Cold drafts over the years have hurt Penguins
During the celebration of his team’s Stanley Cup title on the ice of SAP Center in San Jose, Calif., on June 12, 2016, then-Penguins general manager Jim Rutherford made a point to give credit to two people.
Craig Patrick and Ray Shero, his immediate predecessors.
Each had some role in constructing the roster that led to the franchise’s fourth championship.
Patrick had steered the Penguins through a rebuilding process — some might call it tanking — in the 2000s and drafted luminaries such as Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Kris Letang and Marc-Andre Fleury.
As for Shero, he oversaw a management team during the early 2010s that found complementary pieces in the draft such as Bryan Rust, Tom Kuhnhackl, Olli Maatta and a would-be franchise goaltender in Matt Murray.
And in 2017, other players drafted during the Shero regime, such as Jake Guentzel, Scott Wilson and Josh Archibald, aided the Penguins in repeating as champions.
Six years later, the Penguins are sorting through the indignity of missing the recently completed postseason thanks, in part, to a roster that received almost nothing of note from a recent draft class, or at least a draft class compiled under Rutherford’s watch that started in 2014.
(Recently departed general manager Ron Hextall’s draft classes of 2021 and 2022 are not yet truly in a position to reach the NHL.)
While the big names such as Crosby and Malkin largely lived up to their lofty standards and supporting cast such as Rust and Guentzel provided sufficient contributions in 2022-23, the Penguins got all of 48 man-games last season from players drafted since 2014:
Kasperi Kapanen, right winger – 43
Sam Poulin, center – 3
Filip Hallander, left winger – 2
That’s not an accident.
Seemingly, Rutherford’s default setting was to deal away draft picks for a player who could help the team immediately. And he never masked that modus operandi.
“I’m more willing to trade draft picks than I am prospects,” Rutherford said in 2017. “When you’ve got a prospect that you’ve had time to work with, and when you know he’s going to be good, that’s the kind of guy I’m more hesitant to trade. Draft picks? You don’t like to trade them, but they’re no sure thing. A lot of them don’t make it.”
Rutherford’s suggestion that many draft picks don’t reach in the NHL is valid. His draft classes with the Penguins verify that postulate.
To be clear, Rutherford’s chances of landing an All-Star like Guentzel (third round, 2013) or a viable top-four defenseman like Maatta (first round, 2012) were limited given how often he traded away his higher draft picks.
But even unearthing bottom-of-the roster contributors such as Kuhnhackl (fourth round, 2010) or Wilson (seventh round, 2011) with the mid-to-late round picks Rutherford kept proved to be a futile enterprise.
Between Rutherford’s first draft (2014) and his last (2020), the Penguins drafted 35 players. Nine of them have played an NHL game for the club, and it would generous to say any have been even moderately significant contributors.
Rutherford’s methods worked out marvelously as the Penguins became the first team in roughly two decades to win back-to-back Stanley Cup championships.
But the bill finally came due in 2022-23.
Here is a year-by-year look at those classes:
2014
Rutherford’s first draft class might have been his best, albeit by default, in that over half of it reached the NHL.
His first pick, Kapanen (first round, No. 22 overall), was traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2015 but returned to the Penguins via another trade in 2020. After a promising 2020-21 campaign when he scored 30 points (11 goals, 19 assists) in 40 games while primarily skating on Malkin’s line, Kapanen followed up with two disappointing seasons before he was waived by Hextall this past February.
Forward Sam Lafferty (fourth round, No. 113) bounced in and out of the lineup before being traded to the Chicago Blackhawks in January 2022, and forward Anthony Angello (fifth round, No. 145) had a few cups of coffee at the NHL level and was allowed to leave via free agency in 2022.
Forward Jaden Lindo (sixth round, No. 173) never signed with the club, and defenseman Jeff Taylor (seventh round, No. 203) left the organization after his two-year entry-level contract expired in 2019. Neither has played in the NHL.
2015
The Penguins only had four selections in this class, and they arguably got their greatest contributor from a Rutherford draft in forward Dominik Simon (fifth round, No. 137).
