Why did the Pens sign 38-year old center Matt Cullen?
Penguins GM Jim Rutherford gave lip service to Cullen being the type of player that he wants in his locker room after signing Cullen to a one-year deal last week. But as the Penguins witnessed last season with Craig Adams, all the intangibles in the world don’t add up to squat if the player can’t produce on the ice.
Well, Cullen may be 38, but he’s far from unproductive. Over the last two seasons with Nashville, he averaged .122 goals per game and .338 assists per game, which would put him on a 10-goal, 28-assist pace over an 82 game season.
That’s the kind of production the Penguins have been sorely missing from their fourth line. 2014-15 bottom-six players Adams, Zach Sill, Marcel Goc, Maxim Lapierre, Mark Arcobello, Rob Klinkhammer, Jayson Megna, Daniel Winnik, Bryan Rust, Andrew Ebbett and Bobby Farnham combined to score just nine goals in 292 games played.
Cullen can play on the power play, the penalty kill, center and left wing. He wins faceoffs and at 6-foot-1 and 200 pounds, he’s big enough to win battles along the boards and in front of the net.
With Eric Fehr scheduled to miss up to two months at the beginning of the season, Cullen could prove to be extremely valuable for the Penguins in the early part of the season. He also has 70 games of Stanley Cup playoff experience and won a title with Carolina in 2006.
The best other option the Penguins have at center is Swedish rookie Oskar Sundqvist, who only has one North American game under his belt. If Sundqvist can outplay Cullen, that will be a good problem for Mike Johnston and the coaching staff. If not, the Pens have secured a solid option going forward at a reasonable price.
After signing Matt Cullen, how much (if any) cap space do the Penguins have left?
With Fehr (elbow surgery) likely being on the shelf for the start of the season, the Penguins could put him on long-term injured reserve (LTIR) and exceed the cap by his $2 million cap hit.
That would be a temporary measure, though, and they would have to get back under the cap when Fehr returns to the lineup. He’s expected back before the beginning of December.
If the Pens don’t use the LTIR exemption for Fehr, they have a little wiggle room, but not much. I wouldn’t expect another major signing unless it’s in the same format as the last deal: trade away some salary in order to clear up space for a free agent.
The Pens need help on defense. Why don’t they go after Cody Franson?
Former Toronto Maple Leafs defenseman Cody Franson is one of the last big-name free agents left in what wasn’t a particularly deep free agent class to begin with. Fortunately for Franson, that means that there are plenty of teams that would be interested in signing him. Unfortunately for Franson, there aren’t very many teams with the salary cap space remaining that it would take to swing such a deal.
He’s been linked to a half a dozen teams in rumors including the Penguins, Buffalo Sabres, Boston Bruins, Dallas Stars, Los Angeles Kings and Arizona Coyotes.
It’s expected that Franson, who just turned 28, will sign for somewhere in the neighborhood of $4 to $5 million per season. In order for the Penguins to sign Franson, they would have to find a trading partner that would take on some salary, most likely in the form of veteran defenseman Rob Scuderi, who is due $3.375 million this season.
If trading Scuderi was going to be an easy undertaking, I’m sure that Rutherford would have done it months ago. So while there is certainly some level of mutual interest between the Penguins and Franson, I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for him to sign.
If not Franson, don’t the Penguins have to do something about the defense?
After Rutherford’s late-summer binge on skilled forwards, the Penguins front lines are a stocked as they have been in a very long time. The defense, however, is decidedly thin.
The Penguins have a large group of players that have established themselves as NHL players, but none of them seem to be automatic fits for the second pairing. Further complicating the matters is that the Penguins have seven blueliners that would have to clear waivers in order to be sent to Wilkes-Barre, and that doesn’t include likely top-four guys Olli Maatta and Derrick Pouliot.
It seems that Rutherford has set himself up to make some kind of move on defense. That could be trading Scuderi or sending him down to save some cap space (that move would save slightly over $900,000), or making another move to send out a player that could be lost on waivers.
Players such as Pouliot, Brian Dumoulin and Adam Clendening have the pedigree to be top-four defensemen. There’s no guarantee that they’ll pan out, but I expect them to at least be given a chance. Ben Lovejoy and Tim Erixon are more veteran guys that should help stabilize things around the younger players.
If the need arises during the season, Rutherford thinks that the Penguins should be able to make a trade for a defenseman to stabilize their blueline.
Many of you wrote to lament the departure of longtime Penguins radio network host Bob Grove.
I, for one, will definitely miss “Grover” on the radio. He had a levelheaded presence that is rare in that business these days. That, combined with his vast historical knowledge of the Penguins and the NHL always seemed to be exactly what Penguins fans needed to hear after a game.
Listening to Grove on the post-game show after a loss was like attending a group therapy session for hockey nuts.
While I understand that it may not have always been gripping radio from the perspective of a producer or potential advertiser, the connection with the fanbase and knowledge of the team that helped make him so popular will certainly be missed.
In sports as in life, however, change is the only constant, and although I will miss Bob, I’m excited to see what the Penguins have in store for the next chapter. From what I’ve heard, they are looking to make this into more of a full-time role, combining the pregame and postgame duties with in-game updates at Consol Energy Center and on-line radio and video hosting duties.
As always, thanks for the questions and interaction Facebook and Twitter. The mailbag doesn’t happen without your participation!
Photo credit: Doug Pensinger/Getty Images
