Quoting: pensfan21
I think the roster needs to be nuked. Whether or not I did that realistically or successfully is another question, but it needs a complete overhaul.
Honestly, I doubt overhauling the roster is possible, or necessary, or even beneficial. The lineup at the top is actually really good, just not good enough to take the travesty of last year's depth anywhere. The Pens generated a ton of offense last year, but struggled to finish. By both evolving-hockey and moneypuck, the Pens were 4th in xG and 9th in xG%. GAAx was pertty average, but GFAx was the worst in the NHL. The finishing here was an anomaly in how bad it was, and only a few teams come close.
The top 6 was given a lot of ice time. Guentzel-Crosby-Rakell was 5th and Zucker-Malkin-Rust was 13th in ice time, and the swaps of Raks and Rust were both in the top 25 as well. Still, the two lines I mentioned were 7th and 9th in xG/60 and 7th and 18th in xG% out of lines with 200+ minutes. If the Pens were to run it back with a similar top 6 and improved forward depth, they can more evenly distribute ice time and not have a bottom 6 that gets caved in every night. McGinn-Carter-Kapanen had the 4th worst xG% and 5th worst xG/60 of any line with 150+ minutes.
Defense is still pretty top heavy, but not to as much of a degree. Of all D pairings with 300+ minutes, Pettersson-Letang and Pettersson-Petry were top 30 in xG% and top 10 in xG/60 (Joseph-Ruhwedel was actually pretty close to Petey-Tanger in both, interestingly). The xGA/60 is less impressive across the board, but Pettersson-Letang was still the best pairing the Pens had in that regard. Joseph-Petry was also the 2nd best pairing in actual goals/60 with 200+ minutes.
I say all that to say this: The top of the lineup was very effective. The Pens need significant
additions, not significant
changes. There are some guys in this ACGM that can provide that. Bertuzzi, Lafreniere, Hanifin, Rodrigues, Engvall are all worth consideration. But I don't think that moving the likes of Guentzel, Rust, Petry for equal or worse players and tossing team chemistry into the Monongahela River are going to do us any favors. How many major changes will Dubas even be able to make in one offseason?