The Pittsburgh Penguins have stockpiled a ton of long-term and future assets, thanks in large part to some of their offseason moves.
In Kyle Dubas’ first offseason in charge of the Pittsburgh Penguins it was very clear that he was still trying to give the team a chance to compete and win immediately.
Acquiring Erik Karlsson was very much a win-now move.
Trading for Reilly Smith was a win-now move.
Signing Ryan Graves and Tristan Jarry, as poorly as those signings have been, were win-now moves.
They were trying to capture lightning in a bottle and give their core another chance to compete for a Stanley Cup. It did not work as he, or anybody else, could have intended, and it kickstarted what is now the early stages of a rebuild, but it was very clear what the vision was.
It should also now be very clear what the vision for his second offseason was. Winning immediately was very much not it. Instead, it is very clear that trying to restock as much of the long-term assets as humanly possible to position the team for long-term success was the intention.
They took on the contracts of Cody Glass and Kevin Hayes to acquire more draft picks. They signed short-term, placeholder free agents that could be flipped at the trade deadline. They did not add longer-term contracts or look for impact players.
At the time, if you were not seeing where the team was or fully grasping the intent of the front office and still expecting a push for the playoffs (raises hand), it was probably an underwhelming offseason.
But now that the trade deadline has come and gone, and when that is looked at in context of everything else that has been done since the Jake Guentzel trade at last year’s deadline, it’s looking like the offseason Dubas had did exactly what it was intended to do.
Especially with the way they were able to turn Glass and Anthony Beauvillier into multiple draft picks.
- Beauvillier cost them only $1.25 million against the cap in free agency, and after putting him into top-six situations for a chunk of the season and letting him score some goals, they were able to turn that investment into a second-round pick. That is a solid return, especially for a guy that was traded for a fifth-round pick exactly one year ago.
- Their $2.5 million investment in Cody Glass (at the expense of minor leaguer Jordan Frasca) initially brought them third-and-sixth round picks. They got another third-round pick, as well as two prospects, for him and John Gruden.
- They received a second-round pick from the Blues for taking on Kevin Hayes’ contract, and then gained an additional pick (a third-round selection in 2025) by trading that pick back to the Blues for a 2026 second-round pick.
- They received a 2027 second-round pick and a conditional fifth-round pick in 2025 from the Rangers by sending away Reilly Smith.
In total, the moves they made this offseason resulted in the organization adding eight draft picks into the organization, as well as two prospects (Chase Stillman and Max Graham), into the organization.
That includes two future second-round picks that have a chance to be extremely high picks. The Blues’ 2026 second-round pick could very possibly be closer to the first-round than the third-round, and given the path the Rangers are on that 2027 pick could end up in a similar spot.
When combined with the in-season trades that saw the Penguins send away Lars Eller, Marcus Pettersson and Drew O’Connor that netted the picks first-and third-round picks, as well as the Michael Bunting trade that resulted in Tommy Novak and then second-and sixth-round picks, the Penguins now have 30 draft picks over the next three years, including 18 in the first three rounds and 10 in the first two rounds.
No team in the NHL has more under any category.
Now, that does not guarantee long-term success and I am not trying to say it necessarily a slam dunk series of moves. It was probably necessary. They ended up getting good value considering what they sent away and what they brought in, But you are also not going to successfully rebuild an entire franchise through second-and third-round picks. Each of those individual picks is probably only a 50-50 bet at best to even see one game of NHL action, and probably only a 20-25 percent chance of sticking in the NHL for more than a year or two. If two or three of those 10 picks in the first two rounds over the next three years become above average NHL players, they will have done well for themselves. It’s a numbers game.
The best chance for a home run with those picks is to give yourself as many swings as possible.
They have done that.
Even then, just simply sticking with them and letting them develop is going to be a payoff that is still several years away.
There is also nothing that says that has to be the strategy. While I would anticipate the Penguins will in fact keep most of those picks and use them, I would also anticipate some of them will get sent away at some point.
Those picks are assets.
They are assets that can be used to get a better quality pick (moving up), acquire more assets (moving down) or trying to get more immediate NHL help in the form of younger players or players under contract.
I believe the Penguins are sincere in trying to try and do this relatively quickly and not looking for a complete teardown. I don’t know if they can do it as efficiently as, say, the Washington Capitals did, but I do think there is a path there.
The salary cap is rapidly increasing, and even with the Graves and Jarry contracts they are still well positioned under the cap in coming seasons.
They are going to go into the summer with around $28 million in salary cap space while already having 16 players under contract for next season, and that is before they make a single move that could also see them jettison some salary. They currently have more than $55 million in cap space for 2026-27 with eight players under contract.
They have flexibility and assets to spend. They have rapidly upgraded the farm system. It has not resulted in a pretty season, but that also never seemed to be the intent. The intent seemed to be positioning the organization long-term. It is hard to argue they have not done that.