Pittsburgh Penguins: Thoughts on the Phil Kessel trade
The Pittsburgh Penguins have done the unthinkable. They have traded Phil Kessel to the Arizona Coyotes.
Well, I wrote earlier this week that a trade involving the Pittsburgh Penguins felt inevitable. After Friday night’s trade, the Phil Kessel era has come to an end in Pittsburgh. The Penguins have acquired Alex Galchenyuk and defense prospect Pierre-Oliver Joseph from the Arizona Coyotes.
It’s really obvious that the Penguins got worse with this trade. Galchenyuk is a 25-year-old winger the team has been interested in dating back to Galchenyuk’s days with the Montreal Canadiens. The 19 (and soon to be 20) year old Oliver-Joseph was Arizona’s first-round pick back in 2017 and is a relatively promising defenseman.
Oliver-Joseph is just turning pro this season and should see a lot of minutes with Wilkes-Barre. Pittsburgh’s prospect pool is very thin, so this acquisition provides some depth and hope moving forward on the back-end.
The future Hall Of Famer Kessel is the best player in this deal and has fared better than Galchenyuk in all offensive categories over the last three seasons and throughout their respective careers.
While Galchenyuk is no slouch, he is not going to match Kessel’s offensive output. He has scored 30 goals once and has generally tallied between 17 and 20 goals per season throughout his career.
He really struggled in his first season with the Coyotes, but the Penguins are banking on the quality of teammate boost in helping him become more productive. Corey Sznajder summed up the trade up pretty well for both sides.
Pittsburgh cleared less than $2 million with this trade and got worse. Jim Rutherford needs to add another offensive weapon.
Kessel was a great third wheel and was an elite offensive force that complemented Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. That will be very difficult to replace. Pittsburgh needs to trade another contract and go acquire another scoring winger. Jason Zucker, Marcus Johansson, and Mats Zuccarello would all complement Pittsburgh’s top six nicely. Mike Hoffman is another name to keep an eye on.
With this trade, the final third of the famous HBK line has departed. The trio had a Primanti Brothers sandwiches named after them and played a crucial role in the Penguins surge to winning the Stanley Cup in 2016.
Kessel’s personality was always unique and fun, and it was great to see him prove the Toronto media and all of his doubters wrong, by putting an end to all of the ridiculous cliches that were formed about him over the years. Banners hang forever and Phil Kessel played a vital role in winning back-to-back championships in Pittsburgh. Thanks for everything, Phil!