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Q: With Mario Lemieux coming back, my first reaction is, (will he play in) 10, 15, maybe 20 games this year? What would be the chances of Lemieux being a special-teams player? If he only played every power play or short-handed opportunity, he might be available for 60 games and rack up some decent points, as well.
Jeff of Malvern, Pa.
MOLINARI: There might be better ways to push a highly skilled 40-year-old into retirement than to tell him that a good chunk of his ice time will come killing penalties, but it's hard to think of any at the moment. That's probably the most grueling, draining and dangerous work a forward can get. So while Lemieux's talent and hockey sense probably would make it possible for him to manufacture some short-handed scoring chances, the trade-off isn't close to worth it.
Lemieux has said that he would like to get about 20 minutes of work per game, and even-strength and power-play shifts should get him into that neighborhood. Just about every player is most effective when he gets enough ice time to get him into the flow of the game, and that certainly is true of Lemieux.
Mind you, there will be some people who believe Lemieux should be confined to power-play duty, in an effort to keep him healthy as long as possible. There's a certain appeal to that idea -- especially when it looks as if there will be so many opportunities with the extra man -- but Lemieux has shown no interest in being that kind of specialist.
Of course, precedent tells us that betting on Lemieux to stay healthy for an extended stretch is no way to get rich, so those who espouse limiting his role can begin to polish their I-told-you-so gloats any day now. Nonetheless, until Lemieux proves that he can't be effective five-on-five anymore, he should -- and will -- remain part of the regular forward rotation.
Q: With the retirement of future Hall of Famer Ron Francis, is there any chance the Penguins could retire his number? I know he also was tied to the Whalers/Hurricanes for a good part of his career, but even so, is there a reason the Penguins would not or could not bestow this honor? I don't think I will see another two-way center as great as he was.
Dave Holley of Doylestown, Pa.
MOLINARI: It says a lot about the way Penguins fans respect Francis's game -- and recognize the contributions he made to the franchise, on and off the ice -- that more than a dozen Q&A readers have written about the possibility of his number being retired.
The Penguins do not have a formal procedure for assessing whether a number should be retired, but that's the kind of issue that likely would be thrashed out in a discussion between team executives like Ken Sawyer, Craig Patrick and Lemieux. The Penguins have retired only two sweaters: The No. 21 worn by Michel Briere, who suffered fatal injuries in an auto accident after his rookie season, and Lemieux's No. 66, which was put back into active duty nearly five years ago. By doing it so infrequently, the team has made it an honor of the highest magnitude.
If the Penguins were to retire Francis' number, chances are that no one -- not any of the guys he played with and against, or any of the people who watched him do it -- would protest. That is not, however, reason enough to do it.
The most compelling argument against retiring Francis' number is not that he spent the majority of his career with the Hartford/Carolina franchise, but that so many players contributed so much to the Penguins during the same time Francis was here. If his sweater is retired, what do the Penguins do about No. 5? How about No. 25? Or 7? Or 55? Or 77? Or 35? Or 68?
You can make a good case for retiring any -- or all -- of those. But you can make an even better one for retiring none, and reserving that tribute for the greatest of the franchise's greats.
(No one, by the way, specified which of Francis' numbers should be retired, which might indicate that at least some people have forgotten that he wore No. 9 during the Penguins' first Stanley Cup run. The sweater most often associated with Francis -- No. 10 -- belonged to Barry Pederson in 1990-91.)
Q: I got to take in the Saturday training-camp games and saw Sidney Crosby for the first time. Remarkable. Watching him do the little things like positioning and anticipation, especially, indicate what a special player he's going to be. Anyway, I just wanted to pick your brain as to the young players (Crosby aside) who caught your eye in camp. Johannes Salmonsson, Noah Welch, Ben Eaves and Stephen Dixon all made impressions on me.
Rusty Ryan of Bloomfield
MOLINARI: The players you mentioned all showed serious promise during the early days of camp. Salmonsson proved that his shoulder trouble is history and that he can score goals against men. Welch established himself as a legitimate contender for an NHL job, Eaves showed the puck skills and instincts that should get him to the league when he gains experience and muscle and Dixon reinforced the notion that he is versatile and valuable all over the ice.
