The Depth Chart Has One Name at Left Wing. That Is Not a Depth Chart.

The number that keeps forcing this conversation is not 28 — it is 100. As in, Elmer Soderblom's depth-chart production share at left wing is listed at 100%. There is no rank-two player at the position with observed playing time. There is no rank-three. There is one name, and that name is producing at 28% of league median for his position. That is not a depth chart. That is a single point of failure dressed up as a roster spot.

I have written about this twice already in the past few days, and the numbers keep getting more uncomfortable the longer this offseason stretches without a response. The league median production rate for a left wing starter sits at 0.72. Soderblom is at 0.20. That is not a player in a slump. That is a gap so wide it shows up in the team's overall construction — a 41-41 season built on a positive goal differential of just +0.3 per game, a team that went 12-23 in one-goal decisions. When your margins are already that thin, carrying a positional void on your top line's weak side is not a manageable inefficiency. It is a structural problem.

What makes the left wing situation genuinely alarming rather than merely bad is the absence of any fallback. Every other position on this roster has at least a second name. Erik Karlsson and Kris Letang give the blue line two legitimate producers. The goaltending tandem of Arturs Silovs and Stuart Skinner offers options. Even right wing, which has its own problems — Bryan Rust producing at 37% of league median — has Rickard Rakell behind him as a legitimate secondary option. Left wing has Soderblom, and then nothing. The depth chart entry is not thin. It is blank.

The departure of Anthony Mantha to New Jersey on a two-year, $9.5 million deal sharpened this problem without creating it. Mantha was listed as a right wing in the key players data, and the news confirms he scored 33 goals in his Pittsburgh tenure — a career season by any measure. His exit stings. But the left wing hole predates him leaving. It was already there, already rated HIGH priority by the roster analysis, already lacking a viable backup. The offseason activity so far — Nick Robertson signed to a two-year contract, Brandon Pridham added as a hockey operations consultant — has not addressed it. Robertson is a right wing. Pridham is an executive. The left side of the ice remains exactly what it was.

My read is this: Pittsburgh is a team that can still generate offense through its center depth. Sidney Crosby at 54 points in 47 games and Evgeni Malkin contributing at his own high level in limited appearances give this team a genuine engine. But engines need wings, and the left side is running on fumes. The late-season offensive surge — 4.6 goals per game in the final ten — suggests this group can score in bunches when everything is clicking. The problem is that "everything clicking" is doing a lot of work in that sentence, and a positional void that ranks 28% of league median is the opposite of clicking. Until there is a second name on that left wing depth chart — one that actually played — this team is building its 2026-27 hopes on a foundation with a visible crack running straight through it.