Dubas has turned things around for the Penguins in just a few short months since being fired by the Leafs

After failing to convince Brandon Pridham to join him in Pittsburgh as his General Manager, Dubas decided to take the post himself. He served as the Interim General Manager up until that point and made some big moves over the last few months.

He traded a 2024 third round pick to the Vegas Golden Knights for Reilly Smith, drafted Brayden Yager with the 14th overall selection, signed Matt Nieto, Noel Acciari, Tristan Jarry, Alex Nedeljkovic, Ryan Graves, and Lars Eller in free agency, and is coming off the heels of a massive blockbuster deal for Erik Karlsson.

Considering the prize of the deal is the reigning Norris Trophy winning defenseman, Dubas did a relatively masterful job in involving a third team - Montreal Canadiens - and not giving up as much as people had thought would be necessary to acquire a player of Karlsson's stature and reputation.

The Penguins acquired Karlsson, Rem Pitlick, Dillon Hamaliuk, and a 2026 third round pick, the San Jose Sharks acquired Mikael Granlund, Jan Rutta, Mike Hoffman, and a 2024 first round pick, and the Canadiens acquired Jeff Petry, Casey DeSmith, Nathan Legare, and a 2025 second round pick.

Sharks retained 13.04% of Karlsson's contract for the next 4 years and the Penguins retained 25% of Petry's contract for the next 2 years.

As things stand today the Penguins are holding onto Karlsson for the next 4 years at a $10 million cap hit, while getting rid of Petry and Granlund, who didn't quite work out in Pittsburgh and essentially come out to the same dollar amount - for the next 2 seasons. Dubas acquired a 100-point defenseman, cleared 3 million in cap space, and only had to part ways with a first and second round pick.

Acquiring Smith before the draft was a sneaky move as well because the Golden Knights needed cap alleviation and Smith has provided solid secondary scoring throughout his career. He comes into the 2023-24 season with 12 seasons under his belt, 200 goals and 473 points, including 124 goals and 286 points in 399 games for Vegas.

After Ron Hextall and Brian Burke tarnished the Penguins in short order and ended their lengthy playoff streak, Dubas has come in guns-a-blazing and has turned around their fortunes by acquiring front-end talent, depth pieces, and has cleared cap space along the way.

Once Jake Guentzel returns from his ankle injury in November, the Penguins have the opportunity to roll out a top power play unit comprised of Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Jake Guentzel, Kris Letang, and Erik Karlsson, which is almost certainly one of the most lethal units in the league, all things considered.

Leaf fans know better than anyone that the things that Dubas does in the summer and at the deadline don't matter if things don't click come playoff time, so unfortunately, we'll have a good length of time to wait to see how this all works out. On paper, though, this has been an impressive summer for Dubas.