Locked On Penguins - Daily Podcast On The Pittsburgh Penguins - Talking some more Kasperi Kapanen, this time with Jesse Marshall!

Episode Date: August 27, 2020

We're talking more about the big trade that happened on Tuesday and Jesse Marshall from The Athletic comes back on Locked On Penguins to dive into all of it with Hunter. They discuss why the cost to acquire was still bad from Jim Rutherford, plus how he wouldn't have made a difference against the Canadiens in this years playoff series. They also touch on if there's a way that the trade could be really worth it next season if he produces well enough next to Sidney Crosby and Jake Guentzel. Also, what's the biggest question mark going forward, besides the goaltending trade that's coming? Jesse answers that, plus much more in this episode of Locked On Penguins. 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 today's episode of the Locked-on Penguins podcast. I'm your host, Hunter Hodes, follow the show's Twitter at LO underscore Penguins. Follow me on Twitter at Hunter Hodes. Today's show is brought to you by rockado.com, amazing selection, reliability of prices. All the parts your car will ever need. Visit rockado.com and tell them Lockdown sent you. So we do have a special guest coming back on to the podcast for today. Jesse Marshall of the Athletic has agreed to come on and talk all about this.

Casperi Kappaninan trade back to the Penguins as they sent a whole lot back to the Toronto Maple Leafs in the process. But first off, Jesse, how are you doing, man? About as well as it can be in this crazy world, man. We're hanging in there. Yeah, it has been just absolutely crazy to say, you know, with all the sports going on and just all the games being boycotted, just everything like that. But, you know, hopefully we can talk some hockey here and just talk. about Kisbury Kappaninan. Jesse, I've kind of come around a little bit on this trade, a little bit, just a kind of,

just a tad. I still hate the cost to acquire the asset management by Jim Rutherford. It's still piss poor with it, but I mean, there are a couple of tweets this morning that I saw about Kappanin that, you know, it looks like at 5E5 this year. He scored it like an above average second line rate, which was good. It just sucks that he was behind Neelander and Mariner. Jesse, what does your overall take on the trade just to, with you? the asset management and everything around it?

I don't think it's good. Pretty much like my primary area of frustration. Aspery Caponin doesn't make the Penguins beat the Montreal Canadians. Probably doesn't even put that series at five games.

But the way they were saying, there's no way. No. And I know that this is one move, we're judging one move in what is about to, you know, we can assume be a series of moves. Under no circumstances, to me, was this player worth the value that gave up? Now, there's multiple fronts to this, right?

The first one, I equated to this. I gave somebody else this analogy earlier, Hunter. Let's pretend that your neighbor was selling their car. It was an okay car, right? It wasn't great. They wanted $1,500 for it. And you knew your neighbor didn't need the car because he had a couple other cars.

And you knew the car didn't run all that great. Like it was okay. Like $1,500. And then you went over to his house and you gave him $3,000 in one of your cars. What would you do that for? You didn't need to do that.

The car only costs $1,500. And your neighbor's strapped for cash and he really needs the money. You don't, you know, there was everyone in the hockey world do the Toronto Maple Leafs were going to shed salary. A, and B, the Casperi Capitan was going to be the player that was going to be the shed. Yeah.

Everyone knew that. We're in absolutely no position. Come after you and demand Philip Hollander. We're in no position to ask for a first round pick. Yeah. I mean, it's just to overpayment the overvalued asset, and we've seen it from Jim Rutherford now several times. It's also, I think, a preferential view. overvalued view of assets he's familiar with.

You could take that, Hunter, all the way back to 2011 with Corey Stilman. He brought Corey Stelman back to the Carolina Hurricanes and deemed him the solution to a problem. He was not the solution to, but he was a name that he was familiar with. Ray Stelman's second go around there. Matt Cullen, Ron Hainsey, Jack Johnson.

The list goes on. This is a player that I wasn't in any... Let me put it like this, right? So be like, I'm segmenting you into your own next segment now, probably. But, you know, where they're going to play him becomes a problem for me. Because you're putting him in the top line right wing, or the second line right wing. That's what I was thinking too. Okay.

