Once again Ray Shero worked his magic and transformed the Pittsburgh Penguins team into a better team. That is not an easy thing to do with the NHL’s Salary Cap the Way it is, but somehow he did it again. the best part of all of Ray Shero’s moves is that he did not dismantle the Stanley Cup winning team anymore than it was dismantled over the summer last year.
Ray Shero added two players and lost two prospects. I have heard many fans are complaining that Ray Shero is trading the future away. I have news for them: The future is now. Luca Caputi and Chris Peluso were not the future, the core players on the team are around 22 years old, the future is already set for 10 years or so and all Shero needs to do is fill in the blanks with the amount of money he has left under the cap.
Amazingly, Ray Shero did the opposite and did not trade away any future core players. You can read my opinion on how Penguins GM Craig Patrick ruined the Penguins in the early 90’s by trading away the future here: “Shero Don’t Be A Hero”
The penguins picked up two players: defenseman Jordan Leopold and 29 year old 6’4″ left winger Alexei Ponakarovsky to add to the teams depth. Leopold already played a game for the Penguins yesterday and looked fantastic. Ponakarovsky will be joining the team sometime soon apparently he’s having immigration problems.
Ponakarovsky was brought in to help with the Penguins problems with their wingers inability to put the puck behind opposing net minders. He averaged over 20 goals a season with Toronto, I’m expecting over 30 a year here in Pittsburgh. He’s big and can park it in front of the net, something the Penguins could really use on the powerplay.
These trades and lack thereof are the signs of an incredible GM who has made all the right moves so far. In Shero I trust and I’m looking forward to another cup run.
I think Ray did a great job getting Pony now Malkin has somone to play with that can score(FEDS 9 goals at 1.8mill) and maybe Ray wants to keep him here for a few years, cooke, Ruslan, Billy ,Eaton,Sergi all UFA at season’s end.hope fully in off season he can dump kuntiz at 3.6 mill!!!!
Word on street is that Ponikarovsky is soft. I say give him a chance. Some players are soft until they have something to play for. Maybe when he see’s the rest of the team giving up everything for sake of a win he will follow suit. Fedotenko is from the Ukraine also and I beleive Poni spent much of his early career playing in Russia. I think Feds and Malkin could rub off on him. Could be a good pick up…we’ll see.