Where’s Crosby’s Contract? Is Dubas Planning Full Rebuild in 12 Months?

There are lingering and significant questions without definitive answers. Yet the circumstantial evidence is piling up, and arrows are beginning to point to a full-scale rebuild, not a retool on the fly, for the Pittsburgh Penguins beginning within the next 12 months.

For starters, it’s July 3. Where is the new contract for Sidney Crosby?

Clearly, issues are being discussed, and after two months of communication between the two sides, they are not settled. Both Penguins president of hockey operations/GM Kyle Dubas and Crosby have specifically stated that the conversations and negotiations will be private. That’s fine, but notice that neither side has yet used the phrase “optimistic.”

Last week, when discussing his inclusion on Team Canada, Crosby only conceded that “We’re talking. I’ll leave it at that.”

Surely, if both sides were anxious for a deal, some of that would be evident, and the talks would not be shrouded in more secrecy than a President’s mental acuity.

After well outperforming his contracts for the entirety of his career, Crosby deserves whatever he wants. He has earned a blank check with Fenway Sports Group’s signature at the bottom. However, that hasn’t happened, and after July 1, perhaps the reason there isn’t a new contract on the books isn’t because of money but rather the direction of the team.

Notice all of the one-year deals Dubas signed. New top-four defenseman Matt Grzelcyk only got a one-year contract. Anthony Beauvillier was kicked around the league over the last two years, playing for four teams, and he was the second-most notable free-agent signing.

Skipping past the merits of putting bottom-six scoring in the hands of a player who couldn’t stick in New York, Chicago, Nashville, or Vancouver, Beauvillier got one year, too.

Fourth liner Blake Lizotte and depth defenseman Sebastian Aho were the lucky two who got two-year deals.

Next July, Crosby, Lars Eller, and Marcus Pettersson will be unrestricted free agents. In two years, Evgeni Malkin, Michael Bunting, and Kevin Hayes will be UFAs.

It’s valid to wonder if Crosby is looking at the coming iceberg and wondering if he wants to bravely ride the Titanic to the bottom as the tuxedo-clad band plays an instrumental version of his rookie year goal anthem, Song 2. In full disclosure, we don’t know the details of any contract talks. Perhaps it’s not the lack of an FSG blank check, but Crosby seeing all that was and comparing it to all that won’t be.

No blame here if he doesn’t have the stomach for it. Unlike Mario Lemieux, Crosby doesn’t own the team. One wonders if even Lemieux would have come back or stayed through the horrors of Generation Next if he were not the owner. Lemieux was never thrilled playing on a line with the likes of Alexei Morozov or Toby Peterson.

Hypothetically, if Crosby were to go to Montreal and lead the young team to a Stanley Cup, the hockey world might replace Gordie Howe with Crosby on the Rushmore of greats. It would be a just reward for Crosby’s extreme work and dedication.

Penguins Lineup

Pittsburgh Hockey Now laid out the Penguins lineup on Tuesday. For all of the public commitment to keeping a good team around Crosby, the 2024-25 roster is obviously not as good as last season’s roster. Or the year before. And both of those teams missed the playoffs. Yet one of the stated goals was to respect Crosby and the core with NHL talent.

“We’re not looking to simply squeak into the playoffs. It’s to return the team to becoming a contender as soon as possible. Can we do that this season? Can we do that next season,” Dubas said Tuesday. “It’s hard to put a timeframe on it, but this is obviously not as strip-it-down to the studs situation here. The people in the room are too good for that.”

Can’t strip it down this year, but what if those people are no longer in the room next year?

The Penguins organization and Dubas have no doctrinal obligation to continue wasting future assets to solve current problems—far from it. Just as Crosby has no deistic duty to remain.

The spate of one-year contracts means the Penguins will be a somewhat blank slate and be scouring the free-agent market again next summer just to fill regular spots. They’ll be choosing from players who can’t get a better deal or need a short deal to reestablish their careers. Despite agents telling PHN that Pittsburgh remained a destination, that clearly was not the case this week. Players signed one-year “show me” deals across the league, but the talent the Penguins recouped represents a significant downgrade from last season’s near disaster.

If Grzelcyk was a good choice to join the blue line, why not sign him for a few years?

Penguins Prospects

Let’s factor in the coming wave of Penguins prospects. Dubas is amassing draft picks, but so far, only second-rounders have been acquired in the Kevin Hayes and Reilly Smith trades.

There is only one blue-chip prospect in the Penguin’s house, Brayden Yager, and even he isn’t a guaranteed top-six center.

Read More: PHN Full Scouting Report from the Memorial Cup on Brayden Yager.

And with respect to a handful of young players, there isn’t a guaranteed top-six winger on the way, either. Perhaps Yager grows into a second-line type player, and Villie Koivunen matures into a top-six winger, but neither is anything close to a sure thing in that regard. Yager will play in the NHL, but the rest could just as easily miss, and that includes 2022 first-round pick Owen Pickering, who was available but did not get a sweater for the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins playoff games.

Read More: In-Person Scouting Report on Tristan Broz and Villie Koivunen

No, it’s not coach Mike Sullivan’s fault for not playing the young players. It’s a combination of bad drafting, lack of draft picks, and poor development. There aren’t young players to play. No matter how many chances the prospects of recent years got, they weren’t going to make it.

Make no mistake, Dubas is signaling his intentions.

“We’re going to try to get established guys on short-term deals (who want to) come in and try to help. That’ll be up to us to select the right players there,” said Dubas just before Round One of the NHL Draft on Friday. “But for me, the major focus is trying to bring in players that are younger and hungrier, who can be with our club for a long time and help us long-term.”

However, Dubas’s timeline for inserting the “kids” has remained nebulous. Certainly, by signing Beauvilier and Lizotte and acquiring Hayes the day after that statement, he’s taken a spot or two away from young players in the system or that he might soon acquire.

What Comes Next

Dubas’s chessboard is deep into his plan of attack. The dots are there to connect–perhaps Crosby wants to be the shepherd to the next generation, perhaps not. And if he’s not the Penguins’ Northstar through the next phase, what’s to keep Kris Letang, Evgeni Malkin, Erik Karlsson, and Bryan Rust around?

It’s a bold gambit. By design, the Penguins will have gaping lineup holes next summer, too, but those holes were unnecessary unless it’s part of a greater plan.

Dubas has fortified the NHL lineup but done so with lesser players on short deals. Dubas could have signed veterans to two or three-year deals and gotten better talent as a result. It sure seems like the stage is set for a true tear-it-down rebuild by next July.

The Penguins are not a playoff contender as currently constructed. The team currently has more suspect players than a Guy Ritchie film.

The evidence after two days of free agency shows that. The team can continue to slide, and perhaps Crosby is looking forward to being the mentor who instills the virtues of being a Penguin in the next generation. There are more questions, but you may want to brace yourselves for the answers.