So knock on Capitan in his draft year. I wrote about this. I didn't think that he had the hockey sense. Bring all of his skills together. the number one criticism of his game. And it would manifest itself on her to give you an exact example, because I don't want to talk in like hyperbole, or I don't want to give you general draft nonsense.

I'll give you an exact example. Set face off plays. Just not participating. Or like not knowing where to go. Or taking situations where he's not supposed to be the actor, becoming the actor. And that means like shooting it, high off the glass.

Like, how frustrating is that? So, so knowing that history, right, they go to Toronto, with Capitan, and one out of his three years has been really above average. The other two were, you know,

basically it were, I would say, not to confuse anyone with the term replacement level, at league average or below. How about that? And when the problem manifested in Toronto, it manifested when they moved them up to lineup, and asked them to the playing

with guys like Austin Matthew, and Mitch Marner and players that think the game at a high level, he couldn't do it. Because that's been the criticism of his game and his time as a prospect. Now you're going to play him with Sidney Crosby. If it didn't work

with Matthews, Tavares, and Marner, it's not going to work with Sidney Crosby. And you're talking about a player that's got six times the sense of any of the players that I just mentioned. So, like, it's, A, it's miscast for me.

B, the amount you gave up. Hubberg's playing in the KHL. You've already said they don't even know if they're going to qualify him. That's the point of that. Yeah. Spurlingrens of number four, number five,

A.HL defense. I've barely even heard of them before yesterday. And neither have I. And the only reason I'm like, the Marleys are a super fun team to watch, I'm super bad. If there's one thing I've gotten bad at, it's paying attention to the American Hodge.

Like, Hunter, and because, like, me too. I got, like, there's no much, so much you could do when you're paying attention to the draft already. And outside of Pierre-Ollivia Joseph, the Penguins didn't have anybody down there worth watching. Like, I don't pick my battles. So, but I see, like, but everybody that watches the Marley's at Thaley is a player that frustratingly leaves you wanting more from his skill set and has never exhibited the ceiling. He's never cracked the top 15 in the Toronto, like, prospects ranking. I know the Penguins pool is really small,

but Philip Hollander is number three for me. Number two, number three. So if you've given up one of your better prospects, a guy in the KHL, a guy that's not playing in the NHL probably ever, Aspery Kappaninan, and you've also given up a first round pick. I just don't see in what world that value adds up.

And I've had people approach me, and this is the last thing I say, because I've gone on a total tangent, but like I've had people approach me and say, They were never going to keep that pick. That I was misanimate. And I never even really thought about it all that hard. You know, I didn't know what they were going to do with it.

I kind of prepared for them to keep it, I think. It's not to, I care about that. It's just that I care about the, like, the value you could have gotten for that pick. And that's what I was saying, too. Yeah. It's just like, I was of the opinion. I've talked about this on my episode on Tuesday. I basically said, you know, I don't usually have this kind of take because they

always trade it and you know you're a win now mode i would have rather them kept it because i think this is a deep draft and i mean i'm no draft expert here but i just i read and i look at bob mackenzie's draft reports and i look at some hockey prospectus and core corey on the athletic does a great job but it's just i kind of would have kept it because you could have gotten a really good player there but i mean to your point you could have gotten a bona fide top six winger i think with part of that package with a number 15 pick a top prospect what kind of defense could you have gotten? Yeah, a top four defenseman

that slides Marcus Pedersen down to the third pairing. I mean, in a perfect world, that's beautiful. I know the flat cap of... I wrote about this the other day, Hunter, that they need... what they really need to play

with Jack Johnson is a number four. Could have gotten your number... You know, really... Because you can't put a third pairing... You can't ask a third pairing defenseman, do all the things that's required of a third pairing defenseman and passed to play with Jack Johnson.

Yeah. Gone out and swung for the fence and gotten yourself a guy that you get to put down there having a sacrifice one of Marcus Peterson or John Marino. and I have to say this too because like I just want on that tangent like Casbury Cabin does not make the Penguins a worse hockey team. He definitely improves the Penguins in some aspect.

