Mark Madden: Don't blame the core 3 or their cap hits for Penguins' struggles

The Pittsburgh Penguins are, at best, a first-round playoff loser. That’s their ceiling, and they might not reach that.

There’s lots of blame to go around, but none should fall on this past offseason’s retention of Kris Letang and Evgeni Malkin, thus preserving the core three along with Sidney Crosby.

There was certainly a different way to go and has been since the Penguins shed their mantle as legit Stanley Cup contenders after their second-round loss to Washington in 2018.

But loyalty to the core three is what the franchise chose. It’s understandable, and those three have lived up to their part.

Crosby, 35, is continuing his uninterrupted streak of elite play over the entirety of the rink. Malkin, 36, is over a point per game. Letang, 35, has missed 18 games and occasionally misjudges risk vs. reward. But he’s still a true No. 1 defenseman.

When Letang and Malkin signed their new deals this past offseason, each took less than he would have gotten on the open market, thus saving the Penguins salary cap room. Each is a $6.1 million cap hit.

So the core three are not the problem. Nor are their cap figures. (Crosby’s hit of $8.7 million has long since grown into a bargain.)

The problem is the roster assembled around the core three.

The contracts given to center Jeff Carter, winger Kasperi Kapanen and defenseman Jan Rutta were horrible mistakes. They carry a combined hit of just over $9 million.

The Penguins would be better off without any of those three, making do with whomever, and having $9 million in cap flexibility.

Carter and Kapanen are playing unspeakably bad. If you want to blame individuals for the Penguins struggling, paint the target squarely on them. They ruin the third line. (Giving Kapanen a two-year deal this past offseason remains mind-boggling. Who else offered him one year, let alone two? The SM-liiga, maybe. The Penguins bid against themselves.)

Rutta is average and too often injured. (He’s hurt now.) The Penguins would have been better served with the youth, energy and skill of Ty Smith in their bottom pair or could have gotten by with Chad Ruhwedel or Mark Friedman.

The trade for defenseman Jeff Petry hasn’t worked out. At 35, he was supposed to bring veteran experience. But the Penguins already had enough of that. What Petry has instead provided is slow encrusted in meh. Petry is also a whopping $6.25 million cap hit, higher than Letang’s or Malkin’s.

Perhaps most damaging, the Penguins clearly had goaltending inadequacies come to light last season between Tristan Jarry’s fragility and Casey DeSmith’s borderline quality. GM Ron Hextall took the easy route, as he prefers, and gave DeSmith a two-year contract this past offseason. Here the Penguins are, in goaltending trouble again.

You can’t spell “Tristan Jarry” without “T.J.,” as in Watt. He’s always hurt, too.

Coach Mike Sullivan hasn’t covered himself in glory. His blind loyalty to a bum like Carter out of veteran respect has been damaging. So has his commitment to a high-octane style the Penguins just can’t play anymore.

Perhaps Sullivan is only a great coach with a great team. If he’s not careful, he’ll turn into Dan Bylsma or Mike Tomlin. Maybe he already has.

But if you want to point fingers, the biggest one must be aimed at Hextall.

I wonder if Hextall ever put his plan down on paper for owners Fenway Sports Group. But we have no idea what FSG’s plan is, either.

As this space previously noted, the Penguins shouldn’t mortgage even the slightest bit of their future to achieve what little can be salvaged of this season. Their streak of 16 consecutive postseason appearances is impressive but useless when you stop winning playoff series. It’s akin to Tomlin never having a losing season.

Hextall has said he won’t trade the Penguins’ first-round pick. FSG should tell him he can’t, or Hextall might make a grandstand play to try to save his job. (Hextall and mystery employee Brian Burke should get canned at season’s end.)

The Penguins can’t think they’re in “win-now” mode.

That’s because they can’t win now.