The most impressive player among those with no NHL experience might be center Maxime Talbot, whose high-energy style and outstanding penalty-killing during the first two exhibition games have established him as a serious threat to be in the Penguins' opening-night lineup.
Left winger Daniel Carcillo made a major impression on a lot of people who watched him -- to say nothing of the people he played against -- with his hard-edged game, his ferocious style and fearlessness. If he can keep his focus -- and avoid crossing the line that separates hard-nosed play from major infractions -- Carcillo won't be easy to send to the minors when the late-camp cuts are made.
But the biggest surprise of camp might have been Mike Doyle, a free agent from St. Cloud State. He won't be in the NHL this season -- he won't even get a contract from the Penguins -- but he skates well, has shown decent skills and plays tough enough that he certainly looks like a good candidate to sign with one of the Penguins' minor-league affiliates. And that's no small feat for a guy who came to camp with a promise of nothing more than meal money.
Q: The NHL has also seen an increase in the goal scoring during the pre-season. I can't even remember the last time I have watched NHL pre-season scores, so is this because of the new rules, or are pre-season games typically this high-scoring?
Mitch Marklow of Erie
MOLINARI: Anyone inclined to analyze early pre-season games, let alone take the results too seriously, should remember that most lineups in those are liberally sprinkled with junior players, free agents and minor-leaguers, which can seriously skew most statistics.
Nonetheless, TSN, a Canadian TV network, broke down the first 16 exhibition games this fall and compared them to the first 16 from 2003. The study showed that 6.3 goals per game were being scored this season, up from 5.8 two years ago. That shouldn't surprise anyone, since TSN also found that, while there were 8.48 power plays in 2003, the average spiked to just over 19 this year. With all those extra man-advantages situations, a rise in goal production is pretty much inevitable.
Q: What good does it do to exclude the home opener from the individual ticket sales? I thought the idea was to make the games more affordable for the casual fan. I love the Pens, but I can only afford to go to about 6-8 games a year. I know the team wants more season-ticket packages sold. The fact of the matter is, a lot of the season-ticket packages being sold are to people who will not even attend one game. They will sell the tickets on Ebay or something in order to turn a hefty profit. Hence, a pair of $60 tickets will cost a true fan like me who is desperate to see the Pens this season (especially the opener) probably around $200, if not more. This is a joke. The same groups of people will still be the ones who can afford to go to games, as it was before the lockout. Does this make any sense?
James Rolley of Youngstown, Ohio
MOLINARI: The idea for the Penguins -- or any other team -- is to sell as many tickets as possible and, as long as they're not aware of any laws being broken, they probably shouldn't have to be concerned about precisely who is purchasing them.
The Penguins' marketing strategies, like those of most other businesses, are governed by the law of supply and demand. If the Penguins were again fielding a lineup like the one from two years ago, they probably would have come up with a few dozen fan-friendly packages to lure casual fans to Mellon Arena, because they would have known that their team couldn't do it alone.
But when they won the rights to Sidney Crosby and signed big-name free agents like Sergei Gonchar and Zigmund Palffy, the equation changed dramatically. Penguins tickets again became a hot commodity and that gave the franchise leverage, allowed it to place a heavy emphasis on season-ticket sales. And it is not a reach to suggest that, had the front office known how the summer would play out, there would not have been across-the-board cuts in season-ticket prices, especially with Lemieux claiming ownership will take a seven-figure hit this season.
The home opener is a particularly attractive game, which is why it specifically has been excluded from single-game sales. If fans want to see Sidney Crosby's first home game badly enough, the thinking goes, that might be enough to convince them to commit to at least a 20-game package. By using tickets to the opener as a carrot, the Penguins are doing much the same as the Pirates have by using 2006 All-Star Game tickets to boost their season-ticket sales.
A lot of long-time, hard-core fans have been priced out of NHL rinks in recent years. That's unfortunate in a lot of ways, but anyone who has filled their gas tank lately understands that economic realities aren't often pleasant.
Q: With a huge hole up the middle, why don't the Penguins go after Victor Kozlov (of New Jersey, which is desperate to get under the salary cap)? I think his qualifying offer was for $1.75 million, not a huge amount for a big, quality center. As excited as I am for the coming season, I'm a little nervous about the lack of depth at center and with the core of the team containing a number of players with significant injury histories, including John LeClair, Palffy and Lemieux.
