Report: Former Penguins defenseman P.O Joseph signs with Blues

Throughout most of the 2023-24 season, defenseman P.O Joseph had difficulty finding a regular spot in the Pittsburgh Penguins’ lineup.

That won’t be an issue in 2024-25.

On Tuesday, the left-handed defenseman reportedly signed with the St. Louis Blues per two Canadian outlets. According to Cap Friendly, Joseph agreed to a one-year contract worth $950,000.

Joseph (6-foot-2, 185 pounds) just completed a two-year contract with a salary cap hit of $825,000.

His departure comes two days after the Penguins opted not to issue him a qualifying offer as a pending restricted free agent, allowing him to become an unrestricted free agent.

After noting he was leery of Joseph potentially reaching arbitration and being awarded a salary that could adversely affect the team’s salary cap figures Friday prior to the first round of the NHL Draft in Las Vegas, Penguins president of hockey operations Kyle Dubas shed a little bit more light on the decision to no-qualify Joseph on Monday in Cranberry.

“The other (pending restricted free agents) who don’t get (qualifying offers) impacts the arbitration case,” Dubas said. “If a number of players that are in that grouping don’t get qualified, you put yourself at more risk. As that information came to us as we went into yesterday, we had (Penguins director of hockey operations and legal affairs Vukie Mpofu) in constant discussion with his representative (Olivier Fortier). We said, ‘This is what we would do.’ Otherwise, we probably wouldn’t be qualifying. (Joseph and Fortier) elected to take it. They could test the market out. Initially, with the number of similar players, I thought it would be a slam dunk to qualify.”

Over the past two days, the Penguins have signed other left-handed in defensemen Matt Grzelcyk and Sebastian Aho.

Joseph’s time with the Penguins comes to an end after five seasons with the organization.

Acquired in 2019 as part of a trade that sent forward Phil Kessel to the Arizona Coyotes, Joseph made his professional debut with the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins of the American Hockey League that same year.

After seeing sporadic recalls to the NHL roster in the 2020-21 and 2021-22 seasons, Joseph became a full-time NHLer in 2022-23, appearing in 75 games and scoring 21 points (five goals, 16 assists).

This past season, Joseph’s ice time and offensive figures tumbled. Playing in only 52 games, he scored 11 points (two goals, nine assists) while averaging 15 minutes, 5 seconds of ice time.

His 2023-24 campaign decidedly had a before-and-after component to it, however.

After playing in only 22 of the team’s first 52 games because of injuries or healthy scratches, Joseph played in the Penguins’ final 30 games of the season, helping them make a frantic push for a playoff berth while primarily skating on the top pairing next to his friend, Kris Letang.

Few people in the organization — or NHL, probably — are bigger proponents of Joseph than Letang.

“He has to play his game, and his game is a good two-way game,” Letang said in April 7. “He skates really well. He can break out the puck. He’s got instincts offensively. He has to play that game. If he wants to spend a long career in the league, that’s the game he’s going to bring because that’s what suits him better.”

Joseph will be joining someone closer to him in with the Blues. Earlier Tuesday, his brother, forward Mathieu Joseph, was traded to St. Louis from the Ottawa Senators.