On Thursday, the Hoffmann family introduced itself as the new principal owners of the Pittsburgh Penguins.
The person who will always be the Penguins was absent, however.
Mario Lemieux, who is arguably the most important individual to any professional sports franchise, at least on this continent, had no presence during Thursday’s event.
But that doesn’t mean his strained relationship with the Penguins isn’t in a better place.
Lemieux, who virtually ensured the franchise would remain in Pittsburgh as a player and as a previous owner, maintained a minimal presence with the Penguins for the past half decade after a falling out with the outgoing ownership entity, Fenway Sports Group.
A pair of lawsuits with a minority investor in the franchise in the wake of the 2021 sale from the Lemieux Group LP to Fenway Sports Group led to some bitter feelings between the franchise icon and the outgoing franchise stewards from Boston.
Geoff Hoffmann, who will serve as governor of the Penguins, outlined hopes to have Lemieux become a more regular presence with the franchise while holding a news conference along with his father, David, and brother, Greg.
“Mario and I have spent some time together,” Hoffmann said. “He’s been as good as advertised, I think. Just a great, great guy. I’m really hopeful that he will be a part of this in whatever way, shape or form makes sense for him. But we would love for him to be a part of it. We know what he means to the Penguins, what he means to the city and what he means to the league, the NHL.
“Everybody would embrace him with open arms, especially the three of us up here.”
Geoff and David Hoffmann addressed a number of queries over their recent purchase (of approximately $1.75 million).
Kyle Dubas has served as the Penguins’ president of hockey operations since 2023 (Chaz Palla | TribLive).
• Hearty endorsements of incumbent president of hockey operations Kyle Dubas and coach Dan Muse were offered. Geoff Hoffmann labeled each the best in the NHL at their respective stations.
“Kyle, we think, is a particularly talented executive in the league,” Geoff Hoffmann said. “And that was one of the things that attracted us about making the investment, especially at this point in time. We fully support him and his vision for the organization, and we’re prepared to give him the resources that he needs to be as successful as we can possibly be as an organization.”
• Finances will not be constrained when it comes to the salary cap:
“I can commit that Kyle will have whatever resources at his disposal that he needs to have the type of hockey team that can go out there and be successful,” Geoff Hoffmann said. “We’ll follow whatever we need to do in terms of spending to make sure that that happens. But that’s Kyle’s call.”
• Off the ice, the seemingly never-ending struggle to develop the site of the former Civic Arena is something the Hoffmanns want to tackle.
“That is something that we still think could be a tremendous opportunity for the city, for the team — creating a space where communities can join and enjoy, creating opportunities for mixed-use development, and making a space downtown that people frequent beyond just our 41 or 42 home games with the expansion of the NHL schedule,” Geoff Hoffmann said. “Activating the space for the entire community of Pittsburgh, and making it hopefully the jewel of the area, is what we see as an opportunity.
“I don’t have all the history. I know it’s a very complicated issue and a lot of stakeholders to be satisfied, and I’m optimistic that we can get there, once we have an opportunity to hear the concerns about, let’s design something that works for everybody, especially most importantly the community.”
• David Hoffmann was frank when discussing the availability of hotels in Pittsburgh, particularly near PPG Paints Arena.
“One of the things that I’ve noticed coming here is the hotel situation doesn’t seem to fit with the demand of all the great assets you have here,” David Hoffmann said. “So Greg runs our real estate portfolio, runs it very well. We’ve had lengthy discussions about why isn’t there a better choice for more hotels here? But a hotel close here that’s maintained well and looks good.
“It’s an attraction where everybody wants to go to. It just doesn’t seem like with all you have going on — four sports teams, three colleges and a vibrant community — that you have enough hotels. So, we’re very interested in building a hotel here.”
David Hoffmann purchased the ECHL’s Florida Everblades in 2019. Since then, the Everblades have won the Kelly Cup four times. (Florida Everblades)
• The Hoffmann’s previous experience in professional hockey is as owners of the Florida Everblades of the ECHL. David Hoffmann stressed a desire to make Penguins games attractive to families, similar in a fashion to how Everblades games are.
“We made a distinct effort to make it kid-friendly, and we did a bunch of really cool stuff,” David Hoffmann said. “Like, we have an inflatable Swampy, our mascot, that flies around. We shoot T-shirts out, we have fire going, we have games at intermission. We do that because we got a lot of kids, we got 13 grandkids. They like to be entertained at the game. But I think the one distinct thing that we did, we won. You’ve got win. And two, we made it kid-friendly, where families wanted to come to it. And then, I think because we got so engaged in the community, businesses really wanted to support it, and they started buying bucketloads of tickets to our games.
“Success is success.”
The Everblades have won the ECHL’s Kelly Cup championship in four of the past five seasons.
• The Hoffmanns’ ownership of the Everblades will likely mean an end to the Penguins’ relationship with the nearby Wheeling Nailers, their ECHL affiliate since 1998.
David Hoffmann was not ambiguous when asked if they want the Everblades to become the Penguins’ new ECHL affiliate.
“100%,” David Hoffmann said. “I think they would run me out of Naples (Fla.) if they’re not. We already have people wearing Penguins jerseys at our games, so I think the high expectation level is that’s going to happen. And we want to do that.”
Geoff Hoffmann indicated it would take a handful of weeks to get an affiliation agreement sorted out with the ECHL.
• The fate of the Penguins’ television broadcasts remains uncertain beyond the 2026-27 season. SportsNet Pittsburgh, which was run by Fenway Sports Group through New England Sports Network (NESN), will carry games next season, but it is not clear what that landscape could be moving forward.
“We have one year left on the deal, at which point we’ll have to get in discussions about what the future might look like,” Geoff Hoffmann said. “But next season, we’re going to stay on SportsNet Pittsburgh. It’s managed by NESN in conjunction with our partnership with the Pirates. Beyond that, I don’t have specific details of what it might look like.
“It’s a changing landscape in local broadcast media rights. But I can tell you we want to get our games broadcast and available in as many homes as people that would like to see it and want to make sure we do it in a way that is easy to access.”
