2009 Pittsburgh Penguins Free Agents

Here is a current list of Pitttsburgh Penguin players who’s contracts are up and become free agents as of 12:01 pm, July 1st 2009.

Here is the 2010 list:  2010 Pittsburgh Penguins Free Agents

You can click on their name to see their lifetime stats.

Click here if you are looking for up to date salary cap numbers and upcoming free agents: 
Pittsburgh Penguins 2009 – 2010 Salary Cap Numbers

Unrestricted Free Agents:  On July 1st, 2009 any player not under contract who is 27 years or older or who has at least 7 years of experience in the NHL, is a Unrestricted Free agent.  Free to go where they want and take whatever pay the get offered.

Here is a list of Unrestricted Free Agents the Penguins have at the end of the Year, their age, their current salary level, and position: ...

Game Day Poop: Stanley Cup – Pittsburgh Penguins vs Detroit Red Wings Preview

Last year the star struck Pittsburgh Penguin youngsters didn’t fair that well in their first trip to the Stanley Cup finals. We’ll guess what. These kids are returning to the finals with an extra year of experience on their resume, the determination that they will not lose like they did last year and they are star struck no more. They have a new coach that has released the reigns of inhibition that the team played with last year and two superstars have broken free and are ready to wreak havoc on the Red Wings unlike anything the Wings have seen thus far in the playoffs.

Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin have been tearing through the best teams in the league for just a chance grab hold of the hardware for the summer. These two are the leagues leading scorers by far, thanks to the teams new aggressive approach and thanks to the positive attitude instilled into them by Dan Bylsma. They have already have the highest amount of points scored in a playoff season in the last 13 years.

Don’t forget about Jordan Staal, he claimed he was going to have a breakout during the Carolina series against his brother, but everybody knows Osgood is Staal’s favorite goaltender and my prognostication is that this will be his breakout series.

As far as goaltenders go, I would take Marc-Andre Fluery in a heartbeat over Osgood.   Talent wise Fluery beats Osgood to a pulp and with Detroits defensive corps falling apart injury wise this post season you are going to see Conklin in net sooner rather than later.

Revenge on Marian WHOssa? Hossa, the most overrated player in the NHL returned to his playoff under performing self the second he stepped off of Sidney Crosby’s line. After notching 26 points along side Sidney Crosby last year, he has 12 points so far this post season. Are the Penguins using the ...

Empty Net Goals: Malkin, Ovechkin & Crosby

After watching Malkin & Crosby miss getting an empty net goal on probably about 5 attempts the other night at the Calgary game,   I started to wonder how many empty net points the players in the race for the Art Ross scoring leader trophy had amassed this season.  Apparently the NHL doesn’t keep that statistic among the thousands of oddball statistics they keep.

2010 results:  Empty Net Goals: Ovechkin, Stamkos, Crosby & Sedin – 2010

So I pulled out the calculator and here’s what I came up with:

• Evgeni Malkin:                  3 goals and 2 assists on empty net goals.
• Alexander Ovechkin:        5 goals and 2 assists on empty net goals.
• Sidney Crosby:                 2 goals and 2 assists on empty net goals.

While the Art Ross Trophy race is not affected by empty net goals, the MVP vote should be looking at how many of the players points were derived from emptynetters.   If you take the players total points that they have now and subtract the freebie empty net points, then the race looks like this:

• Evgeni Malkin:                              107 pts – 5 empty net pts. = 102 pts
• Alexander Ovechkin:                    100 pts – 7 empty net pts. =   93 pts
• Sidney Crosby:                              97 pts – 4 empty net pts. =   93 pts

 Just another reason Evgeni Malkin deserves the MVP award.

Best NHL Unrestricted Free Agent Available in 2009

Two Pittsburgh Penguins, born 3 years and 1200 miles apart, have an a very mirrored past and a very distant future.  Aleksey Morozov & Milan Kraft are two Birds of a Feather.

Aleksey Morozov was drafted by the Penguins 24th overall in 1995, 3 years later Milan Kraft was drafted by the Penguins 23rd overall. Morozov played his first game for the Penguins in 1998 and 3 years later Kraft had his first game with the Penguins.

Both players last game for Pittsburgh was April 4th, 2004. Kraft scored the final goal for the Penguins that year, a game winner again the Capitals. Morozov had the game winning goal the game before that, against Atlanta, his final goal with the Penguins. They both were unable to come to contract terms with the Penguins after the NHL lockout and are both currently NHL unrestricted free agents.

The year of the NHL lockout, Morozov headed back to Russia and joined the Ak Bars Kazan of the RSL (Russian Super League), which as of this year is part of the KHL, the same league Jagr plays in. He has played for the Ak Bars Kazan for 5 years, won two championships, and one playoff MVP. ...