Click here to submit your question

Note: You can follow the Penguins on the Penguins Plus blog at PG-Plus. Membership in that site is only $3.99 per month or $36 per year.

Because of the strong response to Bill Ratay's Mellon Arena memories printed in the Q&A recently, similar submissions from other readers interested in sharing their recollections will be posted in the Penguins area of PG-Plus. Those pieces can be sent via the Q&A submission form or to DMolinari@Post-Gazette.com

Q: Since the Columbus Blue Jackets are all but out of the playoffs and the Pens could use a scoring winger, do you think the Penguins would trade for Plum's own R.J. Umberger? He was always a Penguins-killer when he was with the Flyers and he has 18 goals so far this year.

Bryan Busch, Leechburg

MOLINARI: As with any player the Penguins might be interested in acquiring, whether it's Umberger or Ray Whitney or Alexei Ponikarovsky or whoever, the guy's contract status and his current employer's asking price will go a long way toward determining the chances of general manager Ray Shero making a play for him.

Umberger is versatile, capable of playing center or wing, and had 18 goals in 57 games before the Blue Jackets played at Colorado Tuesday night. He certainly wouldn't be miscast in a top-six role here.

But before the Penguins would make a serious inquiry about him -- and get a feel for just what kind of assets Columbus would be seeking in exchange -- Shero and his staff would have to conclude that Umberger would be a piece of their long-term personnel puzzle, because his contract carries a salary-cap hit of $3.75 million and runs through the 2011-12 season.

Even if the asking price were palatable, Shero and his staff would have to be sure that making that kind of commitment to Umberger did not conflict with their plans for the next few seasons.

The thinking here is that if the Penguins would get into meaningful trade negotiations with Columbus about a winger, someone like Raffi Torres, whose salary-cap hit would be a prorated share of $2.75 million and who will be an unrestricted free agent after this season, might be a more likely candidate.

Torres entered the Avalanche game with 16 goals in 53 games, and has a history of playing a hard-nosed game and going to the net like he means it. He has put up numbers that are more than respectable despite getting extensive work on the Blue Jackets' fourth line, although his skating is a bit suspect, especially by Penguins standards.

If the Penguins would acquire Torres, or any other free-agent-to-be, they could decide during the stretch drive and playoffs whether he was worth trying to re-sign during the summer (much as they did with Bill Guerin in 2009). If he turned out to be a less-than-ideal fit, or if his contract demands simply weren't acceptable, they could sever ties and move on.

That kind of flexibility is important, because the Penguins have a number of forwards -- guys like Luca Caputi, Eric Tangradi, Dustin Jeffrey, Mark Letestu, Nick Johnson and Chris Conner (the latter two of whom will be restricted free agents this summer) -- who might be ready to challenge for steady work in the NHL next season. All would carry a smaller cap hit than wingers who are established in the NHL.

(And if, at any point, the Penguins would pursue a trade for Umberger, it wouldn't be because of the success he's had against them, or because he's from Plum. There was a time when management might have brought in a local guy in the hopes of selling a few extra tickets, but attracting people to Mellon Arena hasn't been an issue for a while.)

Q: Do you see any indication in practice that Evgeni Malkin is working on his lower-than-40-percent faceoff success rate? He gets a lot of ice time, and it's almost a shame to only get every third puck out of his line's draws.

Steve Binder, Vienna, Austria

MOLINARI: Malkin has won 39.5 percent of his draws this season, a stunningly low figure for a player with his reflexes, anticipation and strength.

Unlike Sidney Crosby, who has turned himself into one of the NHL's best faceoff men largely because of the extra time he spent on them during practice the past few years, Malkin doesn't seem overly concerned about how he fares on draws.

He, like everyone else on the team who is expected to take faceoffs, works on them during practice when it's part of the day's agenda, but doesn't come close to focusing on them the way Crosby has.

Penguins Plus, a blog by Dave Molinari and Shelly Anderson, is featured exclusively on PG+, a members-only web site from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.