Part 1

My question is: Just how good or bad is the Penguins’ lineup? I used end-of-season data from Capfriendly to create this table (split in two for this post) to investigate how the Penguins’ roster compares to other teams and to investigate what needs to change for improvements.

In this section, I created several categories of players to make finer distinctions. Only the forwards are included. The coloration of the chart is green to show teams at an advantage over the Penguins and red for a disadvantage.

East

West

Categories

• "Steals" are players making less than $1.125M (able to be buried in minors) with 30+ points. (30 points is used as the threshold due to the criticisms Jeff Carter received this season.) The average Steal is 22-years-old, 75GP 20G 45P, playing 15:51, paid $880k, making them a modest 2nd liner or good 3rd liner.
• There are 34 Steals in the league. So, most teams have one, but the Penguins have none. Only six other teams have no Steals.
• How to get a Steal? Most Steals are RFAs so are likely obtained through the draft, or maybe an opportune trade or signing. Exceptional cases of UFA Steals are: Krecji, Parise, and Kuzmenko, who are special cases; Noesen, Bunting, and Milano who were good summer signings; and Johansson was a trade deadline acquisition (for a 3rd+1yr round pick).

• "Performers" are players making more than $1.125M with 30+ points. The average Performer is 28yo, 76GP 24G 58P, 17:41TOI, paid $5.4M, making them a modest 1st liner or good 2nd liner.
• There are 192 Performers in the league. So, teams have six on average, but the Penguins have seven (only six teams have more, though another seven have just as many). However, this count includes Granlund ($5M, 41P) whose season metrics qualify him, though his play for the Penguins has been criticized. It also includes Zucker ($5.5M, 48P) who is a pending UFA. Both are under the average points for this category. Rust is also on the low end of points but also cap hit. Crosby, Malkin, and Guentzel are well-above the salaries but also in terms of points. While Rakell is also in this class and is at a low cap hit for the average points of this class.
• How to get a Performer? There is no secret to getting players of this type. They could climb the ranks through the draft or be acquired by trade or signing.

• "Underperformers" are players making more than $1.125M with less than 30 points. The average Underperformer is 28yo, 56GP 8G 18P, 13:33TOI, paid $2.9M, making them a bad 3rd liner or poor 4th liner who gets high minutes. Hopefully, they have a specialized role.
• There are 106 Underperformers in the league. So, teams have three on average, but the Penguins have only two. This revelation might be surprising considering the performance of the team. The Underperformers are Carter (29P, $3.125M) and Bonino (19P, $2.05M), who is a pending UFA. Former Underperformers included McGinn (19P, $2.75M), Blueger (16P, $2.2M), and Kapanen (34P, $3.2M), but the former two were traded, while Kapanen was both traded and scored enough to move up rank to a Performer.
• How to get an Underperformer? Sign a bloated contract, or a player gets injured. The real question is how to get rid of one. As we saw, it took McGinn+3rd to get Kulikov; Blueger yielded a prospect+3rd+1yr; and Kapanen only took waivers. If a trade is not available, a buyout or waiting for the contract to end are painful ways to get free from them.
• The cap hits of Underperformers are also listed. Teams have an average of $9.3M stuck in this way. I called it "bad money", not to be confused with "dead money", such as from previous buyouts, tied up in injured reserve, or other cases. The Penguins have only $5.2M in this bad money, after losing the three players mentioned, but that does not include Granlund. There are four teams with less bad money, but another seven with just as much. The trade deadline moves helped the situation but have not relieved the worry in this category.

• "Tweeners" is a column calculated mathematically, rather than associated with player traits. They would theoretically be players making less than $1.125M (so can be buried) with less than 30 points (which is why they might be buried). I calculated this placeholder by adding the first three types and subtracting that number from a 12-person roster.
• The Penguins would have three more roster spots to fill. Eight teams have more spots to fill.
• Tweeners could be callups that bounce between the minor league, injured players who miss many games, or off-and-on healthy scratches.

So, the Penguins have some catching up to do because they are behind on Steals and Performers compared to some of the top teams, but the recent contract shedding helped give them some breathing room from bad contracts.

I looked further into the Tweeners to see who could possibly be a Tweener to become a Steal or Performer. However, here is a list of the eventual UFAs among them; some others are RFAs.

We have seen some of these players as Penguins already, and none really inspires enough confidence from me to chance a breakout with a signing or trade.

To more specifically seek players that could be available immediately, I sorted all players for UFAs and filtered for players under 29yo in order to get younger.

I would possibly try to sign any two of them for $2-3M each when free agency starts, and then, I would keep an eye out for these players after about two weeks after the initial dust settles with free agency and try to get another of them for $1.1M (for an AHL option if necessary).

Still, a mocked-up roster leaves a lot to be desired. Here’s one modest configuration:

Guentzel-Crosby-Rakell

Puustinen-Malkin-Rust

Athanasiou-Poehling-Granlund

Donato-Carter-Nylander

This mockup (plus Ty Smith and Adin Hill as placeholders) still left about $8M to upgrade.

Substituting someone like Granlund (out) or someone like Zucker (in) makes a big difference.

It is interesting in hindsight (now halfway through the playoffs) to see which teams are still alive in comparison to where this model would predict, but remember, defenses and goalies are not included here and are important to the story.

In the next article, I will describe a different method I used and assessments of players in particular positions.