Ben Dickinson of Seattle, Wash.
MOLINARI: It could be that Kozlov will go on the market if the start of the season is closing in and Devils general manager Lou Lamoriello still needs to cut payroll, but there's no indication Kozlov has been aggressively shopped around the league yet. There has been a lot of talk that the Devils might be willing to part with Jeff Friesen, too, but Lamoriello hasn't made a move with him, either. If either is made available, Lamoriello should have no trouble finding clubs to take them, but it's pointless to dwell on the Penguins going after a specific player until his team starts listening to offers for him.
The specter of injuries to key older players like Lemieux and LeClair figures to hang over the Penguins all season. LeClair has had three back operations and plays a game predicated on initiating -- and absorbing -- contact. That's hard on anyone, let alone a 36-year-old. As for Lemieux, he has done a remarkable job with conditioning over the past five years -- if he'd made that kind of commitment when he was in his prime, he might have put up 250 or 300 points in a season -- but that doesn't take away from the reality that he'll be 40 on Oct. 5. Factor in his medical history, the records of which must be thicker than the Manhattan phone directory by now, and you have to believe the Penguins would be delighted to get 50 games from him this winter.
Q: I have a hunch that by December, we'll be longing for the tight officiating found in the training camp tournament.
Lee of Pittsburgh
MOLINARI: Given that previous officiating crackdowns have lasted about half as long as the average Hollywood marriage, it's easy to understand why almost everyone -- from players to coaches to fans -- seems skeptical that the league will stick to its vow that by-the-book refereeing will endure from the first exhibition game to the final game of the Stanley Cup final.
But if the NHL softens its stance and allows the quality of its product to deteriorate because players with limited skill are allowed to drag -- often, quite literally -- the game's greatest talents down to their level, it will be a public-relations blunder of epic proportions.
Giving players like Ilya Kovalchuk, Jarome Iginla, Nikolai Zherdev, Crosby and so many others with extraordinary abilities the opportunity to perform and entertain to their full potential is the best hope the league has to win back old fans and create new ones in the aftermath of the lockout.
If the rules aren't enforced the way NHL exeuctives have said they will be, look for people -- whether it's referees or management types at the league level -- to lose their jobs. And they should.
Two of the Penguins long-time rivals, Philadelphia and Washington, figured prominently in responses to last week's question: "Aside from the Penguins, which NHL team do you believe has most improved its lineup since the 2003-04 season ended, and which club's roster has gone downhill the most?" Many readers believe the Flyers significantly improved, and even more feel the Capitals have gotten appreciably worse. A sampling of the responses, with most edited for brevity and/or clarity:
Jimmy Rixner of Ashland, Va.: The team that's lost the most is the defending Cup champion, Tampa Bay. Aside from the obvious, losing star goalie Nikolai Khabibulin, they lost key players like Cory Stillman, Brad Lukowich and even Andre Roy. That's the price to pay to retain the three big guys (Vincent Lecavalier, Martin St. Louis and Brad Richards) in a salary cap world.
Ken Bosak of Gibsonia: Boston in the East and Calgary in the West have made changes that will enable them to really challenge this year. In the East, Buffalo, and in the West, St Louis, have done little to help themselves.
Matt Favreau of Bernardsville, N.J.: I would say that the New York Islanders have improved significantly. They were a formidable team in 2003-04, but I think their 2005-06 roster is even stronger. Adding Miroslav Satan, Mike York, Alexei Zhitnik, and Brent Sopel is impressive. The team improved the least is Washington.
Brian Stevens of Moon: The team most improved has to be Atlanta. If Ilya Kovalchuk returns, they are in the playoffs, easily. If he doesn't, they are in the fight for eighth place in the East. The team hardest hit has to be Colorado. To replace studs with has-beens and never-weres smacks of the Pirates, and we all know how that turns out.
Jim Schloder of Jacksonville, Fla.: The most improved team has to be Chicago. Really, it had nowhere to go but up. Talent-wise, Colorado lost a lot without being able to add any.
