Trevor Daley decided about a week ago that he was ready to end his long playing career and move into a front-office job.
That was years after Jim Rutherford decided that Daley, a defenseman on the Penguins' Stanley Cup-winning teams in 2016 and 2017, was a great candidate to fill one.
"Trevor was a very quiet leader when he played here, and a good player for us," Rutherford said. "He has great character, and was very well-liked. When Trevor left here as a player (to join Detroit as a free agent), I said to a few people the things I just told you about him, the description of him.
"I said, 'I'm going to try to hire him someday, to get into management. I stayed in touch with his agent and told him over those years, 'Remember what I said about Trevor.' So when I heard that Detroit wasn't going to sign him (after his contract expired this year), the conversation got more and more and more (intense). Trevor was thinking about still playing and I just said, 'If he's not playing, I'll have a spot for him here.' "
Daley, 37, moved into that spot Monday, when the Penguins hired him as an advisor to their Hockey Operations staff.
He will evaluate players at the NHL and American Hockey League levels and serve as an "eye in the sky" for the coaching staff during games, although he did not rule out getting into coaching at some point.
"The nature of the position kind of allows me to find my way and gives me some time to find my way," Daley said. "The opportunity is wide-open. I think there's time for me to see both sides, and what I like. ... They gave me the flexibility to freelance and work with both sides of it.
"At this point, I'm not ready to jump into a coaching career or looking for that. I'm leaning more toward management. But with the opportunity, I should try to take advantage of both sides."
Daley's hiring was the Penguins' second major front-office move of the day, coming hours after assistant general manager Jason Karmanos was fired.
Karmanos was one of Rutherford's first hires after he replaced Ray Shero as GM in 2014, and recently was named general manager of their AHL affiliate in Wilkes-Barre.
Rutherford offered a curt "No" when if he would elaborate on why Karmanos was fired, and another "No" when asked if it resulted from "anything nefarious."
In a statement released by the team, he characterized it as part of an ongoing makeover of his staff.
"We would like to thank Jason Karmanos for his contributions to the organization over the past six years," Rutherford said. "I have been evaluating our Hockey Operations department, and this is the first part of the process to reorganize our group."
Rutherford said he plans to hire at least one assistant general manager, a role that is unfilled at this point.
Karmanos, via a text message, said he did not want to discuss his firing, but seemed taken aback by it.
In the interim, Erik Heasley, the Penguins' manager of hockey operations, will take on Karmanos' responsibilities as GM in Wilkes-Barre and Sam Ventura, the team's director of hockey research, will assume his other duties.
"I have full trust in them," Rutherford said. "We're OK, until we get everybody in place."
A source familiar with the situation said that Karmanos' firing is not tied to an imminent return to the organization by Jason Botterill, who was Rutherford's associate GM before being named GM in Buffalo in 2017.
Botterill, who was fired by the Sabres in the spring, is a strong candidate to rejoin the Penguins at some point, but there's no indication that it will happen in the immediate future. He has about two years remaining on his contract with Buffalo.
Daley, meanwhile, was without a contract after the one he signed with Detroit three years ago expired following last season.
Ending his 16-year playing career, he said, "was a difficult decision," but he is "excited about the opportunity" the Penguins offered when he spoke with Rutherford and team president David Morehouse last Monday.
"I still thought (a week ago), that playing was a (possibility), so I was hanging onto that," he said. "But when I had the talk with Jim, making the decision to leave the game ... was a lot easier."