2015-16 Pittsburgh Penguins Season Preview

kessel-for-s1-main-art.jpg.size.xxlarge.letterbox

The addition of Phil Kessel by the Pittsburgh Penguins earlier this summer was one of the biggest blockbuster trades in recent memory, and it gives the Penguins a consistent, dynamic goal scorer. But, while all eyes will be on Kessel entering the 2015-16 NHL season to see how he performs alongside Sidney Crosby, arguably the most gifted playmaker in the game today, was acquiring Kessel the right move to put the Penguins in the Stanley Cup picture?

“I think everybody is excited to have [Phil] as a teammate, to know with one chance in the slot he can change a game pretty quickly,” Crosby said about his new teammate. “Those guys aren’t easy to find. Regardless of who plays with him, he’s going to create a lot of offense.”

That’s an understatement. Kessel has scored 30 or more goals in five of his past seven seasons, and twice posted 80+ points. At 27-years-old, he’s coming into his prime, and honestly, he’s never really had the talent surrounding him like he will have in Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. No offense to Tyler Bozak, but he is certainly no Crosby or Malkin.

The Penguins were middle-of-the-pack last season in terms of goals scored per game, averaging 2.65 per game. Kessel will certainly help improve that stat. They were also 10th in the league in goals against per game—a stat that could easily worsen this season.

Both Paul Martin and Christian Ehrhoff hit free agency and signed elsewhere. Sure, you could argue that Ehrhoff isn’t much of a loss, especially given how much time he missed with injuries, but he still ate up more than 21 minutes of ice time a night when healthy. Martin contributed nearly 23 each night. Only Letang had more at over 25 minutes each night. Regardless, the Penguins lost two of their top three defenseman in terms of playing time, and Martin and Ehrhoff also finished second and fourth respectively in defensive scoring for Pittsburgh last season.

That’s a lot of playing time and production that the team has lost heading into the 2015-16 season, and they will need young defenseman to step up and take on a more prominent role on the blue line.

You can’t blame the Penguins for not getting into a bidding war for defenseman like Mike Green, Andrej Sekera or Francois Beauchemin (or even Cody Franson, who remains unsigned) during the offseason in an attempt to make up for the losses of Martin and Ehrhoff. They made some major front office changes last year with the intent of building a dynasty, and the opportunity to add Kessel gives them a significant piece of that puzzle. As we approach the upcoming season, it’s fun to speculate just how good Kessel can be playing alongside guys like Crosby and Malkin. Let’s just hope that an enhanced offense can overcome a weakened defense.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *