The Pittsburgh Penguins are clearly in a bad place right now. The team is filled with quality veterans, but they are no longer able to collectively lead the team to the top clubs in the league. Since the 2017-2018 season, Mike Sullivan's squad has never made it past the first round of the playoffs, and they missed the postseason this year for the first time in 16 years. Important decisions will need to be made over the next few weeks, as the team's core is aging and internal succession is virtually non-existent, due to the prices paid over the years in an attempt to remain competitive. Popular journalist Mathias Brunet has a very drastic solution to help the future of the club, as he proposes to trade Sidney Crosby. Let's just say I wasn't expecting to hear this one! It is true that the value of the captain will never be as high as it is now, when he still has good hockey to play and only two years left on his current $8.7M deal. He could easily bring back several interesting pieces that could cushion the blow of a violent rebuild in Pittsburgh, when all the big pieces of the current core retire. However, as he turns 36 this summer, I doubt this is the right move for this organization. While there will be a major change in the leadership of this team in the next few weeks, with the President, GM and Assistant GM all fired at the end of the season, I don't think cutting ties with the future Hall of Famer is the answer. Unless it is Crosby himself who is demanding a trade for a chance at one last Stanley Cup, he should run out the clock on his final year in Pittsburgh. To tell you the truth, it's more the organizational decisions to surround the core that have been greatly lacking for the Penguins, as management has royally screwed up on several trades, starting with the one to get rid of Marc-Andre Fleury in 2017. <div align='center'><blockquote class='twitter-tweet' data-lang='en'><a href='https://twitter.com/DLCoulisses/status/1650228123949051904?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1650228123949051904%7Ctwgr%5Ef0780ab901c689928a1b706d32aedc923b6bbd3b%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.habsetlnh.com%2FDeclaration-monstre-concernant-un-echange-impliquant-Sidney-Crosby-230183'> </a></blockquote></div> Credit: <a href='https://bpmsports.ca/lepreuve-des-faits-avec-mathias-brunet-10/' class='link_marker' target='_blank' rel='noopener'>BPM Sports</a> & <a href='https://www.habsetlnh.com/equipe-lnh/penguins-de-pittsburgh/Declaration-monstre-concernant-un-echange-impliquant-Sidney-Crosby' class='link_marker' target='_blank' rel='noopener'>HabsetLNH.com</a>