Comments on: Malkin Needs a Winger Sooner Rather than Later

By: DR Hook

DR Hook — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 17:01:46 +0000

There is a thought that that goes along with the “sign him to trade him” that makes it a bad idea to do those things. (a) If you sign him to a fair contract why would you want to trade him, and (b) If you do those things the word spreads around the NHL like wildfire. Like it was in Washington for years. For a while it was thought that Washington’s GM caused a lot of player dissension by screwing with players. I don’t know if McPhee still does that but with McPhee and Ron Wilson they made moves more likely to be found in dinosaur workplaces. Just two years ago they had a problem with Ovechkin (Hanlon, not Wilson in this case) where they took that problem to the Washington Post. There was the Calle Johnasson episode where Johnasson refused to follow direct orders from Randy Caryle. That cost them a series. Wilson screwing with Adan Oates… McPhee and Hanlon screwing with Eminger is another. I think that you treat players fairly and it comes back to you in spades. And that works two ways… it goes for players also. For example… Hossa had every right to sign with who he wanted but he screwed with the Penguins and that forced Shero to take other measures with Satan and Fedotenko. Hossa could have let Shero know what he intended and Shero could have taken other actions earlier. What comes around goes around and not that it’s that big of a deal to me but I would like to have the Pens beat Detroit in the Finals this year… second to that I’d like to see Hossa eliminated in the first round while the Penguins continue on. It would serve Maid Marian right.

By: lateharvest

lateharvest — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 04:37:10 +0000

Sykora only scored 4 less goals than he did last season…but his assists are way down…and this slump is really worrisome.

I think signing him with the intention of trading him is probably the best idea. There may not be many headliners in the UFA pool that the Pens have much of a chance of signing, but this is all given that the GMRS can’t pry away an RFA, particularly one that might be anxious for a change of scenery.

Afinogenov, Cole, Booth, Cammalleri, Gionta, Knuble(old), T.Ruutu…all UFAs. There are some players out there that would probably look good in a Pen’s jersey. Signing any of them is proabably along the same pipe dream lines as re-signing Hossa though.

I’m really interested to see what happens with Gaborik. He was at 7.5m, but who knows what he’ll get on the market. That sure is a waste of money if he never plays…

It’d be great if Tangradi and Caputi can step in and legitimately fill some roles, but at this point, who knows. Tangradi’s ranked 23rd over at Hockey’s Future, but they seem to think he’s going to need a season in the AHL, but I remember the same comments about Staal for a while too.

By: DR Hook

DR Hook — Sun, 12 Apr 2009 14:15:10 +0000

Every year is different but I think we could be looking at 2 right wings. Would you resign Billy Guerin if we went out in the first or second round? Same as with Sykora… however, Sykora @ $2.5 million for 2-years wouldn’t be too awfully bad. Or, would it.
With the salary cap about to take a nose-dive it’s quite possible that the Pens look more within the organization. Having Crosby, Malkin, Staal and Fluery down the middle you can be very selective of how to fill those RW and LW spots.

The UFA pool has only three big name RW players: Gaborik and Hossa (at approx. $7.5 million) are out of the question and so is Havlat @ $6 million. Two of them are band-aid players and Hossa may be joining that band-aid group. Possibly it’s Cuputi and/or Tangradi who end-up on those first two lines. Tangradi is juicing it up in the OHL playoffs right now… Belleville is now facing Brampton for the OHL Eastern Conference Championship… Tangradi has 8 goals and 12 assists in 11 games. That’s not too shabby.