Team: 2023-24 Pittsburgh Penguins

Initial Creation Date: Jul. 8, 2023

Published: Jul. 8, 2023

Salary Cap Mode: Basic

This is about the best case for the pens, they don’t completely strip their picks away and build good depth for this year, if things go well they have pieces and cap to trade for someone, but it banks on Nylander or Boqvist working with Geno and is hoping a Zadina can turn it around because they are still losing a top 6 guy in rust, while the bottom 6 has better players and balance, the scoring touch may still need a boost, that would have to come from Ruzicka, DOC or Poulin or Zadina coming up and being good, overall tho it puts them in a good spot to be competitive and see where the team is come Jan/Feb. a deadline deal for a scorer could push them into contention, but having the score dcore here could be enough to facilitate their 5v5 scoring and keep them out of their own zone, they have better forecheckers as last year basically only Zucker was a consistent forechecker, Nylander showed flashes but wasn’t in enough, but this lineup has Boqvist, Acciari, Suter and Nylander. The D should be much better at breaking the neutral zone as any of Letang, EK, Smith, or Petts can carry the puck out, and Bear, EK, Letang, and Smith should make good zone breaking passes to the FWs. They missed guys that made good zone breaking passes outside of Letang mostly last year. Hopefully the threat of both helps the transition and opens up the ice for the pens. If you take the Rust deal out he slots into the Middle 6 but you lose Suter and Ruzicka. Would mean a lineup more like
Jake-Sid-Rak
Smith-Geno-Nylander
Boqvist-Eller-Rust
DOC-Acciari-Carter
Nieto-Zadina/Hinostroza
Still a solid lineup, may even be better than what I have, but would mean it’s a little bit older as well since you switch Suter(27) and Ruzicka(24) for Rust(31) and lose a couple picks

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