Zane Ismail of Pittsburgh: The most improved team, aside from the Penguins, is Phoenix. The potential is there for them to have a huge season. They have a new arena and a new coach in Wayne Gretzky. The Coyotes added Brett Hull who, like John LeClair, can at least be a leader and mentor if it turns out he's become too old. They dropped Chris Gratton and replaced him with Petr Nedved, which is a huge upgrade. They have Curtis Joseph in goal now, and added Mike Ricci and Mike Leclerc, who have grit, skill and leadership. St. Louis is in serious trouble. The Blues lost Chris Pronger, Al MacInnis and Pavol Demitra, and were only so-so to start with.
Craig Cross of Tampa, Fla.: I think the Flyers did the most to help their team this off-season, but it remains to be seen if they can stay healthy. The worst job would have to go to Washington and Minnesota. Have they done anything this off-season?
Chris MacIntosh of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Canada: Everyone would have to think of the Flyers when thinking about who improved their roster. Yes, Chicago, Edmonton and the Islanders signed some key guys, but none of them got Forsberg, who is the game-breaker of the NHL. For the second part of the question, I have to go with the Leafs. They lost their most beloved older players who were liabilities in the first place and signed guys who were more risky.
Rick of Scott: Quite a few teams improved over the summer -- Chicago, Anaheim, Edmonton and others -- but one has to be the worst team in the NHL and has done nothing to improve. The Washington Capitals management is a sham. They get a great No. 1 draft pick in Alexander Ovechkin and didn`t even try to put any good veterans around him.
Ventsislav Mishev of Sofia, Bulgaria: Florida has assembled a very competitive squad by signing experienced players like Gary Roberts and Joe Nieunwendyk. They also added center Josef Stumpel, another impact player, and got a true gem in Martin Gelinas, one of the key figures for the Flames in their run to the Stanley Cup final in 2004 . As for the team that went from good to not-so-good, I'll pick the Flyers. They did get Peter Forsberg, but relinquished Mark Recchi, John LeClair, Tony Amonte and Jeremy Roenick.
Holly Hancock of Butler: Other than the Penguins, I believe that the Columbus Blue Jackets have really improved their lineup. They already had young guns Rick Nash and Nikolai Zherdev and added veterans like Adam Foote, Jan Hrdina and Bryan Berard. The team I believe has gone downhill would have to be the New York Rangers.
Bryan Justman of Modesto, Calif.: Calgary will have the second most-improved roster in 2005-06. Adding Tony Amonte, Daymond Langkow and Darren McCarty to the core from their Cup run will make them the best team in the West. I can't quite see how Daryl Sutter will configure a star-laden defense. He's got Dion Phaneuf and Roman Hamrlik to add to a unit that was already strong. The roster that has changed for the worst is Washington, easily.
Sean Pieszak of Seven Fields: The recent signing of Peter Bondra by Atlanta might have made the Thrashers the frontrunner in my book. Philly's pickup of Forsberg is also impressive. When it comes to who did the worst job, the winner hands-down is Washington. Besides Alexander Ovechkin and Andrew Cassels, their roster is devoid of talent. If their payroll is over $15 million, they're paying that bunch too much.
Keith Justus of Las Vegas, Nev.: Columbus, Chicago, Florida and Phoenix have made dramatic upgrades to their rosters since the end of the 2003-04 season, but I think the biggest improvement will be seen in Boston. The Bruins landed some difference-makers (Alexei Zhamnov, Dave Scatchard, Brian Leetch) some solid role players (Brad Isbister, Shawn McEachern) and kept their own studs (Joe Thornton, Sergei Samsonov, Glen Murray and Nick Boynton. (Note: Boynton, a restricted free agent, still hasn't re-signed with Boston.)
Greg Boschert of Greensburg: Philadelphia has the potential to be the most improved. Potential, because the Flyers unloaded John LeClair's big contract and questionable lower back for Peter Forsberg, the best all-around player in the world. If Forsberg stays healthy, their offense makes a huge leap forward. Throw in the addition of Derian Hatcher, Mike Rathje and Chris Therien to an already solid defense, and the only remaining question is Robert Esche in goal. The Minnesota Wild has moved backward by standing still.
Question of the Week: Who are the most pleasant surprises and biggest disappointments of the Penguins' training camp so far?
