Jakey come back U can blame it all on Sully

I was wroooong

And I just can't score without you

I'm gonna fix this for you.

3rd line
Yager, Broz, DOC.

4th line
Poulin, Eller, Bemström

DEF
bye POJ
Insert Pickering.
bye Ivany
Insert FA 3RD.

Best this team could do....

But here is the thing. I don't want to pay Jake 9.5...... because he's not worth 9.5
To be stuck in that contract, is a decision I'd rather let some other team get roped into.

Full stop, this is far from the best this team could do.
I don't think Yager, Broz, or Pickering are NHL ready. I'd love to be proven wrong, but I imagine they'll all get a quick look at most.
Jack St. Ivany has been solid, much to my surprise. He plays a better physical shutdown game than the rest of our 3rd pairing options. Why replace young talent with a more expensive player that is only marginally better?
"Guentzel isn''t worth 9.5M" have you been living under a rock? He was worth that before scoring 25 in 17 with CAR. He's a superstar. That doesn't necessarily mean that bringing him back is the best move for the team: I want to pick up a shutdown LHD on a short term deal until Pickering is ready. But someone is going to pay Jake a lot of money this summer and they are going to be very happy that they did.

Ideal bottom 6 IMO looks something like:
DOC - Eller - Puustinen
Gruden - Poulin/Ponomarev - Puljujarvi
with Eller moving down to 4C later in the season if Poulin/Ponomarev look good.

Yager is already a better player than Puustinen.
You to worried about age. There are plenty of guys who come in at 20.
While I can see your concern for Pickering, by the end of the year he'll be a better LD than POJ and he sure as hell can do no worse than Ludvig did.

As for Broz, he could step onto this team today and be the best 3C option they have. Guys don't play as good as he does at the NCAA level and not make the jump fairly quickly. He's better than Kerfoot was at the NCAA level and Kerfoot played right away. He's got kerfoot year 4 numbers in year 3. He's got a complete game. He could easily make the jump.
It's the constant shooting itself in the foot that this team makes not wanting to play youth and this fan base who thinks no one is capable other than some over priced old as hell declining vet.

Broz would be a massive upgrade on the ice.

It isn't age I'm worried about with any of those guys I was skeptical of, it was performance.

Yager is probably the closest, had a phenomenal WHL season, but was 3rd in points/game on his own team. How much is he going to score without Jagger Firkus and Matthew Savoie? I don't think Yager's already better than Puusty. He's still only played in juniors, we don't know how well Yager will do against professionals. Look at Poulin, he played well in his last 2 years of juniors, and then struggled in the AHL before he was moved to C. Puustinen had 20 points in 52 games while averaging under 12 minutes a night. His 1.96 points/60 was one of the better rates on the Pens, and with a strong G% and xG% as well. Puusty and DOC are easily the best wingers for our 3rd line, assuming we replace Smith with someone to play with Sid and Rust.

Broz is in a similar boat: he was a major contributor on a great team, but he wasn't the guy. I dislike the Kerfoot comparison. Kerfoot scored 45 in 35 in year 4, and was 18th in points/game and tied for Harvard's leading scorer. Broz was good, but wasn't *the guy*. He scored 40 in 43, good for 63rd in points/game, and was 4th in Denver scoring. The only examples I saw over the past few years of someone making the jump to the NHL and sticking around were top picks and talents like Beniers and Caulfield, and Matthew Knies. Maybe we get a Knies situation out of him, but that's the exception rather than the rule.

Pickering was projected to have 3 or 4 years before making the NHL when drafted, and his development has been slower than the other two over the past couple years. His scoring barely went up between this and last season. With Swift Current being eliminated from the WHL playoffs last night, I assume he'll join the WBS Pens for their run. I think his performance there will tell us a lot about his readiness. If he's going to be better than POJ at the end of the year, he can prove it in the AHL before the end of the year. And better than Ludvig isn't great praise.

And it isn't like I want to play a bunch of old guys in those spaces. Eller was the only guy over 26 that I wanted in my projected bottom 6. Puusty and Pulji were the oldest guys after that. The former provides a scoring touch the bottom 6 lacked for the past few years, and the ladder has the speed and physicality for a great energy/grind line. I'm worried that if we play Yager, Broz, and Pickering before they're ready, it'll negatively affect both the Penguins season and those guys' seasons. Ultimately, I want what's best for their development. If that's an NHL gig, phenomenal. But if not, that's ok.