“Whoever wins that Cup is going to feel just the same way about winning it ... whatever day they win it.”
Jim Rutherford was speaking on a conference call with a group of us Pittsburgh reporters Wednesday afternoon and, first of all, it was good to hear his voice. Or from anyone associated with the Penguins, who'd been strikingly silent since the coronavirus outbreak canceled their game in Columbus and sent all of us scattering our very, very separate ways.
It was welcome. He handled himself with all the class we've come to expect, expressing concern first and foremost for everyone's well being even when addressing a question about actual hockey.
As he elegantly worded, "We live in a great country and we live in a great, great city where people have gone through tough times, and we’ll pull through this together.”
Beautiful. So very Jim.
But I won't lie here: It was the actual addressing of hockey that had me the most uplifted.
Read that quote up top once again. Then try to imagine the seemingly deliberate pause Rutherford left between those two phrases. As if the man, however momentarily, was allowing himself to picture, once again, carrying that Cup. In August. Or September. Or October. Or Christmas. Or "whatever day" it'd take.
He's driven that way. Understand that, and his many machinations make all the more sense. Some general managers and executives in sports set goals for themselves, for their teams, that are segmented or founded in steps. Not this one. As long as I've known him, he starts tracing his path right at the foot of the Cup, then chalks his line only as far back as necessary. And it's the straightest line possible.
Even now, even in this setting that he correctly called "new times," he couldn't -- and shouldn't -- mask that the line's still there for him. And that it could wind up all the straighter upon hockey's return.
“Prior to stopping play," he said, "we'd run into a period where we were overusing guys in certain areas because of injuries, and it was starting to catch up with us. We didn’t have that same energy and juice that we had in the first half of the season. So I would suggest that it would be to our benefit, having the break.”
Talk about straight. And accurate.
We all saw it, the way the Penguins slid into that six-game losing streak before mercifully salvaging a complete W in Newark in what's now almost surely their regular-season finale. They'd stopped scoring. They'd stopped defending. They'd also stopped making saves for the first time all winter.
And he's right, I'd concur, that it was about lacking that "energy and juice."
Remember what Kris Letang told me in Winnipeg way back in October about how Mike Sullivan's system was "demanding?"
Suffice it to say, the demand was exceeding the supply. And it couldn't have been clearer, even before the six-game losing streak. This team was going to need to muster so much extra simply to ensure qualifying for the playoffs, never mind enduring four seven-game series.
Well, that might not be needed now.
Look, every NHL team will face a similar set of pluses and minuses upon the return. But I'll posit right here that no team will benefit more from this break, not even the defending champion Blues in getting Vladimir Tarasenko back, than the local one. Because the Penguins not only will unexpectedly welcome back a 40-goal scorer in Jake Guentzel but also revitalize so many others who'd been in obvious need of it.
No one would disagree with that more than Sidney Crosby, naturally, and he did have three goals in his final five games if he were looking to make his case. But he'd also gone without a point in seven of the final 11 games, occasionally doing very un-Sid-like things with the puck, if that can be believed.
Maybe he was hurting, maybe he wasn't. But he's undeniably 32.
Evgeni Malkin's never stopped flying, and his final five games brought four goals, seven assists and, need I remind, that this stretch was preceded by the everlasting emasculation of John Carlson:
But he's undeniably 33.
And Letang's undeniably 32.
And it isn't just the core, as I can easily count into this context, albeit for varying reasons, any number of additional players: Justin Schultz hadn't been himself for months since returning from an injury, possibly too soon. Brian Dumoulin missed three months and might've pushed himself, as well. Bryan Rust had a fun hat trick against the Senators, but he'd gone without a goal in 15 of his final 18 games. My goodness, Brandon Tanev, whose engine functions on endless rocket fuel, had become a shell of himself, and I'd suspected for a month he wasn't right.
Goaltending's more complex, as ever, but neither Matt Murray nor Tristan Jarry had really grabbed the reins to be No. 1 as both were being given that chance. That couldn't have been age or fatigue, but that doesn't mean it was working itself out. They seemed to need resets, too.
Those Penguins weren't going anywhere. Not like that. They'd have made the tournament, and they might've moved beyond the Flyers -- or not, since Philly'd been the NHL's hottest team -- and that would've been that.
Maybe that'll still be the case. But maybe not. And the latter didn't look anywhere this likely beforehand.
• The Guentzel news was not a no-brainer. Don't think for a second it should've been assumed he'd be able to participate in any playoff, no matter how deep in 2020 this delay goes.
As I reported exclusively in Friday Insider earlier this month, the concern about Guentzel's status to return at any stage of this season/postseason had remained very much in doubt. A team official had told me on the team's Florida trip in February that Guentzel's shoulder injury was deemed to be more akin to a "car accident" than anything hockey-related with how hard he'd struck the boards. The damage was deep, unusual and not easily assigned any timetable.
Rutherford's exact assessment yesterday was that Guentzel's original timetable of 4-6 months -- with the short end of that being late April -- remains intact and, most important, "He's had no setbacks."
This was a big deal.
• What is a no-brainer is that Guentzel and Crosby will be reunited from the first drill in the first practice.
