In late November, then-television analyst Brian Burke spoke about the state of the Penguins' organization on a podcast appearance.
"It is the same thing Jimmy Rutherford is saying in Pittsburgh: ‘I’ve got two elite players we’re not going to a total rebuild were gonna try and win.’ I don’t think Pittsburgh is good enough to win," Burke said. "No matter what they do now with their cap situation I think that window has closed, for me. I love Jimmy Rutherford, you know that, but I look in the East and I say are they better than Tampa? Nope. Are they better than Washington? Nope. Are they better than Boston? Nope.
"The fact is (Pittsburgh and Chicago) aren't close to championship-caliber in my mind. So you're better off getting good fast, or getting bad fast. The muddy middle is nowhere to be."
Just over two months later, Burke is going to have a big hand in getting the Penguins out of that muddy middle.
The Penguins on Tuesday named Burke their president of hockey operations, and Ron Hextall the new general manager. Hextall will report to Burke as his primary advisor, and Burke will report directly to president and CEO David Morehouse.
In the pair's introductory press conference on Tuesday, Burke was asked about the comments he made about the Penguins' window being shut.
"I'm not going to back away from anything I said in my media role," he said. "I'm talking about, the way I compare teams is, you take a team and write it down on paper and put it next to the Tampa Bay Lightning. Or put it next to the Washington Capitals. That's my job as an analyst on TV. I have to pick which of these teams will finish ahead of the other ones.
"All the teams that have had success have cap issues. There's a whole bunch of teams with strange salary cap issues who haven't won a bloody thing. At least with Pittsburgh, when Jimmy Rutherford goes to buy gas, he's got two rings on. So, to me, I'm not going to back away from anything I said. But I also think that when you have pieces like we have here, you've got to try to win."
It sounds like Burke is leaving the window cracked open a little bit longer.
