No NHL-level trades from Penguins
N0 NHL-Level deals from Penguins The Penguins like most of the NHL today were quiet. Pittsburgh looked back into the defenseman market on deadline day but Pittsburgh’s only deals today ended up being minor ones.[hide] The Penguins this morning traded Sergei Plotnikov to the Arizona Coyotes and struck another minor deal. Arizona and Pittsburgh then struck another deal with the Penguins re-acquiring Dustin Jeffrey. Arizona receives 2012 4th round pick Matia Marcantuoni in the deal. Jeffrey who spent over five seasons with the Penguins organization, appeared in seven games with the Coyotes this season. He is expected to report to Wilkes Barre/Scranton. Jeffrey has 154 points in 182 career regular season games with the Wilkes Barre/Scranton Penguins. At the NHL
Penguins trying to get back in on Hamhuis
LATEST TRADE DEADLINE UPDATE As expected rumblings of the Penguins looking for another defenseman have emerged with less than an hour to go before the deadline. The Penguins are making a late play to try to get back into the mix for Dan Hamhuis, a difficult task as the Penguins were informed over a week ago that Hamhuis had no interest in coming to Pittsburgh. The Vancouver Canucks, though, would like to do business with the Penguins on a deal, a source says. In addition to BOS, PIT is trying to get in on Hamhuis but we continue to believe, for now, Hamhuis not interested in waiving there. — Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) February 29, 2016 Chicago, Dallas among teams in
Plotnikov traded to Phoenix
Sergei Plotnikov upset about his playing time in Pittsburgh, gets to face the Penguins tonight. [hide] The Penguins have traded Plotnikov to Phoenix for a minor league player and conditional pick. The Penguins had been shopping Plotnikov for an AHL contract in recent days to lottery teams willing to give him a look in an attempt to create cap space. They have now accomplished that goal. Updated: Penguins receive 24 year old German winger Matthias Plachta (6-2, 220) in return and a 2017 7th round pick. Plachta a low-end prospect has 2 goals and 7 points and a -9 rating in 46 games with the Springfield Falcons. [/hide]
Latest Penguins Trade Deadline Buzz
LATEST PENGUINS TRADE DEADLINE BUZZ Less than 24 hours to go before the trade deadline and Chris Kunitz’ name out of nowhere has suddenly popped back up on the rumor mill. [hide] [“The Penguins will try to move winger Chris Kunitz before the deadline but with another year on his contract at $3.85 million that could be difficult” — Bruce Garrioch Ottawa Sun –] Looked into this today and unless Jim Rutherford is up to something that none of his staff knows about, this one got shot down pretty easy. Outside of the Penguins organization and it was also crickets on Kunitz, other than indications that the Penguins had discussed packaging Kunitz and a prominent prospect for a top-6 winger
Built for playoff hockey? Wilson, Kuhnhackl starting to separate themselves
PENGUINS – JETS POST GAME BUZZ In the Penguins 4-1 win over the Jets, Carl Hagelin had two goals, Marc Andre Fleury made a number of momentum changing saves, including a key breakaway stop with the Penguins up 2-1, and the third pairing of Derrick Pouliot – Ian Cole played a strong two-way game. The biggest takeaway from this one, though, when looking at the big picture was two bottom-six forwards starting to separate themselves, namely Tom Kuhnhackl and Scott Wilson. Wilson scored for the 4th time in five games with another playoff style goal in going to the net for a deflection and those are the type of goals he scores. He has a knack for getting to the
Can the Penguins fix Justin Schultz?
The view in Edmonton of the Justin Schultz trade is that it’s remarkable the Oilers got a third round pick for him. He’s that bad in his own end. The view in Pittsburgh is they got a very talented offensive defenseman who can somehow transform into an adequate enough defender in his own end with a change of scenery. “He’s very good on the offensive side. He still needs to work on the defensive side,” Penguins GM Jim Rutherford said of Schultz. “We think the change of scenery for him is going to be good.” Rutherford said they wanted to stick with having speed on the back end. “We were trying to add some depth to our defense and we
Penguins acquire Justin Schultz
The Pittsburgh Penguins have acquired defenseman Justin Schultz (6-2, 193) from the Edmonton Oilers. Edmonton receives [hide] a 2016 third round pick. The Oilers retain 50% of Schultz salary. Schultz is earning $3.9 million this season and is a restricted free agent at seasons end. He will be due a $3.9 million qualifying offer. In 45 games, Schultz has 3 goals, 7 assists and a minus-22 rating. A former second round pick, Schultz has 28 goals, 101 points and a minus-78 rating in 248 career games. Talks accelerated during the Penguins – Jets game after a proposed Schultz trade to Los Angeles fell through. [/hide]
As LA deal falls through, does Schultz become option for Penguins?
Latest Trade Deadline Buzz — The Edmonton Oilers were closing in on a deal with the Los Angeles Kings that would have sent Teddy Purcell and Justin Schultz to LA but the deal in the past couple hours fell through. Uncertainty over Prokhorin's availability obviously kaiboshed the Purcell/Schultz trade to LA. — Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) February 27, 2016 The Oilers then turned and shipped Purcell to the Panthers for a third round pick. Florida also acquired Jiri Hudler and Jukub Kindl. On Schultz, Edmonton is circling back to teams that had been kicking the tires on Schultz prior to the Oilers entering into advanced talks with LA. They are contacting just about any team looking for defense, an NHL source
On Plotnikov, Latest Trade Rumors & more
LATEST PENGUINS BUZZ — There’s been some interesting reactions from those with other NHL clubs regarding the Penguins, Sergei Plotnikov. One consensus I received is that Penguins GM Jim Rutherford going public that Plotnikov wanted to go back to Russia after being phased out of the lineup and admitting that it didn’t go over well with Mike Sullivan, is seen as Rutherford basically throwing his head coach under the bus and shows a true disconnect between the GM and coach. Another view is the Penguins have botched any attempt to try to pump up Plotnikov’s trade value. “Whether that was the case [Plotnikov asking out] or not doesn’t affect the decisions we make as a coaching staff,” Sullivan said after
Rutherford says Plotnikov asked to go back to Russia
Jim Rutherford rarely hides anything and gave some clarification on the Sergei Plotnikov situation when appearing on 937 The Fan (Cook/Poni Show). “[Sergei] suggested at a time where he wanted to go back to Russia and that didn’t go over well with the coach,” Rutherford said. Rutherford didn’t reveal when the request to go back to Russia came but indications are it was at somepoint [hide] in mid-January, a few games after Plotnikov was a healthy scratch. [/hide]