 15 pick in the draft for, Lord knows how long. I think it was back to 2012 when they selected Derek Pooleyot up there. So, I mean, you just saw the Mark Stahl trade. They also sent a second round pick. The Rangers did to Detroit to make sure that they would take him. I wish the Penguins could do that.

But, you know, they also don't have a second round pick in this year's draft because I think this pick was the one that they sent to Las Vegas. for Mark Andre Fleury, it's either this year's one or next year's one, but I don't think they have the next year's second round pick either. So, yeah, I agree with you on that. If it's not Matt Murray, I don't know what else you said for, to get Jack Johnson off this team. Maybe you just eat some of his salary, but I'm not really sure the Penguins would want to

do that. And no, frankly, I wouldn't want to do that. And I just want all of his $3.25 million off this books anyway. But, I mean, if you do, what team do you think? think we'll get Matt Murray. If you had to take one guess, what team is going to require him? Oh, I don't know. There's so many teams. There's going to be a giant goaltending carousel this off season. If I had the guess, though, like you mentioned a little bit earlier ago, I would just guess Ottawa just for the sheer amount of cap space they have. Yeah. And I certainly think that

changing, you know, the deal around if you've got a deal that is involving just Murray compared to a team that's taking on Johnson along with him, that's going to change the return for that, obviously. But I think people really need to temper their expectations if Murray is traded by himself or something. Because people need to understand that although a team is getting the rights to sign him, he's not under contract. So a team, team is still going to have to turn around and pay for him. Yeah, exactly. And I've seen all these reports that, you know, teams are kind of a little bit scared about what if he's going to take them to arbitration. He may ask for $5 to $6 million per season. I mean, personally, I think that's a ridiculous act. But, I mean, he's won the Cup twice.

That's probably what he's going to use in his leverage. You know, he thinks he can take this team back to the Cup final. He's done this before in the playoffs. So, I mean, I wouldn't envy that team that acquires him because they're going to have to pay up for him in his next contract. I'm not really sure how many years they would want to give him, but so that's going to be a very interesting storyline to follow as well. And then, you know, for the Penguins with resigning, Restricted Free Agents, I mean, they got to decide what they want to do with Tristan Jari with his contract. I mean, I may be leaning towards kind of a bridge

deal, Danny, maybe like a two-year deal worth a few million per season. I don't really like term for him. He has a smaller sample size than I would like, though I still think that he's potentially the real deal. But I mean, I was reading in an article last week. I think it was on the athletic or something, or I think it was. But he could be asking for more than what Matt Murray was making on his last contract, which was close to $4 million per season. And I mean, I don't think I would pay him that. There's just no way. No, I don't see that happening either. I don't see them signing him to a deal probably any longer or larger than what they gave Murray a couple of years ago. Like you said, he just doesn't have the track record to show for it as good as he was last year. And even as good as he was last year, he's still kind of tailed off toward the end of the season and faltered there back in February and March when the Penguins were a tire fire. But I really don't feel comfortable giving him a four or five-year deal at $4 million, and I honestly don't think he'll get that.

I'd be surprised if he signs for more than 3.2. I think so too. Yeah, I mean, like I said, probably two to three year deal for him. I think that's fair. We don't have a big sample size on him. And like you said, he faltered towards the end of the season. I mean, some people were clamoring for him to start in the playoffs. I mean, at the time, I was fine with Murray going, but on a shorter leash than most.

And he eventually did get in because, I mean, the penguins were up against the wall, so they had no choice basically, what the hell. So they put him in. Played really, really well. And, you know, if he plays well during these next couple of seasons, then you give him another contract. But, I mean, I'm never a big fan, though, of paying goaltenders a lot of money.

Just because, you know, it's almost like the running back position of football. There's only a very few select goaltenders that I would pay a lot of money. I mean, Carrie Price being one of them, Henrik Lundquist. But look at some of these other guys. Sergei Bobovsky's overpaid. I'm going to laugh when Braden Holpey gets a lot of money from a team. That is going to be just hilarious just to see which team overpays for him. And, you know, this goalie market is going to be the biggest goalie market that I think we've seen in quite a while.

But before I let you go to any, I just have one more question for you. What are your big goals that you hope Jim Rutherford accomplishes by the time the next season starts, even though who knows if these guys are going to accomplish these goals because he's just such a wild card? but what are your just big aspirations now for the rest of this offseason? I think I would chalk the rest of his offseason up as a success if he's able to find a depth option for the forward group that can provide some offense and resigning Jari for anything less than, you know, three and a half million, 3.25 million.

I'll chalk it up as a success because I'm going to sit here and say all the things that I want him to do, and then he's going to turn around and just throw up all over himself. So I'm going to save myself from that disappointment. Yeah, I mean, that's probably the best way to say because he's just, I don't have a lot of faith in him in right now. I mean, I don't think any Penguins fan can have any faith in him right now.

But, you know, some of the people that always defend him, certain people in the media, you know, who always like to show for him, definitely do. But, you know, that's all I'm going to say about that. But, Danny, thank you so much for coming on this episode. of Locked on Penguins, I very much appreciate it, and I'm definitely going to have you on at some point down the road here during Free Agency when they inevitably do something or when they make another trade,

because that's definitely coming. Yeah, thanks for having me on, man. It was a good time, and I will definitely be back. Yeah, sounds great with me. We'll be back with another episode tomorrow or Friday. I'm not really sure yet. Probably, definitely Friday, I think. But thank you guys so much for listening to this episode.

Danny, just shout out your Twitter for everyone. So you guys can follow me at Shiree Irving. It's S-H-I-R-E-Y-E-Y-U-Ving. That's a Kyrie Irving joke if you haven't picked up on that yet. Yes, that is, that's just one of the best Twitter ads out there on Penguin's Twitter. I'll say that. But yeah, thank you, Danny. Thank you so much for coming on.

And I will talk to you all later this week. Thank you.