CRANBERRY, Pa. -- Jim Rutherford wasn't close to making a move at the NHL Draft, he doesn't sound like he's close to making a move anytime soon, and he'll freely state he wouldn't mind if he didn't make one at all this summer.
Classic GM-speak?
Eh, maybe. But I've spent enough time around the man, including a 20-minute conversation he had with select media outlets Monday afternoon inside his office at the Lemieux Sports Complex, to gauge when he really, really wants to be active. And this, be very sure, isn't one of them. He was cool, casual, relaxed as can be, cracking jokes at seemingly every chance.
For example, when kiddingly asked if he's creative enough to carve out cap space for supernova free agent John Tavares, he grinned and answered, "I'm creative. Not a magician."
So, Jim, any trade talks reach any meaningful level in Dallas?
"No, I didn't come close," he replied softly. "There's nothing, really, that made any sense to us. But I think that was pretty much it in general. You usually see a lot more deals at the draft than you did. I would say this process has been slowed down league-wide, which means it slowed down for us."
He attributed that slowdown to the mad rush by some teams in pursuing Ilya Kovalchuk, now signed by the Kings, and Tavares. The Penguins were never after Kovalchuk, and they aren't after Tavares, either.
"Things will change once those players settle," Rutherford said. "Teams will start to make other moves."
And does he find the situation frustrating?
"No."
A fun smile followed, then a pause.
"There's no deadline. I think it'd be good if we could make a few changes. But if we don't, we still have a good team. You don't win the Cup in June or July. You have until the trade deadline to put the finishing touches on it. If I felt our team had to improve to compete in the regular season, then I'd feel more urgency. I don't feel that."
Then a quick head turn with a raise of the voice.
"But with that being said, my preference would be to make a few changes."
He couldn't have come across more differently than at the same time last summer, when he made known from Miami to Moose Jaw that he'd throw himself in front of a Zamboni for a third-line center. Not just in his words, either. He'd be visibly exasperated about it at times, especially as the deadline loomed closer. Eventually, of course, he followed up his acquisition of Riley Sheahan by adding Derick Brassard, and even then the latter involved a three-team exchange so complex the NHL rejected the initial submission.
I mentioned this to Rutherford and pressed if there was anything like that, any specific facet that he really hoped to address. Maybe a scoring winger. A depth defenseman.
"The balance is the big thing," he replied, repeating a refrain he'd shared with me over the phone a couple weeks back. "With the forwards we have, even if we moved one out, we still have enough to create the four-line balance within the group we'd have, which was helped by the midseason deals for Sheahan and Brassard. So the fact that we've got the structure down the middle and we've got good young wingers coming, we can do that from within."
The wingers he referenced are obviously Daniel Sprong and Zach Aston-Reese, both of whom will be on the NHL roster this coming season.
"Another defenseman," Rutherford continued. "We like Riikola."
That's Juuso Riikola, the 24-year-old defenseman signed earlier this month from the Finnish Liiga. Rutherford made clear to me -- and I must have asked three times -- that Riikola has a very real chance of cracking the Penguins' roster right out of training camp, even though he's never played in North America.
"Yes," came the firm answer. "But if there was no other defenseman available -- which based on where we sit here today with our cap space, that would be hard to do -- I'm going to try to make a deal to free up some cap space, but it doesn't mean I'll use it on July 1."
That's the opening of NHL free agency.
"I may free it up just so that we have it as we go along."
And who might go to clear cap space?
Well, I'm pretty much crossing Phil Kessel off the list. The more we hear from Rutherford and Mike Sullivan, the clearer it's become that he's staying put and, taking it further, that he was never shopped in any way, shape or form.
Asked yet again if he plans on keeping Kessel, he replied, "Yeah. Did I ever say I wasn't?"
And what would be Rutherford's main motivation in clearing cap space?
"It'll be twofold," he replied. "It'll give us the opportunity to sign certain players to longer-term contracts, so we could get that done. And then it would leave us some cap space to do something at some other time. But to answer the question directly, does it give us a chance to sign somebody to a bigger contract? Probably not."
An outside free agent, he meant.
On other topics:
• I asked about his apparently increased emphasis on getting scoring from the fourth line, that before he didn't extend qualifying offers to two pending restricted free agents, Sheahan and Tom Kuhnhackl: "If you aren't getting that, I think it puts a lot of extra pressure on our top two lines and the power play. We have good enough players to carry us through that. But I'd prefer that they don't feel that extra pressure."
• I asked if, beyond Sprong and Aston-Reese, he could name the next young forward on his list who might be ready in the AHL: "Teddy Blueger. Because he's capable of being a fourth-line center right now. He's at that point." I followed up by asking if Blueger's core strength, an issue with Sullivan, has been addressed enough to improve his skating: "Not a lot stronger, but he's adjusted to the pro game. The way he plays, he's very smart. He can play that role." Here's Taylor Haase's most recent interview with Blueger.
• I asked if Brassard, Aston-Reese and Jamie Oleksiak, all sparingly used on the penalty-kill last season, might become fixtures this coming season, given that it seems necessary if the fourth line is being transformed: "Yes. Yes. And even if I'm wrong, they're going to have to be." He laughed slightly, but he evidently meant it. "They should be. Brassard's traditionally been a good faceoff guy, and he's killed some penalties before. He's good enough to do it, so yes. Aston-Reese can definitely do it. And Oleksiak is still adjusting his game and improving. But he should be a really good penalty-killer. Takes up a lot of space. He's got a big, long reach. And so, the answer is yes."
• On whether, after signing Sprong and Dominik Simon to NHL-only, two-year contracts earlier in the day, he might be looking at long-term deals for any remaining restricted free agents, notably Bryan Rust: "That's all part of the negotiation."
• On whether Evgeni Malkin and Kessel can play together: "When Phil and Geno are going, when they're at the top of their game, they're really good together. But there are times when they're not, whether it's an injury or someone's tired or the team they're playing against. And when that happens, that line becomes more of a liability defensively. That's more of what we watch for."
• On whether fatigue will be any kind of factor in 2018-19: "That's not something we can use going forward. The extra month is big for our team. Fatigue is not an issue going forward."
• On whether he's seeking additional size after watching the bigger Capitals win the Stanley Cup: "No. We played in a series with Washington three years in a row. We came out ahead two of the years. They came out ahead this year. The two years that we won could have gone the other way, and I can say the same for the one where they beat us. If we had a few breaks. And we had a handful of players who weren't playing to the top of their ability against Washington. But even then, we hit the post in overtime. If that goes in, we go back to Washington for Game 7, and you never know. I don't think it happened because they were bigger and stronger. I think Braden Holtby had his best series against us of the three he played all the way. He was rested. And Evgeny Kuznetsov came together. And their top players, for the first time, played the game the right way. That was the difference."