Column | Penguins’ Tristan Jarry situation mirrors Jack Campbell in Edmonton — so should the solution

It’s hard to imagine that this season could have started out any worse for Pittsburgh Penguins goaltender Tristan Jarry. 

Jarry was lit up for six goals in Pittsburgh’s season opener, while his opponent at the other end of the ice pitched a shutout. He rebounded a little against the Canadiens in Montreal, allowing three goals and earning the win, but his team bailed him out with six goals. During Jarry’s last start on Wednesday night at home, he surrendered three goals in the first period and was yanked less than 12 minutes into the game against the Buffalo Sabres. 

The Penguins cannot rely on Jarry when he is in the net. He has a sub-.900 save percentage in every game he has played this season. Any goal scored by the Penguins is marred by paranoia that Jarry could give that goal right back 10 seconds later. 

Jarry’s awful start to the year comes off the heels of a poor finish to last season — one that saw him lose his starting job in goal. 

Penguins beat writer Josh Yohe had a terrific way of breaking things down. In his last 17 games overall, Jarry’s save percentage is .867. The team has pulled him four times, and the Penguins have lost 11 of those games. In his six wins, the Penguins have averaged 5.7 goals per game. 

At the same time, rookie goaltender Joel Blomqvist has shown incredible poise between the pipes. The juxtaposition of Jarry and Blomqvist, who looks like the six-year veteran that Jarry actually is, is a tough look for the Penguins’ front office, which held onto Jarry in the summer instead of making a deal to trade him. There was never even a report that Penguins general manager Kyle Dubas was trying to move him, as it was evident that he was confident in running it back with Jarry and Alex Nedeljkovic. 

Speaking of Nedeljkovic — guess who’s back? The Penguins officially activated him from IR on Saturday after he was out with a lower-body injury and spent a few days in the AHL on a conditioning loan. 

While Nedeljkovic was out, the goaltending plan was simple. All Blomqvist had to do was hold down the fort on the backup job. If things went well, the 22-year-old wouldn’t have to see much action. 

But, as we’ve seen, Jarry’s struggles have led to Blomqvist getting thrust into a much larger role than anyone was expecting, a role he is largely performing well in. It only gets harder for the Penguins to justify sending Blomqvist down. 

Head coach Mike Sullivan already made a statement on Sunday in Winnipeg, when he made Jarry a healthy scratch, starting Nedeljkovic and having Blomqvist back him up. Jarry went into this season as the presumed starter. Not only can he not retain that spot anymore, he may not hold the backup spot at the moment. Carrying three goaltenders on an NHL roster is not sustainable — sooner or later, one of them will have to go. 

The Jarry situation is eerily similar to a situation the Edmonton Oilers faced last year with goaltender Jack Campbell, a starter who was on a high-cost, lengthy contract and was flat-out awful to start the year — and the Oilers had to do something to address it. 

Campbell had a .873 save percentage when the Oilers placed him on waivers, with the purpose of assigning him to their AHL affiliate. The Oilers took the chance that no one would claim Campbell and his $5 million cap hit. They were right. 

The Penguins must try a similar approach. Jarry’s contract is skeptical at best, and right now, it looks atrocious. Waving Jarry, assuming he goes unclaimed, would give him a chance to catch his breath in the AHL. 

The chances of anybody claiming Jarry on waivers are practically zero. Per PuckPedia, only a fourth of the league would have the necessary cap space to take on his $5.375 million cap hit. Most of those teams are clear rebuilders — ones that aren’t looking to take on four years of a reclamation project in the net with the cap space they have left. 

Jarry would most likely clear waivers, allowing the Penguins to get him to the AHL and give him the long mental reset he so clearly needs. It doesn’t close the door completely on his career in Pittsburgh, but it takes a more than necessary pause with the Penguins. 

Jarry’s problems have looked like the mental variety. He doesn’t look confident on the ice, almost as if he is simply trying to not let the dam break. That’s never the mindset you want your starting goaltender to have. 

In the AHL, he can take as long as he needs to find his footing, regain his confidence and prove that this was just a bad slump. 

The Penguins are already ahead of the Oilers in this scenario. Edmonton’s second-string goaltender Stuart Skinner had worse stats than Campbell at the time, but Skinner’s youth and cheap contract made it much more likely he would get claimed. 

The Oilers also had few options in their organization. They were forced to call upon Calvin Pickard, a fringe NHL player who hadn’t played more than 10 games in the league since 2018. 

By comparison, the Penguins have Nedeljkovic coming back from injury and a rookie in Blomqvist who is playing well enough to earn extra time in the NHL. 

For whichever way you feel about this team’s ability to contend, Mike Sullivan’s job is to put the lineup out on the ice that he believes gives his team the best chance to win. Sixteen of those last 21 starting lineups haven’t included Jarry. 

That should tell you all you need to know.