Penguins Zach Trotman is out of the tournament undisclosed reasons.

The Pittsburgh Penguins will be a little short on defensive depth come the 2020 Stanley Cup Playoffs.

According to a report from Seth Rorabaugh of the Pittsburgh Tribune Review the Penguins will be without defenseman Zach Trotman during this year's 24 team playoff tournament. Rorabaugh's source for the information was none other than Pittsburgh Penguins general manager Jim Rutherford himself so there is no doubt that Trotman will not be participating in the playoffs. Interestingly enough Rutherford would not go into the specific reason behind the Penguins ruling him out, however there have already been at least two NHL players that have opted out of the tournament today so this could potentially be the case for Trotman as well.

Although this is purely me speculating it would also stand to reason that Trotman is exactly the kind of player you would expect to see opting out in a situation like this. The 29 year old blue liner only made 8 appearances for the Penguins all season and would have been relatively unlikely to see play in the playoffs barring any injuries or suspensions to the Penguins core roster. Trotman has spent significantly more time playing in the American Hockey League over the past two seasons and given that league has shutdown play entirely it would make sense for a player in his shoes to want to stay close to home and avoid contamination. 

Now this may sound like wild speculation on my part, and to be frank that is exactly what it is, but there's one more reason I suspect that this may have been voluntary. Back on the 3rd of June Trotman's wife, Jeanna Trotman, took to social media and made a rather life changing announcement for the couple. Jeanna announced then that they would be expecting a new baby sometime around December which means that she is currently going through a pregnancy during this dangers pandemic. Would anyone be surprised to learn that a husband chose to protect his pregnant wife from any potential risk of infection rather than risk playing NHL hockey? I certainly would not. 

There could be a dozen different reasons for this announcement but if I had to guess, and it is a guess, Trotman has chosen to sit this one out. Congratulations to the lovely couple.