Penguins Shopping Bryan Rust, Rickard Rakell

The Pittsburgh Penguins have considered doing a bit of retail therapy early this season.

While Kirill Marchenko was being discussed in trade talks around the league, the Penguins poked around that front with one of their own veteran forwards. According to Elliotte Friedman on the 32 Thoughts Podcast, Pittsburgh is looking to get younger in trade, and in the aforementioned case, they were trying to sweeten the pot by adding Rickard Rakell to the overall package to send to the Blue Jackets for the Russian Marchenko. This would’ve seen a three-way deal with Montreal, probably because the Canadiens didn’t have any players they wanted to send from their NHL roster to Columbus.

Having said that, there aren’t a lot of sunshine and rainbows for this Penguins squad. Compared to last season around this time, Pittsburgh sat comfortably in second place in the Metropolitan Division through nine games with 13 points. Now? They sit eighth in the Eastern Conference wild card with a 3-6-1 record for seven points; the outlook is grim.

The 33-year-old Rakell is in the fifth year of a six-year contract that pays him $5.0MM AAV, signed back in 2022. Throughout that time, his payment has appeared like a steal for this team, as Pittsburgh has enjoyed his presence on ice, with a +20 goal differential, -5 when off the sheet. Rakell has scored over 100 goals for 232 points across 322 games in black and yellow, fourth among Pens since 2021-22, when they traded a 2022 2nd-round pick (Tristan Luneau) and three other players to Anaheim to acquire his services.

The deal has carried a modified 8-team no-trade list for the duration of his time with Pittsburgh. If they’re looking to move off of him and the team continues to trend downward, best case scenario to maximize his value would be to utilize him as a multi-position player, as my colleague Josh Cybulski has suggested. Rakell, since his draft year, has always been given credit as an all-around forward with capable scoring through his stickhandling abilities.

Right above Rakell on that list of Penguins top scorers since 2021-22 is Bryan Rust, who Friedman also referred to in the veterans that the Penguins would part ways with. Rust has been a true soldier for the club that drafted him. A former 3rd-round pick in 2010, he hasn’t known any other sweater other than Pittsburgh’s. After his ELC, he signed a two-year, $1.28MM deal that carried through the back-to-back cup-winning years in 2016 and 2017, inking back with the team again to carry for four more seasons at $3.5MM AAV until 2022.

We’re now on the fifth year of a six-year contract that pays him $5.125MM AAV. Even in his thirties, Rust has proven that he can produce at a 40-60 point clip, this season he has five points through seven games. His veteran presence and added scoring ability make him a very valuable piece that Pittsburgh could use to turn a new leaf.

This doesn’t come as a major surprise for the Pens, as they’ve been in a retool to find a new wave of younger players that will shape the team’s future while allowing their legends in Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, and Kris Letang to play out their careers. Over the offseason, it was reported that the organization was looking to acquire a ‘change of scenery’ candidate in Shane Wright to help the team in the center position. Given their current standing in the NHL, if the tide doesn’t turn in the Penguins’ favor, they’ll have to maximize what value they can garner towards the trade deadline.

The Penguins, as of today, are the 11th-oldest team in the NHL with an average age of 28.77, 10th in league experience in games played, with over 11.4K. Some injuries on the back-end, as well as up front, have not helped them in their trajectory, but seeing as to where they’re going, they can add to a young core of organizational depth that has the likes of Harrison Brunicke, Rutger McGroarty, Will Horcoff, and Bill Zonnon working their way up the ranks.