Jeff Carter had a great start with the Pittsburgh Penguins, but things have gone south.
Loyalty to players in sports is often something that comes back to haunt a general manager at some point throughout that player's career. We’re seeing that right now with two prime examples on the Pittsburgh Penguins: Brian Dumoulin and Jeff Carter.
Dumoulin was signed long-term by former general manager Jim Rutherford and deservedly so. However, his level of play has dropped considerably and he’s become a liability at a pedestrian salary cap number. The coaching staff refuses to make him a healthy scratch and has for the past two seasons now.
While Dumoulin is of concern, I’m going to focus more on Carter for this piece as he’s been an even bigger problem in my eyes.
When Carter was acquired at the 2020-21 trade deadline, it was a trade that hadn’t really even been reported. The news broke and it was a shock to many as his name wasn’t linked to the Penguins prior to the deadline, at least publicly.
Carter spent a lot of time playing for general manager Ron Hextall in Philadelphia so naturally Carter was a favorite of Hextall’s which made the deal seem like a natural fit.
Carter burst onto the scene with nine goals and eleven points in 14 regular season games and added four more goals in six playoff games that year. Despite being in his age 36 season, it looked as though Carter had a lot left in the tank.
Now? Not so much.
Carter had an underwhelming season last year for the Penguins but again came up big with four goals in the Rangers series before the Penguins were eliminated. While he had 19 goals last year, the majority of them came in the first half of the season as he went ice cold across the second half.
During that torrid pace last season, Hextall, showing his loyalty to Carter, felt the need to hand the 37-year-old a two-year contract extension that put him on the books for a $3.125 million cap hit. The contract almost seemed like the kiss of death that sent Carter’s production into a rabbit hole.
He’s now centering the Penguins’ third line and has four goals and 14 points in 31 games. In his last 26 games, Carter has two goals and one of them is an empty-netter.
The Penguins lost to the Islanders 5-1 on Tuesday night in what was likely their worst game of the season to date. The Islanders are an offensively devoid team and the Penguins made them look like a dynasty. While you can’t pin the loss squarely on one player because the entire team looked lethargic and disinterested, Carter was a prominent culprit.
This season, the Penguins’ third line has been a near disaster on both sides of the puck. Brock McGinn has chipped in for 10 goals but Carter and Kasperi Kapanen have provided little help to support the top six.
While McGinn is a good penalty killer, none of the three are particularly interested in playing shut down defense either. For an entire line to lack identity is a nightmare situation for a team that would like to enter into the Stanley Cup contender category.
It got so bad Tuesday night that the Penguins shuffled the entire deck of cards in the bottom six and Carter ended up on Teddy Blueger’s wing.
While Carter is the team’s best face off man, moving him to the wing permanently and taking some defensive responsibility out of his hands might not be a bad idea. He’s not providing much in the way of production anywhere.
The problem would be finding a replacement. With the Penguins so tight against the cap, along with all the other contending teams, finding a trade partner for Carter and off-loading his deal is simply not going to happen. He’s stuck here and the Penguins will have to find a way to make him a useful player again unless he’s truly aged himself out of the league.
Oh, and he’ll be here again next year too. Yikes.
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