It infuriates me that the organization treats Geno like he's just some 4th liner that can be replaced in a heartbeat. Geno is NOT a fourth liner. He would be the Sidney Crosby on maybe 25 other teams, but he CHOSE to stay with the penguins. He WANTS to be with the penguins. Hell, he was better than Sid at many points. Yes, he's older. Yes, he's injury prone. But he's given soooo much to the franchise. He played through that knee injury TO HELP THE TEAM. Not because he wanted to just for fun. He delayed his own recovery and put himself through hell 5x worse than he had to because he trusted that his place would still be there. Geno could not skate at the same pace that he used to, yet he put up more than a point per game last season, which is more than I can say for even most first liners in the league. THIS GUY PLAYS ON OUR SECOND LINE BECAUSE HE IS SO DEDICATED TO THE TEAM.
Now in what world can we say, "Actually? You're not good enough. Signing you for just 1 or 2 more years than we wanted to is too big of a risk, even if we're taking a nice discount."
Well guess what? Fuck off hextall. Sign the man. It's the least you can do for him at this point.
Not sure if Hextall has it in his contract but in previous contracts GMs/previous ownership (I assume he meant GMs), as part of their contracts CANNOT trade Sidney Crosby or Evgeni Malkin WITHOUT explicit ownership approval? Start around the 2.34 mark. I don't know why this is blowing my mind. JUST! WORK HUSBANDS! But also the fucking NARRATIVE.