Some teams in the Metropolitan Division got better ... others did not.
With most of the big moves around the NHL offseason having already been made (more will still be on the horizon, almost certainly) it is time to check in around the Metropolitan Division and see where the Pittsburgh Penguins — and every other team in the division — currently stand after the first round of roster moves.
I am a firm believer that the 2023-24 New Jersey Devils were a fluke, and that they seem to have learned from the mistakes that also helped sabotage their season.
They had three main issues last season.
The first was that Lindy Ruff had no idea what he was doing in terms of player usage and deployment, and I just feel like he was a bad fit for their roster and what they were trying to do. I don’t know if Sheldon Keefe is the answer to that question, either, but I am pretty confident Ruff wasn’t.
The second was injuries. They were almost never fully healthy with several of their top players missing significant chunks of the season. Dougie Hamilton missed 62 games. Jack Hughes missed 20 games. Timo Meier, Ondrej Palat and Nico Hischier each missed more than 10 games. That all adds up. Especially the Hamilton one. A fully healthy season from Hamilton and the addition of Brett Pesce could do wonders for that defense, especially if some of their young guys take a big leap forward.
Then there was the goaltending. It stunk. Everybody knew it was going to stink when the season started, they did nothing about it, and it ended up completely stinking. Now they are going to have Jacob Markstrom and Jake Allen for a full season which just looks like a gigantic upgrade. They don’t need them to be great. They just need them to be competent.
This looks like the best team in the division on paper.
No matter what else happens the Rangers are almost certain to take a step backwards in terms of wins just because Presidents’ Trophy winning teams don’t tend to come back and win more games the next season. The last time that happened was the 2005-06 Detroit Red Wings, and that came with a full year off between their previous season (lockout).
But I also am not a huge fan of their offseason (so far) because they haven’t really addressed any of their problems as it relates to 5-on-5 play and defensive zone play. Ryan Lindgren and Jacob Trouba still look like top-four defensemen on this roster. They still lack puck-movers. They will still be entirely dependent on the power play and Igor Shesterkin. That will win them a lot of games, but they are probably going to take a step backwards just based on nothing more than random chance and percentages. They are good. I don’t know if they are Stanley Cup good.
The one thing that might change that a little bit is if Alexis Lafreniere completely goes off (and I think he might).
They have actually lost quite a bit this offseason with Jake Guentzel, Teuvo Teravainen, Brett Pesce and Brady Skjei all departing. Guentzel probably isn’t a huge loss simply because they only had him for a couple of months, but Teravainen is an underrated player that is going to be a big loss.
Sean Walker and Shayne Gostisbehere might be cheaper against the cap than Skjei and Pesce would have been on their new contracts, but I am not necessarily sure they are better. In fact, I am sure they are not.
They still have a good foundation here, but this looks like a team — on July 10 — ready to take a step back. And maybe one that — for now — missed its best window.
The Capitals snuck into the playoffs despite being outscored by a comically high margin and not really doing anything all that well. But I have to be honest, I kind of love their offseason.
I don’t hate the gamble on Pierre-Luc Dubois bouncing back, and I love the additions of Andrew Mangiapane, Matt Roy and Jakob Chychrun. The latter two are going to significantly upgrade their defense (Roy defensively and Chychrun offensively) while they also have two new top-six forwards coming in with the Dubois and Mangiapane.
Logan Thompson is also a really shrewd under-the-radar addition in goal, giving them a really cheap — and potentially productive — duo with him and Charlie Lindgren. I would guess Lindgren regresses a little this season, but I like the presence of Thompson to help balance that.
I don’t know that the roster is, at this point, any better or worse. It’s just kind of ... the same. I do think there are some variables and X-factors that, if they break their way, could lead to a big improvement (like the power play) but the new direction of the team seems pretty apparent this offseason — it is about the future.
But because it is not a full-scale, tear it down to the foundation rebuild in a traditional sense there is still enough talent here that they might be able to do something. It just comes down to whether or not they can fix the power play, or if the goaltending can get them through a season, or if somebody from the farm system emerges into a player. Basically, kind of just like the last two seasons where they go through a frustrating year as a bubble team where you keep saying “what if this was different...”
I know they made the playoffs the past two years, and I know their voodoo magic will probably find a way to work again this season as they collect 15 loser points, but I just don’t understand this team.
There is nothing overly exciting about them, they don’t do anything particularly well, they don’t have much high-end talent outside of Ilya Sorokin and Mathew Barzal, and their metrics are consistently terrible. I do, however, love the Anthony Duclair signing.
Matvei Michkov’s arrival is going to be exciting, and he has legitimate superstar, franchise-changing ability. I do not know if that happens in year one, but it could happen relatively quickly and rapidly change their short-term and long-term trajectory.
Independent of that, however, the Flyers front office just simply seems resigned to the fact they are not ready to seriously contend and that a step backwards is inevitable. How else do you explain an offseason where they really have not done much?
From a big picture perspective I do think there are a lot of reasons to be optimistic if you are a Blue Jackets fan. They do have a legitimately good farm system with some serious high-end talent. Assuming they develop it properly there could be a foundation here to build on.
That is still probably a ways off, however, and I am not sure Sean Monahan and a new head coach is going to be enough to dramatically improve a team that has been one of the NHL’s worst the past two years.
There is a light at the end of the tunnel. That tunnel still has a ways to go, however. Patience is a must here.
