Could Stuart Skinner Be Traded Again Before the Deadline?

At long last, Stuart Skinner’s rollercoaster tenure with the Edmonton Oilers came to an end on Friday. As everyone knows, the hometown goaltender was dealt to Pittsburgh along with Brett Kulak and a 2029 second-round pick in exchange for Tristan Jarry and Sam Poulin.

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His departure had been speculated about for years, and after another rocky start to the season, a breakup was bound to finally happen. The timing might have come sooner than Skinner expected, but he now gets a fresh start with the Penguins, who, to the surprise of many, remain in the playoff hunt.

While Skinner is likely excited about the new opportunity, he might want to hold off on buying a house in the Steel City, because Sportsnet insider Elliotte Friedman has already raised the possibility that general manager Kyle Dubas could flip the newly acquired goalie ahead of the trade deadline.

Friedman said:

“So I have no doubt that Dubas’ phone will be ringing. What are you doing with Skinner? What are you doing with Kulak? What are you thinking here? And then Dubas can make his decisions, does he want to keep them? Does he want to flip them? He has time for this to figure out. But, you know what Dubas is thinking, he’s thinking even though we’re off to a good start here and we’re in the race, we still have to get a bit younger, and we still have to collect assets. So, I think you should be prepared for anything with him,”

The 27-year-old Skinner is a pending UFA, in the third and final season of the three-year, $7.8 million extension he signed with the Oilers back in 2022.

Stuart Skinner is Not the Future in Goal in Pittsburgh

There’s no doubt Skinner deserves another NHL shot — at the very least as part of a tandem —, but Pittsburgh is unlikely to be that place.

The Penguins already have a pipeline of young goalies: offseason acquisition Arturs Silovs (24), highly-touted prospect Sergei Murashov (21), and former second-round pick (52nd overall, 2020) Joel Blomqvist (23), all of whom are a part of the organization’s future plans. Pittsburgh will want Murashov and Blomqvist to gain more AHL experience this season, so, for the next few months, Skinner is expected to see a sizeable workload alongside Silovs with the big club.

If the 2023 All-Star puts on a good showing as a Penguin, then teams around the league will certainly come calling closer to the trade deadline. The Montreal Canadiens, Utah Mammoth, Carolina Hurricanes, and Philadelphia Flyers are just a few landing spots to keep an eye on should Skinner find himself on the move for the second time this year.

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