The phrasing on the Karlsson trade condition is that if the Penguins' pick is in the top 10 Dubas can choose to defer the pick to 2025, not that he has to. Considering how fortunate they were with the health of their big 4 this year and the fact that the youngest of them is Karlsson who has a significant injury history and will be 34 before the season starts and the others will be 37,37, and 38, and they lost a guy who was a point per game player through 3/4 of the season this year, there's a decent chance next year they drop in the standings beyond where they are this year. If the pick is in the 8-10 range I feel like it would make sense for them to just give up this year's pick instead of waiting until next year and risking it being even earlier. On the other hand, deferring when they don't have to would be admitting they're expecting to do worse and that could be tough to do while Crosby's still there and playing well.

This reminds me of when the Senators drafted Tkachuk 4th overall and gave up what became the 4th overall (Byram) the following season.

We'll see if the Penguins are faced with such an easy decision. The way they're trending it should be a top 5 pick.

I have the utmost confidence that no team with Sidney Crosby on it, not to mention Erik Karlsson and Kris Letang, will finish in the bottom 5, especially now that Kyle Dubas has had an entire season to evaluate the roster and has this off-season to take some steps to improve the team, so I can't see the Penguins doing worse than they have this year.

The biggest question is about health and age...even if the players don't get injured, at some point their performance is going to fall off. It might not be next year but time is undefeated so eventually it will happen. Add to that the older they are the more likely people are to get injured and the longer it takes for recovery. Karlsson, Letang, Crosby, and Malkin haven't missed a game this season. Will they be as healthy next year?

I’d defer automatically if eligible in nearly all cases.

I’d rather have a guaranteed top 10 pick today at the cost of maybe a better one then wait a year to upgrade that pick some less than 10 number of slots. One year is not worth slot 8 to 5 for me, as an example. I’ll take the 8. In many cases if you wait a year, the pick isn’t all that much better if not the same or worse, and you’ve lost a year of time.

The only way I’d change my mind is if I believed I was going to trade Sidney Crosby. If you’re doing that, you can/will get some prospects, and the time value that could be lost by not deferring is accounted for in the trade return.