I think I think his impact is similar to that of a Carl Hagelin. Be honest like Carl, Carl Hagelin was a nice accessory piece. Yeah, he just. But when did we, you know, we wouldn't have assumed. Carl Haglin is a solution long term to Sidney Crosby's wing, would you? You know, it's kind of that same thing for me. Yeah. And, you know, the one thing before we go to a commercial break and we'll touch on this more,

I think after, you know, the one thing that I do like about this trade, if there's one really big thing. You know, they didn't do this. Jesse, they didn't do this. Oh, yeah, he's tough to play against nonsense. We need more players like that. I mean, he actually. No, he is.

Even though he is. You're very right. But you could have said that about him. Yeah. And all the other stuff about speed and everything still would have been true. Yeah, I just really jumped out at his game is just how fast he is. I put a clip on my Twitter yesterday. He just blew past Brad Marchand in a, I think Game 7 of that playoff series in 20, I think it was 2019.

I mean, the Leafs lost that game because they always lose to Boston. But, I mean, it's just, that's what really jumps out to me about his game. You know, he's a skilled winger in. Just, yeah, the main thing is, yeah, the cost to acquire was just, it's just too much. It was just another thing that Jim Rutherford always loves to do, Jesse. He gets in these bidding wars, he pays too much for the player, and then you know what? It just, that's why everyone gets so upset, you know. He kind of did the same thing with Jack Johnson, though.

I don't really know if anyone else was going to give him a five-year term, but, you know, he kind of did the same thing with Brandon Tanna. I ate a lot of crow on Brandon Tanna. That six years, I still think. And Reeves, though, maybe, right? Ryan Reeves is one. I mean, they only moved down a couple spots, but you also gave up Skersonkis, who's actually played very well in the bottom six for St. Louis.

Yeah. Ryan Reeves was here for less than a year. So, you know, again, like, I'm not saying Oscar Sunquist fix all your, fixes all your problems. Teddy Blugher's probably better. But you could have both. Yeah. Or you could have moved, you know, one of, if you wanted to move Sunquist, you could have got maybe a better piece back. So I read, this is interesting.

And I, uh, I went, it's true day. I was goofing around online. I went back and read Carolina newspaper articles about Jim Rutherford after he left. You know what they said, Hunter, that I thought, and I think you'll find this funny. What? All said, Jim Rutherford's time here won't just be remembered for the Cups. It'll be remembered for the nonstop series of trades he had to make to fix other trades. Yeah, it's just the same thing is happening here.

Like, it's such a time. capsule to read all this. There were other instances of him having, like, things to say about people leaving an organization and kind of kicking people when they were down. And, like, we just saw that with Justin Shultz. We've seen it with other guys. Like, it's, it's just, uh, that's what it is, you know? And I, I don't, uh, again, I, you know, anybody cares here what this is going to look

like afterwards. They're going to be done. Everyone knows it. The team is going to sign. I might as well just get ready for it now. Now you might as well just go all out, you know. Exactly. We're going to touch on Jim Rutherford coming up here in the next segment

because, you know, he's just kind of been trending down a little bit. I would say the past few years, but first off, it's time to talk about rockado.com. It's a family business serving auto park customers online for 20 years. You can go to rockado.com to shop for auto and body parts of hundreds of manufacturers. The catalog is unique and remarkably easy to navigate. We can quickly see all the parts available for your vehicle. choose the brands, specifications and prices you prefer.

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A lot of the takes been coming in, you know, time to retire, Jim. It's time to just, you know, go your separate ways. You know, you're in the Hockey Hall of Fame. You brought this team to Stanley Cups. I'm never, like, too much of a reactionary person. I'm not someone to say, we'll fire the GM after this loss. Fire the GM after this trade. Fire, you know, after whatever the people like to do when you're,

if you're a Cleveland Browns fan or something like that. But, Jesse, I just, I feel like the time it's coming here. And, you know, the last couple of seasons, he's had more misses than hits. I know he's had the Jason Zucker trade, the John Marino acquisition, but it's just, I just don't like the trend that we're seeing right now. All these moves that he makes to fix prior mistakes. I mean, the Dominic Cahoon trade now just looks foolish. I mean, I don't really understand why they had to give up on Rodriguez, even though we really didn't get to see a lot of him. It's just, I just don't like the trend of what's going on here with Jim.

