The Penguins waived forward Philip Tomasino today.
The timing of the move is curious, the Pens only have 12 healthy forwards without Tomasino, after putting Ville Koivunen on IR and calling up Sam Poulin from the AHL.
The end result is not that surprising, Tomasino has been a frequent healthy scratch and only averaged 12:10 of ice time in the nine games he’s played in, generating no goals and one assist. As an offensive-minded player, who scored 11 goals and 23 points in 50 games last season with Pittsburgh, Tomasino hasn’t been able to get a lot of traction or find a niche this season and lost his regular role on the power play (going from 1:31 per game last year to just 0:15 this season). It’s felt like they were winding him down as the vicious circle of showing less and getting less icetime continued, though waiving him now with so many injuries is a curious move.
In general, it shows a roster and lineup that continues to churn. Tomasino wasn’t given a qualifying offer but was brought back as an unrestricted free agent on a one-year contract for 2025-26. Recently the team opted to call-up Danton Heinen, who was waived at the end of training camp and performed well in the AHL. Joona Koppanen was also recently promoted to the NHL. Kevin Hayes has returned from injury. Several other forwards like Koivunen, Hallander, Justin Brazeau, Rickard Rakell and Noel Acciari have ended up on injured reserve, though none appear to be at an imminent return that would necessitate waiving Tomasino today.
Tomasino was acquired last season for a fourth round pick from Nashville. Pittsburgh gave him some runway to relaunch his career but it now looks back at a crossroads. They’ll find out tomorrow at 2pm if Tomasino clears waivers, at which point they could assign him to Wilkes-Barre immediately or opt to keep him on the team for now until some of those injured players need to be activated and take a spot back on the roster.
The Pens have some time before their next game on Friday, should Tomasino get claimed or sent to the AHL there would be time for them to make another call-up in addition to Poulin to add some depth to their current forward group.
