The Penguins moved out a right-shot defender earlier today when they sent John Marino to New Jersey. It appears he’ll be replaced by Jeff Petry as Pittsburgh has acquired the veteran along with center Ryan Poehling from Montreal in exchange for blueliner Mike Matheson and a 2023 fourth-round pick. Both teams have confirmed the swap.
The 34-year-old is coming off a tough season with Montreal that saw him struggle as their top defender in the absence of Shea Weber. He struggled mightily offensively to start the year as over the first three months of the year, he had just two assists in 27 games. However, Petry’s performance improved following the coaching change that saw Martin St. Louis take over behind the bench and he was much better down the stretch, picking up 21 points in the final three months of the season. Overall, Petry finished up the year with six goals and 21 assists in 68 games, his lowest point total since the 2015-16 campaign, his first full season with the Canadiens.
Around the midway point of the year, he also requested a trade for family reasons. While he was widely expected to move at the trade deadline and again at the draft, it has taken a while for a move to materialize.
Petry has three years left on his contract with a $6.25MM AAV and Montreal GM Kent Hughes stated earlier this week that he wasn’t interested in retaining any salary to facilitate a trade. While the Marino move freed up roughly $3.5MM in cap flexibility, that wasn’t enough to absorb Petry’s full deal which is what prompted Matheson’s inclusion in the swap. Petry had been speculated as a possible replacement for Kris Letang if the veteran was to leave in free agency. Instead, Letang signed a six-year deal and Petry will now help form a quality one-two punch on the right side of their back end with Petry’s AAV checking in just above Letang’s to make him the highest-paid blueliner on the team.
Matheson was a top-four defender early in his career with Florida but his stock started to dip a few years ago, resulting in him being flipped for Patric Hornqvist. The move worked out well for the 28-year-old as he had a career year offensively in 2021-22, picking up 11 goals and 20 assists in 74 games while logging just under 19 minutes a night. He was also quite productive for the Penguins in the playoffs, notching a goal and five helpers in seven games to lead all Pittsburgh blueliners in scoring while averaging over 25 minutes per contest.
Matheson has four years remaining on his contract with a $4.875MM AAV on a deal that is somewhat heavily backloaded with his payout set to jump to $6.5MM per season in each of the final three seasons. He immediately becomes the blueliner with the longest contract on the Canadiens while also being their highest-paid. He’ll likely take the place of Alexander Romanov on Montreal’s depth chart as the youngster was traded back at the draft to the Islanders for the 13th-overall pick which was then flipped to Chicago to pick up center Kirby Dach.
As for Poehling, the 23-year-old was a first-round pick of Montreal back in 2017 (25th overall) and spent most of last season with the Canadiens, notching nine goals and eight assists in 57 games while averaging just over 12 minutes per game. He’s likely to have a similar role in Pittsburgh’s bottom six in 2022-23. Poehling is signed for the league minimum for next season and will be a restricted free agent next summer.
With the move, Pittsburgh now has just under $2MM in cap space with RFA winger Kasperi Kapanen still to sign. That’s not enough for the 25-year-old so it would appear that GM Ron Hextall has another move to try to make. Meanwhile, Montreal frees up a little over $2MM with this swap, giving them a little over $2.3MM in cap room with Dach as their most notable RFA in need of a new deal.
Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images. Contract and cap info courtesy of CapFriendly.
Sportsnet’s Elliotte Friedman was the first to report that Petry was heading to Pittsburgh. Daily Faceoff’s Frank Seravalli was the first to report the trade details.
Maybe we’ll employ a 9 forward, 9 defenseman lineup.
Let’s see what the plan is…
Zucker? Pettersson? Zucker and Pettersson? Wonder who is going the other way.
Nope.
Wow. What a dumb ****ing trade.
Hextall was nailing the offseason and then just left a flaming bag of **** on his own porch.
Just stupid.
Im not overwhelmed with this trade one way or another.
Petrys age is definitely a concern, but I think the Pens got the better defender in this deal.
Matheson is a heck of a puck mover, but Petry pretty competent himself.
Let’s not forget that Matheson was a laughingstock before he arrived in the burgh..
maybe Petry is the veteran presence they need to really make a playoff push.
A major argument has been made that the pens have become a regular season team , but now adding Petry and Rutta might make a significant impact in the playoffs
What a minute, all these Dmen changing teams and David Poile isn’t in on this, lol!
I think the Pens got a potentially good player in Poehling.
ya a lot of ppl not sold , but think Poehling can be like McCann was, solid wing/center
and step into the C3 role after Carter leaves
Seems like he was really just trying to help petry out at this point. I mean the idea was to free up space, they freed up less then 2
I like Petry. Thought they might trade for him if they lost Letang, actually. He’s an upgrade to Marino.
But, Matheson grew so much last year and still has ceiling. I guess they think Ty Smith can fill his shoes? I dunno.
