Tim Benz, Brian Metzer on issues that may be slowing Penguins' Evgeni Malkin

The Penguins are on a four-game win streak. Sidney Crosby is hot out of the gate with seven points over the first six games.

Kasperi Kapanen is back with the team and skating into form. Goalie Tristan Jarry appears to have stabilized after a shaky start in the net. The blue line has stayed afloat despite numerous injuries. And the bottom six forwards have provided better scoring punch than expected.

Even Jared McCann has goals in back-to-back games after a pandemic-long scoring drought.

At 4-2 to start the season, there’s not much to complain about following that first weekend in Philadelphia.

Well, unless you’ve picked them to ever win by multiple goals. They haven’t done that yet, accumulating two shootout victories, an overtime win and a 3-2 decision over the New York Rangers Sunday.

It might take getting Evgeni Malkin on track before that happens. Malkin finding his stride is perhaps the biggest missing ingredient from the Penguins so far in 2021. He has just one goal and one assist thus far this season. Plus, No. 71 is a minus-4 and only managed one shot on goal over the last two games against the Rangers.

On Monday’s “Madden-Benz: Unfiltered,” TribLive columnist Mark Madden and I discussed the concern that Malkin’s wife and son are living in Florida. So maybe he’s down in the dumps mentally.

But that can’t be an excuse once the games start, in my opinion. After all, Pens Radio Network host Brian Metzer told us in this week’s hockey podcast, the Malkin family can commute between Florida and Pittsburgh “like you and I go back and forth to Monroeville.”

Let me stop Brian right there. It’s much easier flying to Florida than it is to get through the Squirrel Hill Tunnel at rush hour.

But as Metzer continued, he said “there might be something to it” when wondering about Malkin’s emotional state because of the geographical separation from the family.

“If he is not performing the way that he wants to, he goes home to this big estate,” Metzer said. “He’s bouncing around alone. Nothing is open in Pittsburgh. So he’s left to go home and wallow in his self-pity without anybody there.

“I think there is a little bit to that.”

As Metzer points out, though, based on social media posts, Malkin’s wife and child were around through the first few games of the season. So that can’t be a catch-all explanation.

Hey, as far as I’m concerned, the guy just needs to take more shots. And get a few on the net, too.

Like Madden, Metzer likes the idea of Kapanen going on Malkin’s line. But Jason Zucker needs to help out Malkin a bit. He has just one assist in the first six games.

“It was a combination that was clicking well in training camp,” Metzer said. “But it hasn’t been working well in the early stages of this season. Zucker had himself a ton of scoring chances the first three or four games. And I feel like he was nearly invisible the last two games against the Rangers.”

That’s true. Zucker hasn’t registered a shot on goal the last three outings.

Metzer will be hosting tonight’s radio broadcast of the Penguins game in Boston.

In today’s podcast, we also look at how the Bruins squeezed seven points out of their first five games. We also talk about Pierre-Olivier Joseph’s solid start to his NHL career, Brandon Tanev’s versatility and Evan Rodrigues’ injury.