SAN JOSE, Calif. -- First game on this cross-California trip for the Penguins was a laugher, the second one enough to make one cry, and this third one ... as a great man once spoke, should have all concerned winding their watch.
Because it's time to get real.
"Obviously, that was a tough game for us," Rickard Rakell was saying after a energetic, brisk practice Monday afternoon at the Toyota Sports Performance Complex in Los Angeles, after which the team flew here for the Tuesday night faceoff with the Sharks at SAP Center. "I think talking after about it now, we've just gotta put it behind us. We gotta regroup. We've got a huge game before we go back home."
Mm-hm. Not just because the Eastern Conference standings see the Penguins holding the eighth and final playoff spot by a solitary point, not just because San Jose's among the NHL's cellar-dwellers, but maybe mostly because there's been an undercurrent of renewed focus on playing 200-foot hockey, and yeah, even in that 6-0 loss to the Kings that Rakell referenced. As all concerned agreed on that Saturday night in L.A., the outcome was far uglier than the collective output.
All of which came together for me, on the travel up to the Bay Area, in a slew of random myth-vs.-reality concepts about this often-confounding team that I now can't help but cram the following 10 into a column:
MYTH: This team's too old.
REALITY: Pardon my forthrightness, but that's crap. And hearing it repeated from all over doesn't make it any less crap.
Sidney Crosby's 62 points and Evgeni Malkin's 54 are high atop the team's scoring list, and both remain the two best all-around players on the team, forces on a league-wide scale, and participants in every single game to date. Kris Letang's been hit by injury, illness and tragedy, and he's still the team's best defenseman. Jeff Petry missed a month to a busted wrist, "just when I was finding my stride," as he told me on this trip, but he's otherwise been everything as hoped. All four of them are 35 or older.
So's Jeff Carter, and he's been abysmal. And needs to be scratched. Into eternity. But taking Carter's woes and extrapolating them as some reflection of the entire roster is inaccurate and borderline insane.
MYTH: Too much money was spent on keeping the stars.
REALITY: Man, not even sure where to start with this one, but it's everywhere. Even though all three of Sid, Geno and Letang are hilariously underpaid per their open-market value, and they'd be that even if they weren't performing as they are.
MYTH: The hunger's lacking.
REALITY: The inconsistency's been there, beyond a doubt, and it's ranged from maddening to mind-blowing. But anyone who knows what the Core's all about, on or off the ice, knows it's impossible for any of the three to lack hunger. They've spent careers invested primarily in the three Stanley Cup championships that'll be a big part of defining them, they want more and, oh, by the way, Letang popped right back onto the ice the morning after his second stroke.
The hunger's there. And they don't allow for the hunger to not be there for the group.
Here's Sid, after the practice in L.A., emerging from the room upon noticing P.O Joseph about to be interviewed, trying hard -- and failing -- to distract him:
DEJAN KOVACEVIC / DKPS
P.O Joseph, Sidney Crosby and AT&T SportsNet's Dan Potash, Saturday in Los Angeles.
This captain leads everyone, not just his longtime buds. That's how to build a winner. He's been there, to say the least.
And here's Letang, a few minutes earlier out on the ice, making a toddler of himself in celebrating a between-his-own-legs burial:
The inconsistency, as I see it, emanates from a spectacularly flawed bottom six that does next to nothing to remove the burden from the rest of the forwards. And I can't even put forth that the bottom six lacks hunger since that'd be a gross injustice to their lack of ability/fit.
MYTH: Can't get rid of Carter.
REALITY: Ridiculous. There are several elevators at PPG Paints Arena, and two of those make it all the way up to the seventh floor that houses the press box. Pick one, and press the button.
Look, he can't be traded without his consent, and he can't be forced to retire, but there's nothing forcing Mike Sullivan, Ron Hextall and everyone else to stick him in the lineup and function as a drag all over the rink, no longer just defensively.
MYTH: The scoring lines need (fill in the blank with literally anything at all).
They don't. Their production, their participation, their camaraderie ... even their interchangeability has made the the Penguins' top six among the finest anywhere.
And when I talk about interchangeability, I've got to share this two-minute talk I had with Rakell after the practice in L.A. about adjusting to all the times Sullivan flips him and Bryan Rust between lines:
Good stuff. Really good player. So's Rust. So's the whole half-dozen.
