The Pittsburgh Penguins growing concerned with their blueline, [hide] have begun identifying trade targets on the backend, sources tell Inside Pittsburgh Sports.
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While the Penguins have had what’s described as mild interest in pursuing a trade for Winnipeg’s Jacob Trouba, mostly due to financial concerns, the Penguins have become increasingly interested in the Hampus Lindholm situation in Anaheim.
It’s no secret that Anaheim is prepared to move an impact defenseman once they get Lindholm signed, which remains likely by the December 1 deadline.
Penguin officials have had deep talks internally about the potential fit for 24 year old defenseman Cam Fowler, TIOPS has learned.
Fowler who has excellent mobility, is a fantastic defenseman from transitioning to defense to offense.
A $4 million cap hit for the next two seasons, the Ducks have been dangling Fowler in talks since the draft with the expectation that they can land a massive haul for Fowler and in the process clear cap room.
Buffalo, Montreal have been two of the most aggressive suitors for Fowler since June with many others prepared to make a big run for Fowler when Anaheim is ready to deal.
The Penguins are one of the clubs considering a legitimate run at Fowler as Penguin officials are giddy about the fit on the ice and financial fit.
Pittsburgh also feels it has the forward prospects/young NHL forwards to get Anaheim’s attention.
Rutherford and Ducks GM Bob Murray have a close relationship and have struck two deals in the last 18 months, Ben Lovejoy for Simon Despres, and Carl Hagelin for David Perron.
One source believes the type of deal it would take is a first round pick, Daniel Sprong/Jake Guentzel type prospect and a young NHL forward in the mold of a Bryan Rust type.
Prior to another head injury, Anaheim had also been floating Simon Despres’ name out there in talks with various clubs. Despres is signed for the next four seasons with a $3.7 million cap hit.
Toronto has strong interest in Despres, were his health check out.
— It’s hard to accurately analyze the Penguins right now with Sidney Crosby yet to play and Kris Letang being sidelined for a few games and expected to miss Tuesday’s game vs Florida.
However, where some frustration is building inside the room is that the Penguins have been an easy team to play against.
Getting the Penguins to play the suffocating team game in all three zones that won them a Cup last spring was never going to happen for October hockey games but the biggest challenge for Mike Sullivan is and will continue to be playing a team game defensively where all skaters 1-18 are buying in.
The Penguins are not good enough on the backend to just go through the motions defensively in the neutral zone and defensive zone which has happened in the last four games.
— The HBK line has been minimized this season to a great degree as with Sidney Crosby out of the lineup, the opposition has been able to key on them with one Eastern Conference coach telling me the Malkin line/or line combinations strike no fear.
With Crosby set to return later this week, Mike Sullivan reunited the HBK line in today’s practice and pretty much going with the Stanley Cup lines, except for Scott Wilson playing with Sidney Crosby- Patric Hornqvist as Conor Sheary remains out.
Wilson who a Penguin scout called a poor mans Chris Kunitz this summer, is deserving of a look with Crosby.
He’s a much different player than Conor Sheary. Sheary has had his good moments with Crosby in being able to back the opposition up through the neutral zone and his creativity to see the ice well.
Wilson doesn’t have the foot speed that Sheary does but he still skates well enough and has much stronger scoring ability in tight.
It’s a line that could have success with how well Crosby and Hornqvist play below the dots and Wilson’s knack of finding the soft spots in high danger scoring areas.
Crosby had a strong workout Monday, participating fully in all drills and seeing time with the first power play unit.
“No [symptoms], I feel good,” Crosby said afterwards.
There’s no indication Crosby/team are targeting Tuesday night, though, Mike Sullivan minutes ago didn’t officially rule him out. There is a strong chance Crosby is in the lineup by Thursday.
If Wilson can find a good fit with Crosby, it could have a trickle down effect on the Penguins getting back to having four scoring lines.
One thing that Matt Cullen has showed is he still has it offensively, among the Penguins best forwards this past week.
While Tom Kuhnhackl is loved by the coaching staff and a better defensive player than Sheary, a Sheary – Cullen – Fehr line would give the Penguins a better blend of offense/defense overall from the 4th line in their ability to play more speed and possess the puck better.
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What happened to NPL.
Getting married to Micheal Sam on February 14th now that its legal
Now if only Habs can get rid of that fraud Pacioretty
You spelled “Price” wrong.
This shows how stupid you are when u think crosby,price are frauds. When you think bell center is a museum compare to PPG. Or even think pens fans are louder and more loyal then Habs fans. You really need help. Stop watching hockey or just change sports already
Only you could find an empty arena full of “loyal” fans. They bail at the first sign the team is shit – as usual. Typical french.
