Penguins Bottom-Six Centers Did Not Meet Expectations
Pittsburgh Penguins centers Jeff Carter and Ryan Poehling are trending in different directions heading into next season.
The 2022-23 Pittsburgh Penguins were a team carried as far as their top six would take them. Long stretches of inconsistencies plagued the rest of the roster, eventually leading to what amounted to a losing season. The lineup was in flux, and the bottom six centers switched spots by the end of the year.
2022-23 Penguins player reviews continue with Jeff Carter and Ryan Poehling.
Jeff Carter
Carter spent most of the year as public enemy number one in Pittsburgh. After a hot start, scoring six points in his first seven games, alongside Danton Heinen and Kasperi Kapanen, Carter struggled to find consistency last season.
It wasn't all bad for Carter, who had a couple of things go his way, including his health. Carter played 79 games for the Penguins in 2022, the most he's played in a single season since 2017-18 when he was a member of the Los Angeles Kings. If you've paid attention to the Penguins over the past decade, you know how hard it has been for them to keep players healthy, so for their 38-year-old center to miss only three games is a win.
As Mike Sullivan pointed out countless times, Carter was also excellent in the faceoff circle. He won over 59% of his draws, which led the Penguins, and was among some of the best in that category in the entire NHL.
Unfortunately, that's where Carter's positive attributes end. He was a liability more often than not, and it was abundantly clear that he was a step slower than most of the opposing players. That decline in foot speed left Carter out of position and led to horrid underlying numbers. Carter is entering the final year of his contract in 2023-24 and potentially the last year of his career.
Ryan Poehling
Poehling was not as lucky as Carter in the health department. His 29 games missed were spread out throughout the season, with most of them occurring thanks to a nagging injury that kept him on the shelf between January and February.
By the time he was healthy, there wasn't much time left to prove himself before becoming a restricted free agent this summer, but he left an impression with his performance down the final stretch of the schedule. Poehling took over Carter's spot as the team's third-line center due to the veteran's defensive struggles.
Poehling proved that he could be a good fourth-line center for the Penguins moving forward, and he has the offensive upside to contribute on the scoresheet if he plays with the proper linemates.
The Penguins' bottom six-centers were not overly impressive in 2022-23 and should be an area they look to add to this offseason.
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