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Dan’s Daily: Former Penguins on Waivers; Dubas Not Done
It is an early morning Daily as today will be a busy day in Pittsburgh Penguins land, following the late night in Steelers land. Later today, Penguins president of hockey operations/GM Kyle Dubas will speak to the media, presumably to wrap up his final roster decisions, which are still not final as of this morning. The Penguins made a couple of cuts Sunday but have more moves to make to reach 23 players by 5 p.m. today. We did our best to predict (guess) the final roster, which will be decided today.
Elsewhere in the Daily, several former Penguins players hit the waiver wire. The New York Islanders shocked everyone with their roster cuts. The Florida Panthers had to cancel their ring ceremony, and the Colorado Avalanche pulled off a slick trade with Vancouver in which both teams dumped the player to their benefit. And hello, Jeremy Swayman’s bank account as he inked a healthy new contract.
As of publishing, Rutger McGroarty, Harrison Brunicke, and Valtteri Puustinen are still with the Penguins. If the team were going to waive Puustinen, it would have happened Sunday.
Pittsburgh Penguins
Pittsburgh Hockey Now: Alas, Sebastian Aho, we barely knew thee. Dubas waived Aho as the Penguins’ transactions began.
So, here we go. Trying to predict, project, and opine regarding the final version of the Penguins roster.
Steelers Now: Welp, another terrible offensive performance resulted in a last-second loss. The analysis will be spilling out all day on the SteelersNow homepage. Here’s more bad news—Nate Herbig is injured.
NHL Trade Talk, News, & National Hockey Now
Sportsnet: Matt Murray. Zach Aston-Reese. And another 2019 first-round pick. Here are all 59 players on the NHL waiver wire, including the former Penguins.
I thought ZAR found a spot on the fourth line in Vegas. He had a pretty good preseason. I’m rooting for Murray to get healthy and on his game, too.
Boston Hockey Now: Jeremy Swayman’s agent was correct. Don Sweeney and Cam Neely didn’t offer $64 million. Nope, they offered $66 million, and … finally … Swayman signed.
Montreal Hockey Now: Montreal can go shopping on the waiver wire, and the folks in Montreal were curiously watching the Penguins’ situation for Pusutinen to hit the wire. The Montreal Canadiens’ shopping.
Colorado Hockey Now: The finer points of the salary cap helped the Cancuks and Avalanche make a trade. Vancouver traded to Coloradao an injured defenseman who will never play again and held 20% of his salary. Colorado traded Erik Brannstrom to Vancouver, who promptly waived him. What?! It’s a little bit confusing, but here’s the Avalanche trade.
NY Post: Pierre Engvall signed a big ol’ free agent contract with the Islanders a year ago; it was a seven-year deal. Incredibly, the New York Islanders–with six years and $18 million remaining on his deal–said goodbye.
Waiving a player one year after giving a seven-year deal would be grounds to fire a lot of GMs.
Florida Hockey Now: Ugh. This was one of the cooler things on the calendar until a new hurricane forced the cancellation. There was going to be a public Stanley Cup ring presentation for the Florida Panthers.