If these remain the same Pittsburgh Penguins I've followed for a lifetime and covered for a quarter-century, the franchise of five Stanley Cup championships, of the greatest individual hockey talents who ever lived, of three others of stratospheric stature, of other Hall of Famers galore, of a legacy founded on a spirit to succeed above all else ... then Ron Hextall will be fired by the time anyone reads this.
But they aren't the same anymore, my friends. They just aren't.
Yeah, there've been dark days. Way darker than this. But Eddie Johnston tanked his way into drafting Mario Lemieux in 1984 ... because he wanted to win. Jaromir Jagr lifted a literally bankrupt team to a playoff triumph in 1999 that might've spared the operation financially ... because he wanted to win. Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang soared up to a collective legacy all their own after another hockey/money hole in the early 2000s ... because they wanted to win.
This ... I don't know what to make of it.
No, I'm not isolating on this 7-2 slaughter at the high-flying Oilers' hands on this Thursday night at PPG Paints Arena. Nor the unsettling sight of Connor McDavid flashing his finest form right here on Sid's rink. Nor the stirring chants of 'FI-RE HEX-TALL!' that started in the upper decks and soon cascaded through the whole place. Nor even the broader scope in which the Penguins have won a whopping eight times in their past 25 games, or 8-12-5 to be precise.
Rather, I'm talking about this exchange I had with Letang afterward:
I asked if he felt a change of personnel was in order.
"I don't really care about that. I care about the guys that are in the room with me," he replied. "If somebody's down, we have to pick him up. We just have each other. So we have to push each other to be better and ... I think that starts with me and the big boys."
He spoke not a syllable there that's wrong, so please stay with me on this. That's what the consummate teammate would say. He's not about to toss anyone under any figurative bus, much less name names. Nor should he.
Same goes for Sid when asked if this particular stinker might've been aimed at sending management a message that help's needed:
"We're just trying to win games. Nobody's trying to send any messages," he replied with a dismissive headshake. "I mean, you can turn it into whatever you want to. It's a matter of playing better. I'm not going to sit here and talk about messages. Nobody's trying to send a message. We're trying to win games."
Nothing amiss there, either.
But here's the rub: From the ownership on down, no one's saying a blessed thing. Worse, no one's doing a blessed thing, unless one cares to count those fans in Section 210 who got the Hextall chant rolling. And as a result, nothing's changing.
Who can show that spirit, either via word or deed, to begin affecting change?
And by that, I mean, of course, who can acknowledge, either via word or deed, that not one of Jeff Carter, Brock McGinn, Kasperi Kapanen, Teddy Blueger or Brian Dumoulin belongs on an NHL roster right now?
No, really. Who'll do it?
It sure as hell won't be Hextall, who's pretty much got to be pronounced comatose at this point. Scratch him right off any list. He's had ample opportunities -- and ample avenues, contrary to his constant complaints about the salary-cap crisis he created -- and he's done nothing more active for months now than to flee from cameras and microphones.
Fenway Sports Group?
All right, who'd represent?
Please. They bought this team for the land across Centre Avenue and couldn't care less about any other component to the sale.
Brian Burke?
He's most empowered to take action as president of hockey operations, and maybe it meant something that I saw him turned multiple shades of purple upon exiting the building on this night. But for all his ballyhooed bombast, he's been in total lockstep with Hextall for three years now. Including my talk with him in Los Angeles last week.
Where's the precedent?
Mike Sullivan?
Hmmmmm ...
I asked the head coach, who's at least in charge of who participates, why he has been so patient with a lineup that hasn't done a lot of winning lately, and if maybe he's running out of patience.
"Well, our roster is our roster," he began. "So, we have what we have."
Oh, my. If only he had stopped right there.
"And we're trying to put the best combinations on the ice that we think give us the best chance to win," he'd proceed. "That's the criteria that I've always utilized with our coaching staff. We ask that question every day. We drill down into details, and we put the lineup on the ice that we think gives us the best chance to win. We've had numbers of different combinations out there."
After a slight pause, he'd finish, "But at the end of the day, you know, we've got a group here that we believe in. We've got to find a way to get this thing going in the right direction. Tonight, for me, was a step backward. I don't think all the results most recently are a reflection of how the team has played. But tonight, without a doubt, was a step backward."
I could say the same for the way that answer swerved toward the status quo, but I'll instead applaud the very first, reflexive response.