Ryan Poehling has real Nick Spaling vibes. Better contract, at least.
PS- What number will Petry wear? 58 taken…59 taken even. 85 is ugly. Zubov’s old 56?
Poehling Is no longer a prospect, Just a parttime depth player. Did the Penguins acquire Johan Larsson or not? Confused!!!
Larsson not on Pens roster cap friendly RFA- still unsigned by any team. They did sign Josh Archibald
This seems like making a trade for the sake of making a trade for each team. Weird deal.
Matheson took a big step. He’s a high end 2nd pair, serviceable first pair D man for less than $5 million a year.
If Hextall held out to make the same deal with Pettersson, even giving up a higher pick, I’d love this move.
Letang, Petry, Rutta is a big upgrade over Letang, Marino, Ruhwedel.
Dan Kingerski is somewhere out there right now with a chub buying a pens Petry jersey lol! Definitely an unnecessary trade.
Also if the plan is to be the oldest team in the league possible then they’re doing a wonderful job!
Thanks riverrat55!
Good grief. Josh called it: Hextall was having a good offseason so far, and then this. In what universe is the Jeff Petry of 2022 an upgrade over Matheson??
pretty much every season of his career…
… which all took place before 2022. I know this might come as a surprise to you, but athletes in their 30s decline. Everyone does. Petry has been doing it. He isn’t the same player he was three years ago, five years ago, ten years ago. He will keep on not being the same player he was the season before.
he was a top 3 defender in the NHL 2 years ago
definitely a huge upgrade over Matheson if only for a year or 2
Just what the Pens need, another aging player on the downhill portion of his career with an ugly big-$$$ contract that will need bought out before it’s over. The Pittsburgh Retirement Home will need another wing before Hextall is done.
Don’t understand the like for Petry. Never have
6’3 physical RH defender who’s more than competent in the offensive zone..
what’s not to like? I think this could work out great for pens, just concerned with the age
Yeah, that’s sorta like saying that the only real barriers against Bobby Orr having great success with the Penguins are his shot knees and that he’s 74 years old.
Petry turns 35 in December, and he’s in visible decline. And the Pens traded a much younger defenseman, making a million and a half less on a cap-strapped team, who had a significantly *better* season than Petry did, to get him. (Who is, psst, 6’2″.)
This is NOT going to work out “great” for the Pens, which least of just about any team in the league can stand to get OLDER. This is a terrible deal.
it will when they win the cup.
Mathy had a heck of a season, yet it didn’t even come close to Petrys normal production.
And while Mathy might compose similar height , the guy is anything but physical
Win the Cup? Bahahahahahaha!!!
Let’s review. The team’s bombed out of the first round four straight years. They have added no substantive pieces (without subtractions). Everyone’s a year older, and this might be the oldest team in the league: only four significant players are under the age of 30. They’re losing an uncomfortable chunk of their secondary scoring, with already having waved goodbye to Heinen and having the cap space (maybe) to re-sign either Rodrigues *or* Kapanen, not both.
There’s enough talent left to make the playoffs, but only that much, and that’s presuming that Crosby, Letang, Malkin and Carter do NOT decline, as guys their ages almost always do.
actually they dominated Rangers, but couldn’t deal with using a 3rd string goalie, and then injury to Sid was icing on the cake.
Year before that they were the best team in the NHL only to have Jarry make rookie mistakes in the playoffs.
Next year they come in as one of the biggest, most physical teams in the league
Hextall says he’s done, but we still have 9 D.
Unless you send Smith to the AHL, and if sending him to the AHL is even on the table after he’s played in the the NHL the past two seasons, then you should have never made the trade. So, I assume Smith will not go to WBS just because of his contract.
Dumoulin Letang
Pettersson Petry
POJ/Smith Rutta
POJ/Smith Ruhwedel
Friedman
Trading Pettersson is a big bet on two young D in POJ and Smith. Then again, Pettersson is up and down and both could pass him at some point.
The easy move is just dumping Friedman, who is a nice reserve player, but…when you list out the top 1-8, he’s 9th.
Hopefully, he’s bluffing about being done, though…we only have 3 wingers who can be counted on to score.
POJ AHL
POJ has to clear waivers now. He’s staying in PGH.
We have to make a trade, waive Friedman or carry 9 D. Or bury Smith, I guess, if it comes to that.
And there’s not much sense to carrying nine defensemen. Even a low-round pick for a Ruhwedel or a Joseph is an asset.
that’s why POJ will absolutely start the season in AHL
1-way contract just means he can’t be sent back down, but can start in AHL first
POJ has a NHL contract…for him to be in the AHL at any point ABSOLUTELY means that he has to be sent down and must clear waivers…AHL camps do not start until after NHL camps…
What are you Perogi Pals putting as the over/under on Penguins pts this year? I’m setting it at 88…