8. Rob Scuderi
I will admit when former General Manager Ray Shero signed Rob Scuderi to come back to the Pittsburgh Penguins I was excited. What I didn’t realize was that the Penguins were not getting the 2009 version of “the piece”. Scuderi has presented with a precipitous fall from his former role as a shutdown top four defenseman that was a specialist on the penalty kill.
One of the major deficiencies in Scuderi’s game is that he can no longer match up physically with the younger, faster forwards in today’s NHL. Scuderi is however, still positionally sound and still has a great mind for the game, which is what has kept him from completely falling off of the cliff. It is painfully obvious that Scuderi is not worth the contract that he signed in the summer of 2013 and exploring Scuderi’s options needs to be a priority.
The likely scenario that fans will see in 2015-16 is Scuderi on the bottom pairing taking valuable minutes that could be used to groom the defensemen of the future. There is also a slight possibility that Scuderi has taken two years to fully recover from his broken foot suffered in 2013 but this scenario is not very likely.
Next: #7 - Adam Clendening