See, this is what I'm talking about.

This trade, this multilayered, mega-exchange of players, prospects and picks that might as well have had had three teams in play, with Kyle Dubas sending Marcus Pettersson and Drew O'Connor to the Canucks for Danton Heinen, Vincent Desharnais, prospect Melvin Fernström and ... uh, a FIRST-FREAKING-ROUND DRAFT PICK pick from the Rangers ... that's precisely what I was writing about the other night from Salt Lake City when putting forth that these Penguins aren't at all in the same sorry position as Pittsburgh's other two franchises.

Not in the long haul, maybe not in the short haul, and absolutely not within this particular haul.

Let's pick it apart:

• Pettersson, the main piece moving out, was at his lowest possible value. I love the guy, but he was having a setback season, his struggles only multiplied of late as he seemed sure he'd be traded, and that was because his contract expires after this season and, as our Taylor Haase confirmed on this trip out west, he'd never once been approached about an extension.

• O'Connor, the only other piece moving out, was at his own lowest possible value. I love this guy, too, but he wasn't progressing the way anyone had hoped after an uplifting finish to his 2023-24 season: In 53 games, he had six goals, 10 assists and a minus-14 rating. He's 26 and, given his work ethic, it'd be hockey justice if he grows elsewhere, but it wasn't happening through three years here. And his contract was expiring after this season, as well.

• Repeat: A first-rounder for two expiring contracts of two complementary-type players. Yeah.

• With the remaining players focused on these next four games preceding the NHL's two-week break for the 4 Nations Face-Off tournament -- several of them told me in Salt Lake City the other night they see these as season-defining -- Dubas replaced Pettersson with Desharnais on defense, adding a sorely needed physical facet to go with his 6-7, 226-pound stature, as well as a rare right shot to the organization. And behind Kris Letang and Erik Karlsson, he'll be asked to log only third-pair minutes.

• Heinen, of course, will be a rerun. He'll often look like a team's most threatening sniper, and he'll just as often vanish offensively. But Mike Sullivan used to praise Heinen's professionalism and positional versatility, so he can be deployed in all situations, including both special teams. He won't replace everything O'Connor brought, but he'll score more.

• The Penguins picked up $700,000 in cap space and now have $2.4 million in space. And the cap itself's about to soar, as we all just learned.

• Limiting the scope of this trade to two-for-two, it'd feel fair from the Pittsburgh perspective. Desharnais, a late NHL arrival, is 28 and in his second full season. Heinen's 29. Even if one or both doesn't stick for long, it's not as if some bounty of untapped potential went the other way. Same goes for analyzing positional needs, production and all else. 

Which is where this gets wild ...

• Earlier in the day, the Canucks traded J.T. Miller back to the Rangers, this for the conditional first-round pick that'd eventually get turned over to the Penguins. And all I've got to say on these fronts is that the figurative air gets no more desperate than what's been created between the Vancouver and New York franchises, both dealing with drama all winter and yet somehow still delusional enough to believe they're still contending.

• We'll never know, but I find it wholly plausible that Dubas took grotesque advantage of Jim Rutherford, who's never met a first-round pick he intended to keep, and Chris Drury, who's being buried on the back pages and in the blue seats. Just saying.

• I'll say it again, though: Whether it was Rutherford or his barely-semi-autonomous general manager, Patrik Allvin, responsible for this, it's beyond mind-blowing that the Canucks felt they needed to toss in a first-rounder to get this done. Might even spark another riot out there.

• That's now 15 picks within the first three rounds of the next three drafts that Dubas has amassed, most of any team. Four will be in the first round. That's either a ton of future talent or, if things get fun in a hurry, trade capital for Sidney Crosby's final supporting cast.

• Then there's this, too: Fernström's anything but the standard throw-in prospect. He's 18, he was the Canucks' third-round pick this past summer, he's already playing with the adults in Sweden's top league, and he was consensus top-10 within the Vancouver system. The skating needs work, per scouts, but the kid can really rip it:

That's an NHL finish. And he comes with the full shot-selection arsenal, tips and all.

• To emphasize further, Fernström, like the Rangers' first-rounder, never needed to be part of this. They're handouts. They're gifts.

So yeah, this is another stride, just like the Jake Guentzel trade's proving to be. (Ville Koivunen, by the way, scored again on this night for Wilkes-Barre/Scranton and really ought to get over here soon.) And it's further proof that it's possible in 2025, in a salary-cap system, with a smart executive at the helm, to rebuild/reload on the fly.

That's what's happening here. And for as much of a challenge as it's clearly been for Dubas to convey that to a public that seems convinced that rebuilding can only occur in the context of total teardowns, give full credit to the man for sticking by it.

It's no coincidence that his statement after the trade included the following: “Tonight’s trade continues to move us in the direction set one year ago which is to continue to add young prospects, young players, and draft capital to the Penguins as we chart our course to return the club back into contention as urgently as possible."

They aren't the Steelers, who can't get out of their own stubborn ways and seem satisfied to stay in the same sickly cycle.

They aren't the Pirates, who don't even care.

They're doing this right, and they're now being ... wow, excessively rewarded for it.