But beyond that?
Man, good luck forming Sullivan's lines. Here's what I conjured up, but only after some serious (albeit fun) agonizing:
Zucker-Crosby-Guentzel
Marleau-Malkin-Rust
Aston-Reese-Blueger-Tanev
McCann-Bjugstad-Hornqvist
Yeah, I know: No Conor Sheary. No Dominik Simon. No Evan Rodrigues, either. Or the Wilkes-Barre kids. And I could just as easily displace, say, Zach Aston-Reese and Nick Bjugstad to get them in there. I could go further and suggest that either Sheary or Simon might be a better immediate fit alongside Crosby/Guentzel, if only because they've both already had experience with those two, and it's not as if there'll be any adjustment period going right into a Game 1.
• Rutherford confirmed my reporting from a week ago that the Penguins haven't yet been tested for coronavirus, that they're waiting to see if anyone has symptoms. The fact that they don't, as he added, is encouraging, especially since their late-February California trip came shortly before the Senators went out there and had two players infected.
• Not going to judge here, by the way. If the Penguins do get everyone tested, they'd be blasted for asserting privilege to push to the front of the line ahead of people who are showing symptoms, as has happened across the NBA. If everyone's fine, including those who come in contact with the team, then they're fine.
• Wouldn't read too much into the postponement of the NHL Draft and the Awards show. Those are June events, and the only June event the league could possibly conduct in 2020 is the postseason.
• Sad sight for the day:
A closed PPG Paints Arena, yesterday. - DEJAN KOVACEVIC / DKPS• The NHL's medical director, Dr. Winne Meeuwisse, spoke on a conference call with reporters yesterday, and the only meaningful takeaway was that the league's resumption would be affected by how the coronavirus moves about North America and how different regions, their governments and their people respond.
"The virus is really just entering the rapid acceleration phase, certainly in North America,” Dr. Meeuwisse said. “We want to be doing our part to not only protect our players but also our staff and our fans as the disease unfolds. It’s difficult to predict where the pandemic is going and what the timeline will be.”
Just in case anyone was wondering.
• He's a doctor. He's an expert. I'm neither.
But I'm going to say this until it's proven wrong: Once there's even an appearance that this is under control or manageable, that'll be it. People won't wait to be told it's OK to come back out. They'll just do it. They'll weigh the risk, and they'll make the call themselves.
We aren't there yet, obviously, but mark my words on this once we are.
• Yes, there will be sports in 2020. And a Cup. And a first pitch. And a kickoff.
• Ask Rob Manfred. He went on ESPN last night and basically blurted out that Major League Baseball will be "gearing back up" at some point in May.
Oh, also that 162 games are off the table now and that seven-inning doubleheaders are being discussed. (A-hem!)
All in favor!
Roberto Clemente Bridge to nowhere, Tuesday. - DEJAN KOVACEVIC / DKPS• Speaking of that, today was supposed to mark the opening of the Pittsburgh Baseball Club's 134th season, right down there in St. Petersburg, Fla., a half-hour up I-275 from Bradenton.
• Derek Shelton never gave a clue, including in his conference call with us last week, who might've been his starter, but I'd have been stunned if it wasn't Chris Archer. He's the veteran of the staff, a vocal and visible leader, and he'd have been facing his old team, the Rays.
Possibly against Tyler Glasnow, I should add.
• Shelton did give clues about his lineup, of course, by writing one up every day for three weeks, so I'll go off those and write that this would've been mine for this day:
Kevin Newman, SS
Bryan Reynolds, LF
Adam Frazier, 2B
Josh Bell, 1B
Gregory Polanco, RF
Jose Osuna, 3B
Colin Moran, DH
Jacob Stallings, C
Jarrod Dyson, CF
Bearing in mind that slicker moves could be made for one specific day -- it'd be just as easy to DH for Bell or Polanco, for example -- but there's something special about an opener, and Shelton's enough of a traditionalist to recognize that. Bell's his first baseman. And Polanco's fresh off a year and change of relentless work toward proving he can play in the field. Keeping either in the dugout for the first game would've felt a little uncomfortable.
• Alex Stumpf offers a lineup that's a little different.
• That lineup's not bad. I know it's terribly uncool to say anything about the Pirates that doesn't begin with 'Nutting' and end with 'payroll,' but I'd see that as a pretty good lineup, truth be told ... if not for Dyson. He's the killer. One more bat in the bottom half was needed for some balance, especially if Moran and/or Stallings fall back.
• Whichever NFL general managers were whining about wanting to delay the draft because they can't access certain information electronically, be very sure Kevin Colbert wasn't among them.
Good for him. Good for the Steelers. The playing field's level. Pick away. May the best scouts win.
• Remember what I wrote yesterday about Colbert being pretty much done because he's banging his head on the salary cap?
He confirmed that fully.
“I think we’re up against it pretty good,” Colbert told the team's Missi Matthews in an interview yesterday. “We made a lot of anticipated moves we wanted to make. Unfortunately, we had to make some subtractions from the roster. Can we make some additional moves? Sure. I don’t want to say that we’re out of business, but we’re satisfied at this point."
Also, done at quarterback.
• We'll get through this. We will.