Pittsburgh Penguins: Breaking down how Radim Zohorna fits on team

The Pittsburgh Penguins recently signed a very interesting forward. What will Radim Zohorna bring to the table for the Penguins?

On Wednesday, the Pittsburgh Penguins signed forward Radim Zohorna to a one year, two-way contract. The contract begins in the 2020-21 season and has an AAV of $792,500. Zohorna is 6-6, 233 pounds, and 24 years of age. Zohorna had a career year, tallying 10 goals and 22 points in 46 games while playing for Mlada Boleslav BK in the Czech league.

Throughout his regular season and postseason career, Zohorna has produced 67 points in 202 games. That’s a 0.33 points per game clip. It is encouraging that his tangible production increased across the board this season. For comparison’s sake, current Penguins winger Dominik Simon averaged 0.37 points per game during his time playing in the Czech league. I expect Zohorna’s ceiling to be as a fourth-liner or fringe third-liner at the NHL level.

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I would assume that when hockey does resume, Zohorna will begin with AHL Wilkes-Barre. I do not expect Zohorna to make an immediate impact in Pittsburgh, but you never know. The short-term odds of it are better than that of an 18-year-old.

At 24, Zohorna is not a young prospect that is years away from playing professional hockey in North America. This has been a trend of the Penguins management team for quite some time. Pittsburgh has tended to draft some of the oldest draft-eligible skaters in the NHL Drafts for the last four to five years. While Zohorna went undrafted, his path to potentially making an NHL impact is likely to be faster.

I suspect some of the rationale behind this is that with a core of Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, and Kris Letang the Penguins are all-in right now. They are in the midst of their Stanley Cup window and do not want to wait around and hope that a young prospect will develop. Trading Calen Addison in exchange for Jason Zucker and shipping Daniel Sprong out for Marcus Pettersson are prime examples of that.

Here is one of Zohorna’s goals from this past season. He does a nice job of winning a puck battle along the boards, chipping the puck past the defender, and using his skates to kick the puck to his teammate. From there, Zohorna keeps his stick down, catches the return pass, and fires the puck into a wide-open net.

In this clip, Zohorna realizes that four of the skaters on the opposing team are caught puck watching. As a result, Zohorna finds the soft spot of the ice, catches the pass, and buries his wrist shot for what appears to be a big goal based on the crowd reaction.

Being aware of when the defense is overly aggressive is an indicator of good hockey sense. While Zohorna will not overwhelm you with his skating ability, he can make you pay with the time and space he creates and finds.

While Zohorna appears to primarily play the wing, GM Jim Rutherford said in the press release “his ability to play all three forward positions will help add depth to our forward group.” This is noteworthy to me because of the organizational status of Nick Bjugstad and fellow forward prospect Nikita Pavlychev.

Regardless of whether or not the 2019-20 season resumes, I would not be surprised if Bjugstad has played his last game as a Penguin. His season has been decimated by injuries. He is one of the slowest skating forwards on this roster. Jared McCann is younger, faster, and has been more productive as their third-line center. With the uncertainty of the salary cap moving forward, Bjugstad’s 4.1 million cap hit is likely to be moved. Zohorna is the same height as Bjugstad, offers more flexibility, and could be a cost-friendly depth option.

Nikita Pavlychev was the Penguins 7th round pick in 2015. Pavlychev is a 6-7 center who is a senior at Penn State. His best season came as a junior when he posted 29 points in 39 games. The highlights on Pavlychev were *very* limited, but I did come across some of his highlights in games against Robert Morris University.

Pavlychev is a tank in front of the net. He had a significant height advantage on the RMU netminder as he gets the deflection for a powerplay goal here.

Pavlychev was at the net-front again here. He takes a late hit to make a play. Somehow, nobody on the ice accounted for him until it was too late. Penn State went on to win this tilt in an 11-6 barn burner.

Per Cap Friendly, Pittsburgh has 48/50 of the allowed contracts signed. From that perspective, they have the room to sign Pavlychev if the two sides can agree to terms.

It will be interesting to see how Zohorna fares once hockey resumes. Adding him to the organization could play a role in what the Penguins brass decides to do with Bjugstad and Pavlychev. Thanks for reading!