A popular, if not quite clinical, definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over, but expecting different results.
The hockey version of that might be keeping a roster that has endured consecutive playoff embarrassments intact and still expecting it to contend for a championship.
It's quite predictable, then, that Jim Rutherford is planning some personnel changes before next season -- and not only because of salary-cap constraints.
So while Rutherford has said his intention is to keep the Penguins' core intact, it's not inconceivable that if he would decide a franchise-altering deal is in order, Rutherford would consider trading defenseman Kris Letang,
After all, the quality of Letang's work can fluctuate wildly -- he looks like one of the NHL's top defensemen at times, but makes perplexing on-ice decisions at others -- he consumes $7.25 million of cap space and he has only a limited no-trade clause, allowing the Penguins to send him to any one of 18 teams.
Exploring the market for Letang to see what kind of return he might bring makes perfect sense; actually trading him probably does not, for several reasons.
Letang is the cornerstone of the defense corps, plays more minutes than anyone on the team and is an integral member of both special-teams units. John Marino, who is about to enter his second pro season, seems like a viable candidate to assume that role in the future, but it's probably a bit much to expect at this stage of his career.
What's more, Letang is a right-handed shot, and the Penguins have a dearth of those. At the moment, Letang, Marino and Chad Ruhwedel figure to man the right side on the top three pairings next season. That could change, of course, although there's no guarantee the Penguins could add a right-shot defenseman via free agency, even if they had the cap space needed to sign one, or that they could acquire one in a trade, let alone one capable of taking on all of Letang's responsibilities.
Given that the Penguins remain in "win-now" mode, accepting a downgrade in personnel, even if it's only in the short term, would directly conflict with their oft-stated objective.
So yes, Rutherford would be remiss if he didn't listen to any offers he might receive for Letang during this offseason -- it's always possible that another club will be desperate enough for what he can bring that it would severely overpay to get him -- but he shouldn't count on receiving a proposal that would actually tempt him to part with a player who holds down such a prominent role.
• Looking for a virtual lock in the Western Conference final, in which Vegas and Dallas are tied, 1-1? The prudent approach might be to select not the team that will win the series, since it's conceivable that either the Golden Knights or Stars will prevail, but that whoever advances to the Cup final will do it with a shutout. Each team already has one in the series -- Dallas took the opener, 1-0, and Vegas countered with a 3-0 victory in Game 2 -- which marked the first time in what the NHL considers the modern era (since 1943-44) that each club posted a shutout during the first two games of a conference final. What's more, six of Vegas' past nine games have ended with one team or the other failing to score a goal.
• The New York Islanders were overwhelmed by Tampa Bay in Game 1 of the Eastern final, as the Lightning ran up an 8-2 victory, but history suggests it might be a little early to count out New York just yet. The Islanders are 4-1 this postseason in games following a loss and generally rebound quite emphatically. The margin of victory in all four of those wins has been two or more goals, with no fewer than three of them ending with New York on top by four.
• There are statistical surprises in every playoff year, but here's one that's particularly striking: The league leader in power-play goals in this postseason is Colorado's Nazem Kadri, who has six. That's twice the total of any player on the four clubs still active, and two more than Kadri had in 51 regular-season appearances.
• How important is it for New York to find a way to win Game 2 tonight? Teams that win the first two games in a conference final are 31-2 since the conference format was adopted before the 1981-82 season. One of the clubs to overcome a 2-0 deficit was the 1991 Penguins, who spotted Boston a two-game edge in the Wales final before running off four consecutive victories.
• It's gotten pretty tough to argue with Vegas coach Peter DeBoer's decision to deploy Robin Lehner as his go-to goalie in these playoffs. Lehner already has four shutouts and will enter Game 3 having not allowed a goal in 131 minutes, 44 seconds. Teammate Marc-Andre Fleury (remember him?), who had four shutouts during the 2018 playoffs, is the only other NHL goalie to record that many in a single postseason since 2012.
• Take Game 1 of the East final at face value, and you might expect Tampa Bay to win that best-of-seven in, oh, roughly two games. But while a sweep remains possible, conference finals involving the Lightning tend to be drawn-out affairs. This is the sixth time in franchise history that Tampa Bay is playing for a conference title; each of its previous five trips there lasted seven games.
• No Lightning player ever put up more than four points in a playoff game ... until the opener against New York, when Nikita Kucherov and Brayden Point both did it. But they didn't just set a franchise record; they became the first set of teammates to get that many points in the same game since Paul Coffey and Jari Kurri of Edmonton in 1982.
• While it's not a complete shock that Vegas and Dallas are playing for the Western championship (although Colorado was a popular choice to defeat the Stars in Round 2), there is something about that matchup that is a bit of a surprise. It pairs two clubs who advanced after squandering a 3-1 advantage in their previous series for just the second time in postseason history. The other was in 2008, when Montreal and Philadelphia met in the second round.
• St. Louis lost its chance to join the Penguins of 2016 and 2017 as the only clubs to win back-to-back Cups since Detroit in 1997 and 1998 when Vancouver upset the Blues in the opening round of these playoffs, but one player from that title-winning club still has a chance to pick up another ring. That would be Lightning winger Pat Maroon, who signed a one-year contract as a free agent last August.