What do you think about that? it's fair you know um i don't think anybody can really admonish you for for feeling that way um you know it's hard to know sometimes i think because you you've did a good job of painting the good and the bad right and there is good and bad john marino is no god bless kevin stevens for that one right um you know i i just i think this year hunter is really the critical one because we're in a We're in a transition before a big transition. Like, there's transition already happening now. And I, and, you know, Matt, what happens with Matt Murray is going to be a big, you know, if, if Jim Rutherford goes out and just rob somebody blind from Matt Murray.

That's the dream. Nobody, yeah, I mean, who cares, you know, nobody cares anymore, right? Now you're back to the yo-yo, the ebb and flow of Jim Rutherford. So I just think that how they navigate through the next, you know, 10 calendar months really not only be critical to Jim Rutherford's tenure with the team probably, but critical to what actual length this window has, what that actually looks like. So I think it's a to be determined, you know. I mean, look, the reality of this situation is in this environment, if you lose, in the first round only winning

one possible game you get swept again one game in three years but he's probably going to go you know at that point you know at that point you're in a situation where you know you probably got everybody on the move

so this is his biggest offseason yet I would say you know with all the moves that he's kind of promising that he's going to make you know I was reading the other day you know with Pierre Lebrun It sounded like he was told from a couple people that they were close to a Matt Marie trade over the last week, but it never materialized. And some people, I think, are worried that he's going to keep Matt Murray and trade Tristan Jari.

I do not see that happening. I don't either. Yeah, I don't either. There's a surprising amount, Hunter. I don't know if you've seen this, but there's been a surprising amount, I think, of Tristan Jari dislike some reason. I've been caught off guard by it recently. It's probably because, you know, he faltered down the stretch just a bit. His game dipped a little bit, even though he was the better goaltender this season.

I think that's why I think some of it also is to do with Mark Andre Florey. Some Penguins fans are never going to let that go, you know, that he's still not here, that he should have finished his career as a penguin. But, you know, they're just kind of cautious going with that. But I think some of it also is just because he faltered and struggled a little bit. I think from February to March or after the All-Star game, I think. Here's the thing I'll tell you guys, everyone about Tristan Jari, that I think should, you know, make everybody feel a little bit better.

Tristan Jari went to the same academy, a whole-hanging academy, as Lauren Braswa, who has not, I don't think yet had the same level of success that Jari's had in the NHL, but is at least in it, is playing. Either way, you know, I forgot about this until I went back and read about it before that game four against the Canadians. But the academy they went to on it wasn't traditional. When I say that, like, what I mean is like so many of these traditional goaltending academies are focused on angles, right?

Or like, or not angles, but styles. And, you know, are you a butterfly goalie? you know, what, like, pad placement and, you know, all this nonsense. Not nonsense, but, you know, old school stuff. Tristan Jari and Lauren Bursua were kind of trained in, like, this mathematical school. So everything that they learned in the academy and the stuff that they focused on there was about how, where to angle your head and neck in relation to getting around a screen. Mathematically, where is the best placement for your pads with the shooter located X number of

feet away. Like, it was very, I guess, in that sense, non-traditional, which I think, I think when your focus is rooted in stuff like that, not in a particular style, like, you become less, I think, prone to having the bottom fallout for extended periods of time. It's no different for me than boxing or UFC fighting. Guys get, like, you get in like a style, you, you know, you, you style whole, you know, where now you're like, you're fighting against yourself, uh, within the own, your style, you know, and that's like a, that was very much a Mark Andre Fleury thing, you know, very, I don't know if you remember a point in his career, part of the discussion was, you know, he's got to, he's got to change it up, he's too aggressive, you know, we got to get

a different coach in here. You're never going to really run into those conversations of Tristan Jari because I don't, I don't know that he can be coached, you know, like when you have somebody who's got such a unique background. I mean, he could be coached, but, like, his foundation is so mathematical and so angular. It's almost like a one-size-fits-all type thing. He looks so poised out there. That's one of the things that made me so confident in proclaiming him as an NHL player at such an early point because it's just so enchilent almost, right?

