When Marc-Andre Fleury was struggling all through October, some started to write off this team.

When Sidney Crosby stayed down after that hit by Hedman on January 5, the bandwagon got noticeably lighter.

When Evgeni Malkin crashed into the boards against Buffalo, February 4, the whole of PensNation held their breaths, fearing the season was over.

When our forwards started dropping like flies, the season looked to be over.

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Welcome to Pensburgh. Where the language is clean & the thoughts are anything but.

It’s that time of the year again. Where a tiring 6 month campaign essentially becomes pointless so we can decide with four 7 game series to decide who earns bragging rights to that oversized shiny thing that all 30 teams play for.

No! It's Mine!

Yup, that cup. Not the other one those damned Caps fans are so proud of.

Despite the fact that we’ve lost Geno (& possibly Sid) for the post-season, the Penguins still have a really good team. Sooner or later, some people are gonna figure that out & start rooting for this team too.

Quit snickering, lifers! We’ve all been there...

I figured that as a public service to any new (hopefully not temporary) Pens fans, I’d include a primer on our team so you can keep up in the game day threads.

So!

Give us your tired, your poor. Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,. The wretched refuse of your teeming shore...

Whether you’re just squatting with us for the playoffs, finally giving up on your bullshit team or have no idea what a puck even looks like, WELCOME! We’re glad to have you in the fold.

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I figured I'd like a central thread to breach the entire All-Star ballot when it opens Monday.

The complete list is up on NHL.com.

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I had way too much free time while I was away so I actually took liberties with another song & changed some lyrics around to fit our goaltending "controversy".

Thank goodness MAF had that great game & made this so outdated.

I'll put it up anyway.

First one to guess the song & the artist gets free candy, edible arrangements, a hug & boxful of assorted cookies.

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Frank did insist...

Thanks guys, I didn't realize that an impromptu appropriation of a children's classic could be so well received...

& yes, Pensfan8725. It's exactly like Christmas morning!

Woot!

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I touched on this slightly in the original Arbitration fanshot I put up yesterday...

Apparently the league is now looking into the Pronger, Savard & Luongo contracts. There's an in-depth article on Puck Daddy from Greg Wynshynski...

Makes a lot of sense that teams like Boston & Vancouver are quick to aid the NHL in their "investigation" as the Robert Luongo & Marc Savard contracts are somewhat starting to resemble ball & chains to their salary caps & team structures. I also find it very interesting that the Flyers are noticeably upset over the NHL probing Chris Pronger's contract. When compared to Luongo & Savard, the Flyers have the most to lose should Pronger's contract be thrown out following his Conn Smythe worthy cup run...

(just threw up a little bit there)

I still think that the 3 teams are going to get away with barely a slap on the wrist. The burden of proof in the Kovalchuk case was that the term, the salary structure & the movement clauses were only malicious in conjunction with one another.

The difficulty in proving that BOP & considering that these guys & Hossa have already played out a year of their contract means that the NHL's hands are still tied, even if their track record of going back on business propositions is spectacular. Plus Kovy's contract represents the absolute limit a team can push the envelope, in comparison, all the contracts don't add up.

Personally I'm just glad we Penguins fans don't have to deal with crap like this. It's nice to have a competent & ethical management to rely on...

In case you haven't noticed, OH MY WORD OUR DEFENSE IS GOING TO END LIVES NEXT YEAR.

If you were Dan Bylsma, how would you structure the defensive pairings next year?

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I've been looking at the Free Agent listings and other than Ray Whitney & Maxim Afinigenov on the wing and Zbynek Michalek & Dan Hamhuis for the D, I'm not very excited about the FA market. I haven't been seeing any discussions on trades in the other threads so either I'm missing something or here it is.

I'm thinking the biggest trade chip we have is GoGo. Nothing against him, but we've already wrapped up another undersized offensively inclined defenseman in Tanger. Game 6 brain farts and deflections off his skates aside, I still think that Tanger has a bigger upside and is more likely to develop defensively. Between the two of them, their styles of play and weaknesses are too alike for them to ever play together.

I also think we have too many wingers who can't play in the the top 6 either because they are not good enough (Tenks) or their style of play excludes them (Cookie). Tangradi's still too raw to play significant minutes as a top 6 forward and other than Kunitz & Duppers (who has played his way in this post-season) we have no one else.  (Billy Guerin's retirement not withstanding). Maybe we can find someone to take Tenks off our hands and maybe some complementary pieces like Godard or one of our other prospects...

So that's my take on it, any ideas guys?

Hey guys,

Sorry for the delay in posting the standings. Status quo was that I would tally everything and send it to FrankD so he could cut out picture and post it up. Apparently, I was assuming that Frank would put up the standings and I think Frank was assuming I would do it.

Anyhow, barring any violent objections, starting from now, I'm just going to post the link to download a PDF. You should be able to Ctrl+F your name.  (Frank Edit: You can also view them as a PDF without having to download here).

See you guys at Game 6

Just saw the news on NBA.com.

Derrick Rose will meet Devin Harris, Tony Parker and Jameer Nelson.

Turns out our earlier fears on whether Rose would skip the Skills Challenge was unfounded.

I'm looking forward to Rose v Harris, I've been saying to everyone who would listen to me that those 2 were gonna be All NBA guards one day.

This is probably the only reason I'd watch the broadcast on Saturday.