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The Pittsburgh Penguins are in desperate need of forward help right now. Even with Letang and Martin out of the lineup the Penguins have players who can play NHL caliber defense in their absence.
No offense to Brian Gibbons but he is not going to be the top line right winger of a Stanley Cup championship team, even if his center is indeed Sidney Crosby.
Enter Ales Hemsky.
Hemsky has some of the best puck skills on this planet. If you have ever had the opportunity to watch him play on a regular basis you know what I am talking about.
Some players are just more aesthetically pleasing to watch than others, guys like Ales Hemsky and Alex Kovalev are the ones you love watching with the puck.
Hemsky’s name has long been in the rumor mill but the Edmonton front office has never pulled the trigger on a deal with him. This deadline will be when he is finally moved. It will also be when his value is at an all time low. When the Oilers were busy drafting high end forward after high end forward they forgot to trade Hemsky from a position of strength. The time has passed for the Oilers to move Hemsky for his highest value.
A more prudent move would have been to either draft Ryan Murray or trade down.
Garth Snow was certainly willing to make it worth somebody’s while.
When Nail Yakupov was selected #1 overall that should have been the time to move on from Hemsky. The Oilers also decided to acquire David Perron, and still no Hemsky trade. Instead the Oilers devalued a pretty decent asset.
What is the Oilers loss will be another team’s gain.
It has been rumored that the Ottawa Senators are looking at forward help, but it appears they have their focus on Chris Stewart and Matt Moulson of the Sabres. This helps out the market for other teams, including the Penguins.
Before we take a look at a chart that shows Hemsky’s impact on puck possession, it is important to remember just how miserable the Oilers are in the possession department.
The Oilers are at the very bottom of the league.
Now let’s take a look at the kind of impact Hemsky has had on his teammates. The chart below will document puck possession at even strength for this season and the impact Hemsky has had on his 5 most common linemates (forward or defense)
You will notice that mostly all of the numbers are below 50%, but keep in mind that the Oilers average is 43.8%.
The thing that sticks out to me are the blue columns. There is a huge drop off with four out of his five most common linemates when they are not playing with Hemsky. Hemsky has an overwhelmingly positive impact on his teammates.
There aren’t many people out there who dispute Hemsky’s talent or positive impact when he is on the ice, so let’s discuss the pink elephant in the room, his durability.
Hemsky has had injury issues throughout his career. The time period in which he missed the most games (2009-2011) it could be argued that he was the most targeted player on the Oilers roster by opponents. That kind of attention wore him down. While he hasn’t been a beacon of perfect attendance the past few years he also has not missed the percentage of games that he did during that 2009-2011 sample size.
To put things into perspective here are the games played for 3 select players since the 2010-2011 season:
Player A: 207 games played
Player B: 217 games played
Player C: 202 games played
Player A is Ales Hemsky, Player B is Paul Martin, and Player C is Kris Letang. Given that Martin and Letang are out for the rest of the regular season Hemsky has a chance to take over the lead for most games played amongst those 3 players.
There aren’t too many top end winger talents that will come at a cost effective price for Ray Shero. Hemsky just might be the best option to try and replace Dupuis on the top line.
What do you think?
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Rumor is the Vancouver Canucks have had scouts at Baby Penguins games recently, hmmmmm.
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With the trade talk out of the way for today its time to talk about the Penguins big game against the Chicago Blackhawks tonight.
The Penguins and Blackhawks will battle it out inside Soldier Field (one of my personal favorite NFL stadiums).
This matchup has no lack of star power even with Kris Letang being on the sidelines. Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, James Neal, Chris Kunitz, Olli Maatta (yes, Olli Maatta), Jonathan Toews, Patrick Kane, Marian Hossa, Patrick Sharp, Duncan Keith, and Brent Seabrook. Yowza , that is a boatload of great talent.
This game will also feature a head to head matchup that has never happened before and I am quite excited to see; it is the first time ever Sidney Crosby will play against Jonathan Toews. Amazing to think that these two superstars have never played against one another but the combination of Crosby’s long term injuries and the unbalanced NHL schedule has not lent itself to this savory matchup.
I don’t know what the two coaches will want for line matchups, but I want to see Crosby and Toews go head to head every shift tonight, it would make for great theater. Canada’s top two competitors going toe to toe on Saturday night under the lights, sounds great to me.
These two players have an incredible amount of respect for one another. Crosby has so much respect for Toews that he asked him if he had his blessing as Team Canada’s captain for the Sochi Games.
Here is a moment the two shared at the end of the 2nd period in the Gold Medal game, shortly after Crosby scored on his breakaway:
There is another first in this matchup; Brandon Saad will be playing against his hometown Penguins for the very first time.
Some people don’t care for the outdoor games but I still remain solidly in the corner of supporting them. I think they are special and a nice break from the same old same old we get in 82 game regular season hockey.
Let’s be honest, is the ice at Soldier field really going to be worse than the slosh at Consol Energy Center? I would wager that Soldier Field’s ice will definitely be better. Sad but true.
The only issue I have with this specific outdoor game with Pittsburgh and Chicago is the fact that NBC did not promote the game during the Olympics (specifically the Gold Medal game). I think if the NHL players go to the Olympics the very least its broadcasting partner could do is promote their own product. Penguins Blackhawks is a rare but marquee matchup. There is no reason this game should not have been promoted heavily while NBC had a huge Olympic audience tuned in.
If this game wasn’t going to be promoted heavily during the Olympics they should have played it before the Olympics.
I think these are by far the best outdoor game jerseys the Penguins have used. The Penguins should always be in black and gold. They look sharp; I hope they use them at various times moving forward:
Sidney Crosby is also in good spirits these days. He has come a long way since the last outdoor game:
On the Simon Despres front:
Paul Martin had hand surgery, his timetable has not changed and it is believed the surgery will keep him on track to return.
Marc Andre Fleury was wearing a camera at practice on top of his helmet and a film crew came along to document the Penguins practice at Soldier field.
Fleury has one of the most positive and engaging personalities in the NHL. The video below only further establishes that. Incredibly easy guy to root for:
It should be a great atmosphere tonight in Chicago, enjoy the game everyone.
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In non Penguins news I just wanted to take a moment to address the Ryan Miller trade.
I wanted to pass along my thanks to Ryan Miller for being a complete class act and a true asset to the Western NY hockey community. Ryan Miller was always a bright spot in what was a very mismanaged franchise at the hands of Darcy Regier.
Ryan Miller was a Rochester American during the 2004-2005 lockout and I was able to attend many of the Amerks home games that year. It was a treat to watch a young Ryan Miller on a nightly basis in my hometown. There was no doubt that he was going to be a star in the league for a long time.
It was very rewarding to see his success at the 2010 Olympic Games in Vancouver. We never really saw Miller’s ceiling for extended periods of time due to the Sabres shortcomings, but for those 2 weeks in February 2010 it was on full display for the entire world.
Through the good times and bad Ryan Miller always held himself with class and dignity and he will forever be a hockey legend in the Western NY region.
Good luck in St. Louis, you deserve all the success you get.
Thanks for reading!
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