Did Penguins Development Doom Murray and Jarry?

For you Pittsburgh Penguins fans out there, I have an interesting take on the goaltending situation of late, stemming from the demotion of the team’s starter, Tristan Jarry. It’s probably going to be an unpopular opinion but hear me out.

Maybe, just maybe, most of the blame for Jarry’s collapse falls on the Penguins’ coaching staff, not entirely Jarry? I’m willing to go as far as extending this narrative to Matt Murray’s career as well. 

Sure, Jarry, and Murray, both have their fair share of the blame, but there are striking similarities here that are hard to ignore.

By the time Coach Mike Sullivan took over the Penguins during the 2015-2016 season, Marc-Andre Fleury was an established, Stanley Cup winning goaltender, but Murray and Jarry were both young and talented prospects. 

Remember the name Mike Bales. It will come into play later, I promise.

In case you don’t remember, Fleury was hurt heading into the 2016 playoffs, and after relieving backup goalie Jeff Zatkoff after a few starts, Murray caught fire in the playoffs, ultimately leading the Penguins to winning the Stanley Cup. Same thing happened in 2017, but this time, Murray was hurt, and Fleury took the starting job back until the middle of the Eastern Conference Final versus Ottawa.

Sure, there’s been a ton of revisionist history surrounding the 2017 expansion draft; should the Pens have kept Fleury over Murray (which I really hoped would happen because let’s face it, Murray would’ve landed at least one, maybe two, first round picks, plus prospects). Ultimately, Fleury gets “traded” to Vegas, and the Penguins stick with Murray. 

Let’s be honest here, everyone loved Flower, but keeping Murray was best for the Penguins organization at that time, given all of the information that was available. Murray was much younger, much cheaper in salary, plus teams could only protect one goaltender in that expansion draft. Not to mention, Fleury had a no movement clause in his contract, and unless traded, the Penguins had no choice but to protect Fleury. That meant that Murray would have been left exposed for Vegas to select.

Now that the stroll down memory lane is over, here’s where I believe things started to go sour.

Remember the name Mike Bales from above? He was the Penguins goaltending coach at the time the organization won back-to-back Stanley Cups in 2016 and 2017. That meant Bales worked at the NHL level with Matt Murray. 

Another name to remember is Mike Buckley. Buckley was the Penguins goaltending development coach from 2013 through 2017, meaning he worked directly with both Murray and Jarry at their early stages in the organization. This is significant because at the conclusion of the 2017 season, Bales is replaced by Buckley, figuring his development with Murray would translate into even more success. 

That didn’t happen.

Why is this significant? Because Murray’s best years as a Penguin, arguably, were during both Stanley Cup years. He was making the quality saves that kept his team in games. He was not giving up leaky goals, and his glove hand was solid. Again, this time frame was under Mike Bales.

In the 2017-2018 season, Murray’s first full year as the number one starter, we begin to see some things change. Murray struggles, allowing soft goals, not making timely saves, and his glove hand was awful, all while his team is still consistently winning despite his play. Once steady and making timely saves, Murray came back down to Earth and we see he’s human, like the rest of us. 

Remember, Mike Buckley is the team’s goalie coach. The same coach that helped during Murray and Jarry’s development.

My belief is that Bales leaving the organization is the reason for Murray’s downfall. Clearly, Buckley was a key component to Murray’s development through the Penguins system, but it was Bales that worked with Murray at the NHL level. Buckley could no longer get the most out of Murray, especially after Murray had some personal issues outside of hockey. And when Murray didn’t return to his Cup winning form, he was traded.

Buckley was a key reason why Jarry is a two-time NHL all-star, but Buckley ultimately failed the same way with Jarry, especially after his poor performance versus the Islanders in the 2021 playoffs. 

In August of 2021, Buckley was fired and replaced by Andy Chiodo. Since then, Jarry has shown flashes of talent, but these past two plus seasons, it’s been a nightmare for Jarry, and we see the same pattern here as we saw with Murray. Doesn’t make the timely saves, and just seems to lack focus.

If you look at their careers, Murray and Jarry’s stats are virtually the same up to this point. Both have played parts of nine years at the NHL level: 

Something just doesn’t add up. The odds of the same organization squandering two promising talented goalies are likely slim and none. This happening one time, ok I’ll give you that. But happening twice now with back-to-back franchise goaltenders? This tells me there may be a bigger issue here, and maybe it wasn’t entirely Murray and Jarry’s fault after all. 

Let’s hope this doesn’t happen to Joel Blomqvist, Jarry’s replacement.