I would love to see Sam’s idea of a great team under a cap lol. Hates Malkin because he doesnt like the penalties despite the ability to absolutely take over a game and He hates Max Pac on his favourite team who has been like a top 5 goal scorer over the past 5 seasons lol.
“Favorite.” This is a US-based site.
“U.S.”, you just said us, loudly.
zerocool you are really a Tool shame and disgrace of being canadian
you are as stupid and dumb as an american like npl or stain
and judge players based on score points
watch max game he is a complete disaster to watch he has alot of puck luck
he plays horrible in the “D zone horrible on the boards he cant even deke on a breakaway he has that wrist shot from the circle thats about it very limited player . and as we all saw he was the shitiest player in the whole WC tournament
LOL, I cannot trust your judgement at all. This guy leads the Habs annually in most categories… He is a career 57% CF player. You have made comments about guys like Sutter being awesome but in the same breath shit on Max Pac! The problem is you dont know what you are looking at
Last season he lead in Goals, Points, GWG, Shots, only Plekanec had more ice time for forwards and Only Gallagher drove possession better at 50+ games. He was tied for 4th on the team in hits… was the only top 6 guy in that category and only 2 forwards on your team blocked more shots then him and was 3rd on the team in take aways. The guy does everything for that fucken team but you don’t get what you are watching at all. I know you dont look at stats at all and yes stats can sometimes be misleading… Read more »
How is MT doing stain? Same was right when he said MT didn’t have good top 6 forward last year and subban was a cancer and had to go yet was treated as a racist .now go suckk a black dickk you piece of shit and make sure you choke on it
Same still thinks sucks is a curse word.
They still blow
Lol, Weiss just blew the doors open on that bullshit and he was in that locker room you half wit. Leave it to Sam to start parade planning for his favourite team after six games
Better than Bob Hartley?
Hey cuntt face stain habs winning 2-1, and bell center is still full even at 1min left to the game
It must be team calendar night.
No free hot dogs giveaway night
Max Pac Bobble head
Strong effort D. You got a crazy trade rumor, **** on the Penguins defense, **** on Malkin, and made the team sound un-coachable again. All it was missing was a Fleury sucks, trade Fleury section.
So Mr. Something Special finds ways to create special moments even through injury, apparently Zatkof getting hurt during the morning skate the other day created a ripple effect that led to something truly special happening, because of the timing of the injury and Jack Campbell getting called up, the Kings AHL affilate had to dress their goalie coach(Dustin Imoo) as an emergency backup for their game later that night, what made the occasion special is that Dustin’s son Jonah was making his AHL debut in that game and was now being backed up by his father, what makes it something… Read more »
That is something special.
What? Who gives a shit. You just felt the need to ramble on for a while? You must be drunk.
Yeesh, that was Same-quality sentence structure.
BTW, The Pens are not deep enough upfront to give up two young player/prospects for a Dman. They need to trade from strength. One of the goalies needs to go come the deadline if the Pens look to be a cup contender. Otherwise, sit tight. It’s Oct-Nov hockey.
So the exact same team that won the cup just last season, has to trade away players to be a cup contender? Odd logic.
Not really. Can’t think of any teams that won back-to-back championships and had largely the same roster.
That could have something to do with the fact that very few if any championship teams have been in a position to retain largely the same roster the next year, most have no choice but to break up the roster because of cap issues. It could also have something to do with the fact that it’s been nearly 20 years since a team has won back-to-back championships and that team, the Detroit Redwings returned 19 of their top 22 players in ’97-’98 that had won the Cup in ’96-’97. So basically the last team to repeat did so by bringing… Read more »
So clearly you didn’t think hard enough.
Lol
Shocking development
Sam, you’re turning into Zero. You just had a four-post conversation with yourself.
He’ll never have remotely enough grasp of the game for this to be true, as for Wilson… I believe we’ve seen enough
I find last year sid played his best playoffs of his career but of course some clowns here wont agree because they evaluate based on points
This shows a proves as soon as Crosby is out the other lines are more easy to shut down. You see that cuntt face stain. You see how much sid takes attention in playoffs so the frauds can score easily. Kessel and malkin to name a few
Funny how as soon as sid and letang are injured the team is a disaster. Happens to be same 2 players that stain wants them to be traded
Without real Canadian star the Americans can’t shine. As we also saw in the WC
Tied for 3rd in the conference and top ten in the league through six… Disaster. Dumbfuckry lol