Metro Notes: Hanifin, Petry, Wilson

The Pittsburgh Penguins just spent the last two days re-stocking their relatively thin prospect pool at the 2023 NHL draft, and with that process over their new front office’s focus shifts to improving their roster for next season. One of the ways new hockey operations boss Kyle Dubas can improve the Penguins is by revamping their defense, which could mean adding a top blueliner on the trade market such as Noah Hanifin. The Athletic’s Rob Rossi reports that “the Penguins are on a short list of teams to which Hanifin would approve a trade,” and that “Hanifin would be willing to sign an extension with the Penguins if acquired.” (subscription link)

Adding a top-end left-shot defenseman to pair with Kris Letang is a priority for Pittsburgh, especially seeing as head coach Mike Sullivan “repeatedly pushed” for the team to acquire Jakob Chychrun from the Arizona Coyotes last season. The issue the Penguins face in acquiring Hanifin is twofold: firstly, one wonders if Pittsburgh has enticing enough assets to be able to win a bidding war with other teams to secure a trade with Calgary, and secondly it could be a tight fit for the Penguins to be able to sign Hanifin to a pricey long-term extension given the current money on their books.

Some other notes from the Metropolitan Division:

• As Pittsburgh contemplates acquiring and then ideally extending a top-end player like Hanifin, they’re looking to move money out in order to be able to do so. Defenseman Jeff Petry underwhelmed in his first season in Pittsburgh, and set to turn 36 years old he remains under contract for the next two seasons at a $6.25MM cap hit. Rossi reports that Dubas “has tried to trade” Petry, but “found few interested parties” and Petry’s modified no-trade clause to be a barrier to the possibility of a trade getting completed. The Athletic’s Josh Yohe confirmed his colleague’s report, writing in his own piece that Pittsburgh is “dangling” Petry “pretty heavily in trade offers” but that “there isn’t considerable interest in the veteran.” (subscription link) It would certainly help Pittsburgh more dramatically reshape its blueline if they were able to trade Petry, but given the league-wide lack of cap space among contending teams a Petry deal seems unlikely.
• Another trade that seems extremely unlikely is one involving Washington Capitals forward Tom Wilson, at least according to Capitals general manager Brian MacLellan. MacLellan told the media, including The Washington Post’s Bailey Johnson, that the team “we haven’t had one discussion about” trading Wilson this summer. Some have speculated that Wilson, a 29-year-old winger with a $5.16MM AAV deal that expires in a year, could be a player Washington dangles in trade talks, but it appears in actuality the team has zero interest in dealing the three-time 20-goal scorer, despite an injury-plagued 2022-23 campaign.