Quote:
Originally Posted by Mr Jiggyfly
I think I missed the memo where you can only trade young blueliners for fwds who have expensive deals. The Pens most NHL ready fwd came via trading Whitney.
Rundblad was turned into not one, but two talented young fwds for his last two respective teams.
People flipped when CP took GoGo... There was Whitney, Welch, Scuderi, Fata, Nemec and Fernholm all in the pipeline and all of them seemed promising. Why the **** did he waste a pick on ths little midget out of HS? MFERBBQ!
Should I mention again all of the crying when Despres and Morrow were taken?
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Good points from your post and the one you replied to. There's no wrong way to build and maintain a team, and if there's a GM out there who never makes the wrong draft pick I'd sure like to meet him.
Ray Shero's defense men have not panned out yet, but that doesn't mean they never will. And that's kind of the problem, isn't it? Defense men (almost all of them) need considerable playing time to develope. And it can take 4-6 years before they have the necessary skill and experience to handle big NHL minutes. And that's if they pan out in the first place. Ray Shero had to pay big Free Agent market prices to fill the time gap.
Wingers, can take just as long as defense men. But their positions are considerably easier to master, and as a result they usually can hon their skills a little quicker, and with less ice time.
The Pens are in a cap vice grip, paying big money to forwards and defense men. That's just the price of success. But it's reasonable to suggest that IF they found wingers as the BPA at the time, they would have entry level deals to use. ELD can mean a maintained level of success while prioviding cap flexibility.
The cap can be flexible, or it can loom like an albatrose.