Sullivan could make a difference. He's the only one FSG liked enough to hand out a big extension, he's easily got the upper hand on his two bosses in Pittsburgh, and all his rings here came before Hextall/Burke arrived. Maybe scratch Carter. Or, heck, promote him to the top line between Jake Guentzel and Rickard Rakell. Talk about a message.
I don't know. I could be grasping. And in Sullivan's case, I could easily be guilty of underestimating his own affection for these players that are killing his own cause.
But that right there is the part that's driving me nuts, boomeranging back to Letang. Because they all talk endlessly about their loyalty and camaraderie and friendship and belief in each other that ... man, it feels like an afterthought that a quarter of them aren't helping them win.
Here's Carter making damned sure he wouldn't be struck by this Tyson Barrie point shot that led to Leon Draisaitl's power-play putback in the first period:
Yikes. Might as well have whipped out the matador's cape.
Here's Dumoulin doing just about everything wrong on this Edmonton two-on-one in the second, chiefly turning toward Draisaitl, the passer, with his wickets open wider than the Fort Pitt Tunnel, to concede the Warren Foegele tap-in:
But hey, it was one of only five times Dumoulin was on the ice when the Oilers scored.
I could delve into McGinn achieving his 24th consecutive game without a point -- while also failing to register a single shot attempt, to boot -- or Kapanen's drop pass to no one that left the Edmonton zone on a power play, or whatever it is/isn't that Blueger might've done had I noticed him at all ... except that this is every night. These five bring nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing and nothing.
And for the millionth time, they're not the lone culprits. But they're the most consistent and, as such, they're a drain on everyone else in every conceivable way.
Sid sees this. Letang sees this. Sullivan sees this. Hextall sees this. Burke sees this. The FSG figureheads ... see the Red Sox in spring training, but it's not like any of this is news to the hockey people here.
So, again, why's it happening? What are they thinking? To what end is it worthwhile to put these players ahead of the goal at hand?
Is this Jonestown, where everyone's going to gulp the Kool-Aid and go down as a group?
Don't give me the cap. Everyone but Carter can be waived, any and all would clear -- or better yet, they'd get claimed -- and there'd be enough savings to cobble together a trade, a promotion ... anything at all that wouldn't be this.
Don't give me the "inconsistency" excuse, either, as all involved often try to do. As stressed above, the players dragging all this down are absolute paragons of consistency.
Above all, don't give me that face needs to be saved over Hextall's signings. A GM's ego can never be part of the equation.
This is a significant circumstance, a pivoting point in our city's hockey history. Beyond the 17 consecutive playoffs, the longest such active streak in all of professional sports, it might well represent the final opportunity to see Sid and Geno at their trademark levels.
And this is how they'll just silently, passively let the credits roll?
Maybe pay those fans in Section 210 some heed. Talk about foundational spirit.
THE ESSENTIALS
• Boxscore
• Live file
• Scoreboard
• Standings
• Statistics
• Schedule
THE HIGHLIGHTS
THE THREE STARS
As selected at PPG Paints Arena:
1. Connor McDavid, Oilers C
2. Leon Draisaitl, Oilers LW
3. Kris Letang, Penguins D
THE INJURIES
• Ryan Poehling, left winger, has a lingering upper-body injury that made him a late scratch for this game.
• Jan Rutta, defenseman, has an upper-body injury and is practicing with the team.
• Mark Friedman, defenseman, has an upper-body injury.
THE LINEUPS
Sullivan's lines and pairings:
Jake Guentzel-Sidney Crosby-Rickard Rakell
Jason Zucker-Evgeni Malkin-Bryan Rust
Brock McGinn-Jeff Carter-Kasperi Kapanen
Drew O'Connor-Teddy Blueger-Josh Archibald
Brian Dumoulin-Kris Letang
Marcus Pettersson-Jeff Petry
P.O Joseph-Chad Ruhwedel
And for Jay Woodcroft's Oilers:
Leon Draisaitl-Connor McDavid-Derek Ryan
Zach Hyman-Ryan Nugent-Hopkins-Kailer Yamamoto
Warren Foegele-Ryan McLeod-Jesse Puljujarvi
Devin Shore-Mattias Janmark
Darnell Nurse-Cody Ceci
Brett Kulak-Tyson Barrie
Philip Broberg-Evan Bouchard
Vincent Desharnais
THE SCHEDULE
There's a practice today, 12 p.m., in Cranberry, Pa., after which the team will fly to St. Louis for a game tomorrow, 3:38 p.m. Eastern, against the Blues. Taylor Haase will make that trip.
THE MULTIMEDIA
THE CONTENT
Visit our team page for everything.
