RIP to the Great Ray Shero

Tragic News today as the hockey world is mourning the sudden loss of former Penguins General Manager Ray Shero who died at age 62. Shero was the architect of the 2009 Stanley Cup Champion Penguins and most importantly was a great human being loved and admired by so many he came in contact with. Shero was just such a gracious person, no matter who you were he gave you respect like you mattered.

From the GM’s chair Shero’s run from 2006-2014 as Penguins GM was probably not appreciated enough. Shero in the spring of 2006 was the top up and coming GM candidate on the market. He had his choice of Boston and Pittsburgh, a decision that was quite the toss-up where you couldn’t go wrong.

Despite walking into a situation with Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, Shero’s greatest attribute early on was an amazing feel of his roster, eye for filling out the second-third tier level of the lineup. The budget was really tight in that first summer for Shero due to the arena situation and he just hit on so many depth signings those first couple years.

Petr Sykora, Jarkko Ruutu among them in 2006 summer and what I loved about Shero’s teams was the jam, snarl he put around Crosby and Malkin. It gets understated how difficult the Penguins were to play against in all areas of the rink.

In 2007 pundits said the Penguins needed to get tougher;

Shero said OKAY how’s acquiring Gary Roberts and George Laraque sound for you…… The list goes on and on in the Shero era; Chris Kunitz, Bill Guerin, Matt Cooke, Mike Rupp, Arron Asham; He prioritized high-end skill, but this man just knew how to build a roster with a mix of skill, physicality and toughness, something that became less of a priority for the Penguins organization post 2017.

Starting in 2008, Shero knew how to read the room with a generational talent, scrapped his self-imposed five year plan with a nudge from Ron Burkle and always swung big from there on out.

It started with the Marian Hossa trade and that was the moment the Penguins really arrived in the Sidney Crosby era as a true Stanley Cup level team. That 2008 Team would have won a Cup in a lot of other years. The 2008 Detroit Red Wings were just a systematic machine on a slightly different level. The Hossa trade though highlighted Shero’s tremendous ability again to acquire secondary pieces. Pittsburgh felt at the time they needed to upgrade the 4th line and pushed for Pascal Dupuis to be included in the deal with Atlanta. Dupuis ended up becoming one of Sidney Crosby’s best right wingers in the long run.

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2009 Stanley Cup Champions

2009 he fired a coach he inherited who took his team to the Stanley Cup the prior year, for an unknown AHL coach and the perfect storm happened, highlighted by one of the greatest trades in Penguins history, acquiring Chris Kunitz. Shero had quite the heater from the GM’s chair in those first three years and he had such a great eye of bringing really good people into that room and the organization.

And look at how many executives under Shero in Pittsburgh ended up in a GM chair; Tom Fitzgerald, Jason Botterill and Bill Guerin. Dan MacKinnon the Devils AGM, was Shero’s right-hand man in Nashville/Pittsburgh and he will be a GM one day.

On the ice, Post 2009 the Big Game Hunting continued and always made this team so much fun to cover during the Shero years.

Among them: Shero trades for James Neal, Re-acquires former Penguins legend Alex Kovalev in 2011; tells Jaromir Jagr to pretty much ‘F off’ in issuing a press release the Penguins rescinded their offer when Jagr was playing head games with the organization; To the 2013 Trade Deadline with the Jarome Iginla drama and blockbuster move of acquiring Iginla. The Iginla night was so wild Shero’s own son didn’t believe him the Penguins acquired Iginla telling Ray he was wrong, and that Boston acquired Iginla Shero once said.

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The 2010-2014 Penguins Shero years were a lot of what IF years. Sidney Crosby concussions; Obviously Goaltending to in the front office there was always second guessing about loyalty to Dan Bylsma; Others included regret of would they have won the 2013 Stanley Cup if they didn’t make an emotional decision on Jordan Staal trading him two days after demanding a trade? To a couple years earlier of there being a lot of second guessing in 2010 of did we do enough at the 2010 deadline to give our chance a repeat, namely balking at giving up a first-rounder for Ray Whitney from Carolina when a deal for Whitney was right at the finish line.

At the end of the day, Shero left a major lasting imprint on the Penguins winning back-to-back Stanley Cups in 2016 and 2017. No one just knew it yet when he was let go in 2014 and criticized at the time of his firing for the lack of draft success.

Sure, Shero had some big first-round misses during his tenure, especially 2009-2012, but Shero and his team hit some home runs in the 2010-2013 drafts that catapulted the Penguins to where they eventually went in 2016 and 2017:

2010 | Bryan Rust 3rd Round Pick, who has ended being one of the Penguins best third round picks ever; Pittsburgh also selected Tom Kuhnhackl in the 4th round who was an important depth player in the back-to-back Cup runs.

2012 | Olli Maatta was a major steal at #22; Oskar Sundqvist in Round 3 and the Game Changer of them all, selecting goaltending Matt Murray in Round 3. Murray doesn’t get enough credit for how his accension and coming onto the scene in the 2016 playoffs might have changed the Sidney Crosby era forever. It didn’t stop there for Shero and his group hitting triples and homers…….

2013 | Tristan Jarry in Round 2, say what you want about Jarry, but this is still a two-time All-Star and the biggest one of them all; Jake Guentzel in Round 3. 13 Goals, 21 points in the 2017 postseason, Pittsburgh doesn’t repeat without this homegrown talent emerging on the scene when he did.

~~~ RIP Ray Shero, a Great GM in Pittsburgh & a better Person ~~~