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Kyle
Dubas took over as president and general manager of the
Pittsburgh Penguins two years ago. During that time, he’s attempted
to retool his roster with younger players while trying to add
veterans to build a winner around aging stars Sidney Crosby, Evgeni
Malkin, and Kris Letang.
The results
speak for themselves. They missed the playoffs last year, and are
poised for the same fate this season. They’re near the bottom of the
Eastern Conference standings, six points out of the final wild-card
berth with six teams ahead of them.
At an average
age of 29.48, the Penguins have this season’s second-oldest roster
behind the Edmonton Oilers. The difference is that the Oilers remain
Stanley Cup favorites because core players like Connor McDavid, Leon
Draisaitl, Evan Bouchard, Darnell Nurse, and Zach Hyman are in their playing prime.
The same cannot
be said for Crosby, Malkin, and Letang, who are still good players but are now in their late thirties and well past their prime when they won consecutive Stanley Cups eight years ago. However, those
three have full no-movement clauses and are intent on their
careers in Pittsburgh.
Dubas can’t or
won’t move those three but can accept reality and start rebuilding
in earnest. He may be coming around to it, having traded Marcus Pettersson and Drew O’Connor to the Vancouver Canucks on Feb. 1 for Danton Heinen, Vincent Desharnais, prospects Melvin Fernstrom and a conditional 2025 first-round pick.
He still has tradeable assets like wingers Rickard Rakell, Michael Bunting, and defenseman Matt Grzelcyk. They could fetch a return of draft picks and prospects to replenish a
prospect pipeline ranked 20th by The Athletic’s Scott Wheeler.
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