A skilled winger from Czechia, Simon played in 228 games for the franchise over two separate stints, the most of any of the team’s draft picks since 2014. Routinely finding a place in the lineup, even on the top line with Crosby, Simon earned the trust of coaches — much to the consternation of critics — and was often given prime assignments.
After joining the Calgary Flames as a free agent in 2020, Simon returned to the Penguins as a free agent in 2021, then was traded to the Anaheim Ducks in 2022.
Their top pick, forward Daniel Sprong (second round, No. 46) offered plenty of intrigue with a dazzling offensive skillset, most notably a laser of a wrister, but he never showed enough consistency to gain the confidence of coach Mike Sullivan and was dealt to the Anaheim Ducks in 2018 in exchange for defenseman Marcus Pettersson.
Forward Frederik Tiffels (sixth round, No. 167) and Nikita Pavlychev (seventh round, No. 197) never signed with the team and have never reached the NHL.
2016
Rutherford’s scouts found a starting goaltender with their first pick, Filip Gustavsson (second round, No. 55).
The only problem was he became a starter with the Minnesota Wild.
A native of Sweden, Gustavsson signed a three-year entry-level contract with the Penguins in 2017 but never played a game for the Penguins at any level as he was traded to the Ottawa Senators in an ill-fated blockbuster deal that landed disappointing forward Derick Brassard in 2018.
After languishing a bit with the Senators, Gustavsson was dealt to the Wild in 2022 and became that team’s top goaltender this past season.
The only man games the Penguins got out of this draft class were six from forward Kasper Bjorkqvist (second round, No. 61).
After playing three seasons at the NCAA level with Providence, Bjorkqvist, a bottom-six checking winger, signed a two-year entry-level deal in 2019 but had his first professional season with the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins cut short due to a severe knee injury.
Following his rehabilitation, Bjorkqvist wound up spending most of the 2020-21 season in his native Finland due to the pandemic, then re-signed with the Penguins on a one-year, two-way contract.
During the 2021-22 campaign, Bjorkqvist finally reached the NHL but returned to Finland after being unsatisfied with how he was deployed with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton. Regardless, the Penguins extended a qualifying offer to retain his NHL rights until 2025.
The rest of the draft class was a lost cause.
Defensemen Connor Hall (third round, No. 77), Ryan Jones (fourth round, No. 121) and Joseph Masonius (sixth round, No. 181) never signed with the Penguins and have never reached the NHL.
Finnish defenseman Niclas Almari (fifth round, No. 151) signed a three-year entry-level contract in 2019 but never rose above the AHL level before being allowed to return to his home country by 2022.
2017
This might be the worst draft class in franchise history. And perhaps one of the worst by a team in NHL history.
Not a single player reached the NHL. The Penguins’ 1967 draft class also failed to generate even one NHL game, but the rules were very different at that time as the expansion Penguins were only afforded two selections.
As for the 2017 class, only three of their six selections even signed an entry-level contract, and all three had trouble even staying in the AHL.
Their top pick, defenseman Zachary Lauzon (second round, No. 51), was an intriguing defensive defenseman but had to retire in 2019 at the age of 20 because of concussion woes.
(In a cruel twist, the Penguins acquired the pick they used on Lauzon and forward Ryan Reaves in an ill-fated 2017 trade that sent forward Oskar Sundqvist and a first-round pick in the 2017 draft to the St. Louis Blues.)
Defenseman Clayton Phillips (third round, No. 93) spent five seasons in the NCAA ranks — including three with Penn State — because of pandemic-era rules that allowed college athletes an extra season. Once he ran out of eligibility, he never signed an NHL deal and spent all of last season in the ECHL.
Slovenian forward Jan Drozg had the most “success” of this class in that he signed a three-year entry-level contract in 2019 and played 85 AHL contests with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton before requesting a trade during 2021-22 season. By the 2022 offseason, he was allowed to walk as a free agent.
Forward Linus Olund (fifth round, No. 155) also signed a three-year entry-level contract with the Penguins but only spent one season in North America, appearing in 61 AHL games during the 2018-19 campaign but got homesick and returned to his native Sweden for the final two years of his deal before being cut loose as a free agent.
Defenseman Antti Palojarvi (sixth round, No. 186) never signed with the Penguins and largely has bounced around lower-level leagues in his native Finland.
