DALLAS — For weeks, it’s been clear that the Penguins would eventually trade one of their nine defensemen. Friday, it finally happened.
The Penguins solved their logjam on the blue line by dealing Erik Gudbranson to the Anaheim Ducks in exchange for a 2021 seventh-round draft pick and forward Andreas Martinsen, who will start his Penguins tenure in Wilkes-Barre/ Scranton.
While the Penguins lose a physical player with swagger, the move has a number of benefits for Pittsburgh’s roster flexibility. Even more importantly, the trade is a net salary cap savings of just over $3 million.
“It was totally cap-related,” Penguins general manager Jim Rutherford told the Post-Gazette. “Cap space always helps you. Presently. Long-term. Everything. Clearly, it relieves some of the pressure we were under and certainly relieves some of the pressure going forward related to contracts for next year.”
Gudbranson, whose contract carries a cap hit of $4 million per year through the 2020-21 season, was acquired from the Vancouver Canucks last season at the trade deadline when the Penguins blue line was depleted by injury.
But when Pittsburgh acquired rookie righty John Marino this offseason in exchange for a sixth-round pick — a trade that now looks like a heist — Gudbranson was several times bumped from the third pairing to the press box. He played in a rotation of sorts with Jack Johnson when everyone was healthy.
Rutherford said that Marino’s emergence provided the quality depth to make the move possible.
“All the reports I got from Scott Young and Kevin Stevens when we were trading for [Marino] and when we took him out of Harvard a year early were that this player was ready to play in the league,” Rutherford said. “All the reports were accurate.”
It’s changed the dynamic of our defense. When you go back a year ago, since then we’ve added two young defensemen: Marcus Pettersson in the first half of last season and Marino now. These guys are both good, young defensemen.”
While trading Johnson would have also saved the Penguins some money by unloading what’s left of the deal that pays him an average annual value of $3.5 million, there is one very critical factor to consider: Gudbranson and Marino are both righties. Johnson is a lefty.
The club tried to play Gudbranson on the left side for the first time in his life. It didn’t look great, making him the natural player to move.
One way or another, the Penguins wanted to create cap space.
They were pressed up against the $81.5 million upper limit just prior to the season. Pittsburgh bought some time and space when Bryan Rust went on long-term injured reserve and by carrying backup goalie Tristan Jarry instead of Casey DeSmith.
The lack of space kept the Penguins from signing Pettersson to a multi-year deal prior to the season, as both sides had hoped. Now, with Rust poised to rejoin the club, they’ve created space to more freely make decisions. Perhaps it could even have a ripple effect that even impacts the goaltenders, including DeSmith, whose salary-cap hit is less of an issue.
While the Penguins can use their newfound cap room in a number of ways this season, the move could be even more beneficial in the long run.
The Penguins have several critical offseason contract situations to address. Goalies Matt Murray and Jarry, defensemen Pettersson and Juuso Riikola and forwards Jared McCann, Dominik Kahun, Sam Lafferty and Dominik Simon are all set to be restricted free agents at season’s end. Defenseman Justin Schultz and forward Alex Galchenyuk will be unrestricted free agents.
That’s the situation in Pittsburgh’s wallet. On the ice?
The Penguins now can have a much more balanced roster construction with eight defensemen and 13 forwards once Brian Dumoulin returns from injury. Carrying just 12 forwards and nine defensemen was clearly not an ideal situation, especially when five forwards got injured, as the Penguins were forced to three times play Riikola as a winger.
In terms of compensation for Gudbranson, Martinsen, 29, is signed through the end of the 2019-20 season and carries an average annual value of $750,000 at the NHL level.
This season, Martinsen has played one game for the San Diego Gulls in the AHL. The 6-2, 225-pound forward has played 152 career NHL games split between the Colorado Avalanche, Montreal Canadiens and Chicago Blackhawks.
Mike DeFabo: mdefabo@post-gazette.com and Twitter @MikeDeFabo
First Published: October 25, 2019, 8:01 p.m.
Updated: October 25, 2019, 8:38 p.m.
