Madden Monday: ‘Reading the tea leaves’ of Kyle Dubas’ short-term goals, long-term plans for Penguins
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In listening to Pittsburgh Penguins president of hockey operations Kyle Dubas speak Friday, TribLIVE’s Mark Madden seemed to walk away with two impressions.
Take what he said to be legit. But also read between the lines of what he’s saying.
For instance, when Dubas addressed the media last week, he made it a point to suggest he wasn’t high on buying out bad contracts. That seemed to even hold for Mikael Granlund and his $5 million hit through 2025.
“I’m not a big buyout fan,” Dubas said. “I just think that there are more creative ways and better ways, especially in this environment where if you have contracts that you view as problematic or you’re not getting great value from that you can move them on. … I’ve always believed that you try to find a more creative solution, and it’s a last resort. And I don’t feel that we’re at that point right now.”
Madden tends to believe Dubas is being transparent on this front.
“He’d look really bad right off the bat if he did the opposite of the things he said right away,” Madden said of Dubas during this week’s “Madden Monday” podcast. “If he said he wasn’t going to do it, I don’t think he is going to do it.”
Dubas also made it sound like the franchise is inclined to use its first-round draft choice. Yet he admitted that such a player may not impact the Penguins roster for a while.
“I don’t think anybody we draft, especially at 14, is going to make an impact on the roster for another two, three years, at least,” Dubas said. “You can’t worry about how a player may fit in then. So the goal — and I know it’s cliche — is to take the best available player.”
And that’s where Madden says some interpretation is necessary when trying to determine Dubas’ true plan with the organization — despite the team’s apparent goal to keep a deep run in the Stanley Cup playoffs in mind so long as Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang are on the roster.
“Some of the things he’s talking about doing or not doing, makes me wonder if he really does think the team could still win,” Madden said. “If you’re not going to trade the first-round draft pick, and you’re going to hold on to Owen Pickering, if you think you could win now you trade those assets to try and win now. The Granlund thing, you don’t want to have that contract on the books due to dead cap hits if you buy him out, but you would save $4.1 million under the cap this year, which would be valuable this year.”
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Madden says a schism could be emerging there between thought and stated action plans for the franchise.
“It seems to me if I’m reading the tea leaves correctly, like he’s already hedging his bets. Like he doesn’t think this team can win now, and he might go in a totally different direction than that if it doesn’t get off to the start he thinks,” Madden continued.
There is an inherent push-pull dynamic when it comes to being in charge of the Penguins franchise with this current roster construction. It features a bunch of aging superstars hoping to win now, coupled with a barren farm system that provides no tradeable assets to help that cause.
“I’m glad he took the job. It’s a really tough job. It’s a contradictory job,” Madden said. “Sid is not going to win another Cup with Pittsburgh. None of those guys are — that group. You can maybe make the playoffs, (and) win a series. But what is Dubas being asked to do here?”
Also in the podcast, Madden and I talk about pending Penguins free agents, the struggling Pirates, the national perception of Mike Tomlin, Tom Barrasso’s election to the Hockey Hall of Fame and the chances of some other recent Penguins greats to get in as well.
Listen: Tim Benz and Mark Madden talk Penguins, Pirates and Steelers