The last overall selection of the draft, defenseman Will Reilly (seventh round, No. 217) spent four seasons at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute before signing a two-year entry-level contract in 2020. After two unremarkable campaigns between Wilkes-Barre/Scranton and the Wheeling Nailers, he was allowed to depart via free agency in 2022.
2018
The Penguins appeared to get something of a steal when they selected slick puck-moving defenseman Calen Addison (second round, No. 53), but like many of the team’s top prospects over the years, he was dealt away in 2020 to the Wild in exchange for top-six forward Jason Zucker.
Shortly after selecting Addison, the Penguins landed Hallander (second round, No. 58), but he, too, was traded in 2020 to the Maple Leafs in exchange for another forward, Kapanen.
Hallander returned to the Penguins less than a year later during the 2021 offseason when the Penguins dumped forward Jared McCann’s salary onto the Maple Leafs, and the deal was seen as a move that could truly buoy the Penguins’ limited prospect depth.
A defensive bottom-six winger, Hallander played in all of three NHL games over the past two seasons with the Penguins before returning to his native Sweden. He cited a lack of opportunity at an NHL role as part of his motivation for signing overseas.
Forward Justin Almeida (fifth round, No. 129 overall) signed a three-year entry-level contract in 2019 but spent most of his time with the organization at the ECHL level with Wheeling. Cut loose as a free agent in 2022, Almeida did not play professionally last season.
Princeton forward Liam Gorman (sixth round, No. 177) never signed with the Penguins and had his signing rights traded to the Chicago Blackhawks in 2022.
2019
Poulin (first round, No. 21) appeared to be ready to claim some steady NHL work last season after an extensive look in training camp and a handful of games early in the regular season. But he took a leave of absence in December to address his mental health before returning to Wilkes-Barre/Scranton by March. He will look to regain traction in his career next season.
The Penguins traded up to draft forward Nathan Legare (third round, No. 74 overall) and even signed him to his three-year entry-level contract that same offseason before Poulin. But Legare’s adjustment to the professional game over the past two seasons with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton has produced mixed results, to be kind. Limited to 19 points (eight goals, 11 assists) in 68 games last season, he needs to make some significant progress in 2023-24.
Sensing doubt that he would sign with the team, Hextall traded forward Judd Caufield (fifth round, No. 145) to the Anaheim Ducks this past March in exchange for unsigned defensive prospect Thimo Nickl. Oddly enough, Caufield opted to sign an entry-level deal with the Ducks following the trade.
Plenty of intrigue exists in forward Valtteri Puustinen (seventh round, No. 203) as he has been Wilkes-Barre/Scranton’s leading scorer each of the past two seasons. After playing one NHL contest during the 2021-22 season, he spent the entire 2022-23 campaign at the AHL level. He re-signed with the Penguins on Tuesday, agreeing to a one-year, two-way contract.
Defenseman Santeri Airola (seventh round, No. 211) never signed with the team and NHL rights were relinquished on June 1.
2020
It’s probably premature to expect much out of this class already, but goaltender Joel Blomqvist (second round, No. 52) appears to be the most likely of the group to be a major component of the franchise.
After completing his first season as a starter with Karpat of the Liiga, the top league in his native Finland, Blomqvist signed a three-year entry-level contract in April. He is expected to compete for the starting job with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton next season.
Fellow goaltender Calle Clang (third round, No. 77 overall) offered plenty of potential as well but was traded in 2022 to the Ducks as part of the deal that landed forward Rickard Rakell. He signed a three-year entry-level contract with the Ducks a few months after the trade.
Forwards Lukas Svejkovsky (fourth round, No. 108) and Ravis Ansons (fifth round, No. 149) each signed three-year entry-level contracts in 2022 and just completed their first professional seasons with Wilkes-Barre/Scranton.
Having just completed his third season at the NCAA level with Providence, forward Chase Yoder (No. 170) remains unsigned. The Penguins retain his NHL rights until Aug. 15, 2024.
Seth Rorabaugh is a TribLive reporter covering the Pittsburgh Penguins. A North Huntingdon native, he joined the Trib in 2019 and has covered the Penguins since 2007. He can be reached at srorabaugh@triblive.com.
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