Like, very much just in the right places. Yeah, and he just, he looks so poor. out there too. The way he moves the puck, he goes behind the net and gets her, it just comes out of his net. He does it with such ablam. And I just, I marvel at it because, you know, for the longest time we had Mark Andre Fleury well, where every time he would leave the net, you would basically shit your pants. It was an adventure, yeah. It was an adventure. It's a walking adventure out there because you think he's going to cough it up. And he did do that plenty, plenty of time. So I am excited to see his development going into the next season, he is going to be the number one goaltender.

And they're going to promote Casey DeSmith, I would feel like that's the position that this team needs to pay the least. I will always say goaltending is kind of like the running back position in football. You really don't want to pay it unless you're paying someone like Carrie Price to be your goaltender or, you know, Henrik Lunkus for as long as he was elite. But before we get into our last segment, Jesse, it's time to talk about Roman. Talking about erectile dysfunction isn't easy. usually we just brush it off or blame ourselves saying things like, I lost my mojo, or we avoid it altogether with excuses like, I had a long day at work. But with Roman, you can get a free online evaluation and ongoing care for ED,

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That's get roman.com slash locked on NHL. Okay, Jesse, so I kind of wanted it just to get back to the trade before we kind of close things out. I was kind of thinking about this to myself yesterday. How much would cap and have to produce next season and the season after that for you to go or for some people to go? You know what? trading a top 15 pick in one of the three best prospects, five best prospects in this system was worth it. For me, I was thinking maybe 20 goals, 30 assists on Crosby's line, 45, 50 point season. What's your take on that? I don't know that I can answer this question because

having something work out in an unexpected fashion under doesn't make the principal move the right idea. I mean, like, I would say, like, if you traded Chris LaTang like Anthony Bovillier and then Anthony Bovillier scored 50 goals,

still wasn't. I mean, like, how, you didn't know that was coming. You didn't know Anthony Bovillier was going to score 50 goals. You know, like, come on. So, again, like, I, I'll tell you what I expect. Okay. I think regardless of environment, because the penguins are going to have, I think, the makings on that bottom six, even if Kappenden were to end up there, even if he wasn't playing with Krosby and Gensel, I still think there are environments in the Penguins bottom sitting there, he could be fruitful. And so I think 20 and 20, reasonable. I think the question is, traditionally, the data will tell you he doesn't do well on the power play. a weak point in his game.

So you're probably not going to give him a whole lot of time there. But if he can improve his outputs on the penalty kill, a lot of people boast about he's kind of a quote unquote power killer and then he's so aggressive and so fast, he gets up ice so quickly, but he can kill it in advance.

But the data doesn't, I don't know that it backs all that up. So you got to, I think, one, you got to get some return out of him on special teams, especially on the penalty kill. And I think if he gets 20 and 20, anything over that doing pretty well. I just think that is almost like a slam dunk for me,

regardless of where they put them. But I'm going to tell you this too, Hunter. People get frustrated with Dominic Simone. His lack of finishing sometimes or his propensity to stick out like a sore thumb in the Crosby line or Connor Sherry falling down. If that kind of stuff frustrates you, I can't see you jumping for,

like joy two months into captain and on the top line because it's a lot of that timing stuff that sidney crosbie does the the the meticulous planning you know the amount of information he feeds people on the bench oh uh chris kunitz had that they talked early in his career about what an adjustment that was and then he would get to a point where he almost just stopped listening to sidney crosbie because it was too much information and he was like I had to, like, create a filter to know what was important and when he was just talking to talk through it, you know, that's never been happening's game. Oh, I just, I foresee the Penguins having a very productive third-line player that it's

