Since winning the cup in 2017 he has made some bad decisions and has regressed this team beyond where it should be. Do you think his (somewhat) recent bias of winning back to back cups ensure he gets another shot for the 2019/20 season or will ownership notice his poor decisions since 2017 cup and bring in someone else.

I’ll grade my significant Rutherford moves since the 2017 Cup:

Reaves Trade: F: everyone knew it was a brutal trade then and it clearly is a brutal trade now. Pens could’ve traded elite talent in Klim Kostin and instead slid all the way to the middle of the second round to draft no upside D Zach lauzon over a guy like Josh Brook who went right after

Hunwick signing: C: I didn’t love the signing but I figured it was okay. He seemed like a decent bottom pairing. It clearly didn’t work out but at the time it made some sense. Can’t knock him too hard here

Hornqvist extension C+/B- I like hornqvist but that could look like a bad contract in a few years. I would’ve preferred to have went in a younger direction.

Sheehan Trade: B: gave us a good 4C for a fringe NHLer

Oleskiak trade (first): B: pens added a solid bottom pair D for not a whole lot.

Brassard Trade: B-: when pens made this trade I gave it an A. They acquired the best 3C they’ve had since staal and didn’t give up sprong to boot. I really liked this add for pit. It clearly didn’t work out but I can’t knock this deal too much because it was a good idea, just didn’t work; it happens. A lot of people thought this was a great trade for pit at the time. Not too mad over this one.

Sheary/hunwick Trade: D: if it was used as a pure cap dump I would’ve been fine but they pens used that money to sign....

Johnson signing: F- bad signing then; bad signing now, nuff said.

Pearson Trade: B-: I thought this was a steal for pit when they first made it. Once again I’m okay with good trade ideas that don’t work out. No problem with this trade. It was the right idea.

Pettersson for sprong- C+/B- thought they could’ve gotten more for sprong but they kinda rotted him.

Brassard/Sheehan/2nd+ for McCann/Bjustadd: A-/B+. I really liked the idea with this trade. Brassard didn’t work out and that happens, but pens were able to secure two legit top 9 players with term. We’ll see how it works out but I thought this was a good move by Rutherford and stand by it. Brassard only fetched a 3rd round pick so this looked like a pretty good recovery effort by Rutherford.

Olesiak Trade: C+/B-: I liked big rig but pens had too many LHD and needed to move one. Cleared cap space

Finally...

Pearson for Gubranson- F————-: I cant tell you how bad this trade is. It’s just so arrogant by Rutherford. He knows damn well jack Johnson hasn’t work out, so he goes and gets a (worse?) similar version who makes more money!!!! Absolutely horrible. 7.25 mill wrapped up in JJ and EG now. I’m at a loss for words.


So overall he’s made some decent moves since 2017 cup final, but 3 TERRIBLE decisions that could potentially put an end to the Crosby era. If pens miss the playoffs I want him fired.

Should have a poll. Who gets fired first? JR for a non playoff Pens team or Babcock for a first round exit this year.

haha that would be a close one. I think both survive unfortunately due to bias

No way he gets fired this soon. I realize hockey fans have short memories but he made a ton of great moves over the last few years. Unfortunately for JR, I think they'll make it this season (2nd round) and then its probably gonna get worse before it gets better.

Things will never be terrible b/c as the cap continues to rise, they'll have Sid and Geno on cap friendly deals.

Who'd replace Babcock though? Unless they can find a better replacement its probably best to keep him around. Isn't he due over $6M per season for at least 3 more seasons? They'd hate to pay him AND someone like Coach Q. But, it's TOR. There are bigger issues than money.

Same mistake as Shero/bylsma era. Too much blind loyalty. Both should’ve been axed after the Boston series, hell maybe even the Philly series

Clearly, the Gudbranson trade was a vein attempt to overshadow the the JJ signing. But it'll backfire, that I'm sure of. Neither is good defensively and both are pretty inept offensively. So I'm really not sure what they bring to the table. Why not just trade for Ben Lovejoy instead? Or just keep Oleksiak? IDK! Just too much gambling when it's not necessary.

Exactly!!!!! We had a cheaper, better depth defensemen in olesiak that we traded, or we could’ve easily went for lovejoy. I think Ceci/Mcquire suck but at least they’re UFAs!!!! Why on earth did we acquire a pylon with term????

And it'll inhibit PIT's ability to pursue any real UFA's this summer. I've always said, it's not the big money. contracts that crush teams, it's the combination of 3-4 terrible mid-term contracts that hurt the most. Look at EDM: 2 star players putting up monster numbers and a collection of overpaid bums. I'd hate to see that happen to PIT-one of the most exciting teams of the last 20 years. Especially b/c Sid, Geno, Guentzel, Kessel, and Letang still have several good years ahead of them. But they can't win the Cup with 5 guys making $4M+ doing absolutely nothing. They've been outscoring opponents much of the last 2 seasons but they'll never win in the playoffs that way. You need to win low scoring games. And how many good teams spend so much money of 3rd pair D's? CHI won w/ 4 pros and 2 guys playing 6 mins per night. I don't get the rationale behind a $31M+ defense. Gotta be the most expensive in the league.

When we won:

Murray, Guzental (2017), sheary, rust, dumo, Maatta (2016), etc were all on deals under 1 million.

While guys like bonino, Schultz, Cullen, etc all made between 1-2 million. You NEED to find great value guys when contending with a core of elite expensive players.

I actually think that Rutherford's job is more secure than Jarmo's job in CBJ. They spent a fortune acquiring major pieces at the deadline. They most likely will lose Panarin, Bob, and Duchene after the season. So they're all in. PIT has looked much better of late and all their major pieces are in place long term.

If CBJ miss playoffs and don't resign AT LEAST Duchene, Jarmo will most likely be fired.

I think there are a lot of different things going on with the Pens that have caused for them to be in this spot. Some bad decisions by JR is definitely part of it, but I don't see the Penguins firing him. His track record of in-season trades has been quite good, so Lemieux should at least give him another shot at it. Also, unexpected emergence of teams like Carolina and the Islanders plays a big part as well. The race is so tight right now, so it seems silly to fire the GM who made some key moves that won two championships because they missed the playoffs by a point or two.

However, I do think them missing the playoffs puts an extreme amount of pressure on GMJR in the offseason. At that point, Rutherford is going to need to make some sort of change to spark the team. Be it adding a top four defenseman or finally finding the 3C they've been missing since Bonino, he'd have to do something. I see the earliest he could get fired is in December of 2019, if the Penguins get off a terrible start (but last time someone got fired around that time, they went on to win the Cup, so who knows).