The problems are elsewhere.
MYTH: Can't make moves because of cap constraints.
REALITY: Setting aside what should be excruciating regret over Hextall's two-year extensions for Carter and Kasperi Kapanen that are the dominant culprits in over-spending -- and not Hextall's admirable goal of keeping the top six together last summer, as he'd cited last week as his explanation -- moves can always be made.
They just aren't likely to be much fun.
Well, too bad. Sid's got this year, plus two more on his contract. It can't be known how much longer he'll go. So the goal, as Hextall himself has stated, has to be to pursue the Cup every year that this living legend's suiting up. Not out of deference to Sid. Not because he's owed anything (though he is). But because it's common bleeping sense.
No GM in the league would have three players of this extraordinary caliber, all still doing fine and all at tremendous value, and adopt any other approach. It'd be idiotic, and I can't come up with a kinder term than that. I really can't.
So entertain trades that might hurt in the longer term. Draft picks. First-rounder. Whatever would pass for a prospect in this system. Maybe even a player off the current roster where there's fair depth, likely off the blue line.
Now.
MYTH: This team's slow and can't keep up with (fill in the name of any younger team, even the Sabres, for crying out loud).
REALITY: Name the slow players. I'll wait here.
Really, Carter and Brian Dumoulin?
One who's done and the other whose body's been damaged by years of injury?
That's it?
Name the forwards on the top two lines who are slow. Sid and Geno aren't teenagers anymore, but they sure as hell aren't slow. Jake Guentzel hasn't done enough five-on-five, but he entered this season with a step he'd never shown before. Bryan Rust hasn't finished to anyone's satisfaction, but he's seen within the hockey world as one of the league's fastest skater. Jason Zucker can fly.
Kapanen's got flaws, but he's the fastest in the room. Ryan Poehling can fly, too. Josh Archibald's much smaller, but he can motor. Brock McGinn and Teddy Blueger not so much.
The facet that's truly lacking mobility is the defense, and even that's not extreme. Letang's still got his wheels, Petry has his extra gear, and Marcus Pettersson and P.O Joseph can move ... when they keep moving. But it's not what Carolina and so many other defensive corps have.
So say that instead: That the defense could use more mobility.
Also that Ty Smith's rotting in Wilkes-Barre.
MYTH: Can't call up minor-leaguers.
REALITY: Part of this emanates from the cap situation, but the real root is a fear of impacting the penalty-killing. On the latter count, that's as it should be. Massive part of the game.
But if, for example, the fear of removing McGinn -- and all zero of his points in his past 20 games now -- is that he's a PK staple, then explain, please, how Drew O'Connor wouldn't have made a better choice at third-line left winger over these past 10 games that saw the Penguins kill off only 28 of 37 opponents' power plays for a sickly 75.7% success rate.
It's not like they'd be scratching Selke candidates.
Teach the kid the PK. Let him play. He's made more of an impact than any bottom-six type in weeks -- though I've also really liked Poehling's game of late -- and there's nothing he can do to even get a chance, much less stick. He's been on this whole trip without a shift.
Awesome idea: Put McGinn on waivers. If he's claimed, there's a parade down Grant Street. If he isn't, he goes to the AHL, and there's a prorated $1.1 million cap savings, plus a better player in his place, plus a club option on exercising that same parade down Grant Street!
MYTH: There's no one to call up.
REALITY: There sure isn't much. But I'd calmly, rationally take Valtteri Puustinen in a Wilkes-Barre minute over McGinn or Kapanen.
Over the weekend in Providence, R.I.:
And I'd take Smith over ... well, Dumoulin's play has picked up of late, so I won't take this one too far.
MYTH: Right from Sullivan after the practice Monday regarding Tristan Jarry, who's expected to be back in the crease against the Sharks: "I think he's perfectly capable of being durable. He's had some unfortunate breaks in the first part of this season. But his history with the Penguins, he's been very durable. I don't have any doubt that, when he gets over the hump here, he'll be fine."
REALITY: Not sure what's fair or isn't in contexts like those, but it's been way too often for comfort -- or, seemingly, coincidence -- over the past calendar year. Proof will be the reality, beginning on this very day at roughly 10:38 p.m. Eastern time.
MYTH: I could go on all day with this stuff.
REALITY: Nah. One more game out here, then a free day in San Francisco, then flying home. Life's good. For real.