going to take a while to figure out that that's what it is. Yeah. And, you know, the reason I asked that is just because, you know, he's had a 20-goal season before, so I was just curious if you think, well, I know, I know it's, I know it's that was his only really above average season, but I was just curious to see if you think he could do that consistently. I think no, man. Like, I just,

it's going to have to be an even strength, really what it's going to be about. And if you can get a couple shorties in there, great. Because I don't see a place for him on the top power play in it. Nope. I don't know that he's been good enough on, you know,

to give you to performance on the second one. So, you know, and again, a lot of this depends on what shakes out with the rest of this roster, too, and what it even looks like by the time we get to training camp. Yeah,

I think there's going to be a lot of shuffling around on this roster. Jesse, if you had to pick one big area where Jim Rutherford is going to shore up for the rest of this offseason. I mean, we already know what's going to happen with one of the goaltenders. What do you think it's going to be? Like, what's the next big domino here that you think could be coming besides the goaltenders? They got to address the defense. They have to go out there and find a way to address that defense of depth. if you don't trust

to Yuselah you got to do something you can't you know it's letting him linger is not helping anybody because he's not earning time

he's not making the necessary adjustments that you feel you would need to make to adjust North American ice because he's not playing that's just now a limbo situation

we've gotten nowhere with that Chad Rue Whittle I think is super serviceable and great but he plays on the wrong side of ice um not wrong I just, look, for me, I don't, I don't think you could play Chad Rueh and Jack Johnson together.

It's just unreasonable to expect that to be your third bearing. The Penguins have to go out and get somebody that can be a foundation and it plays it based on the data. How about this, Hunter? This will blow your mind. This is what you need, okay? Just to sum it up. Jack Johnson faced 100, and this is in the games Corey Schneider tracked his zones project.

152 zone entries who was targeted on. I think most on the team next to Marcus Patterson, which by the way, I think, says people are avoiding John Marino like the plague gunner. Because everybody John Marino plays with,

they try to go to the other side of the ice. He was doing that all. That's kind of what that tells me. He was doing that all right. Yeah. So Jack Johnson faced 152 zone entries and successfully defended eight. That's just,

that's comical. That's just terrible. I'll flip that, okay? Zone exits, right? Getting out of the zone, he had about a 19% success rate on a team average of 38%, which is about double that.

So, so you need a defenseman that can help support him on zone entries. He's going to be there because what, it would be about 140 zone entries he failed on. 93 of those were somebody just skating by him. Only 30 passes or

made or things like that, right? 90 plus were just him getting turned. You got to have somebody that can step in there, back that up, and somebody that can make the pass out on the other side. Where

like, where's all the third pairing defensemen that could do all that stuff? That's what I'm saying. Like, you've got to go out and get somebody that can serve both ends up. of the blue line on that pairing. Jesse, you're asking for a prime Paul coffee to come in and basically carry his corpse

around or just a prime Nicholas Lydstrom. Or another John Marino. Yeah. Guess what? Like, they don't grow on trees, man. Like, it's not going to be easy to find one of those. And it just makes the Jack Johnson defense, like Jim Rutherford has of him. It's just even that more baffling that he just continues

to die on this hill for whatever reason. I don't know if it's pride. I don't know if he thinks that this will continue to piss off the fan base and he doesn't care, or maybe he just takes it personal that people just don't care for him. It's just, it's weird. That's, I think, the only thing I can just say about it. But, Jesse, thank you so much for coming on this episode.

Great insight on Kaepinan. The Tristan Jari stuff was absolutely awesome, too. I loved your comparison with the car thing going over to your neighbor. I had a similar one. I was telling my girlfriend the other day. It was, she thought it was pretty funny, too. but yeah man I really do appreciate it I'm definitely gonna have to have you on

throughout the offseason as more moves come in I know we did this for Patrick Marlow and figured we had to do it for Casperi Captain and we definitely got to do it moving forward too sounds good to me yeah yeah it's perfect we have another episode coming on Friday for you guys but thank you guys so much for listening

and I will talk to you all then