Quick one today as we should all be intimately familiar with the contestants already. In case you missed it, the Pittsburgh Penguins were handed their first shootout loss of the season on Saturday, going down 4-3 against the visiting Philadelphia Flyers. They’re getting reacquainted with each other tonight, this time in Philadelphia, before Pittsburgh heads off to Tampa for the other sandwich part of this Double Stuf Oreo on the schedule.
In the first seventeen games of the season the Penguins played only two games ended by a difference of one goal (winning and losing one each), but now five of the past six games have been decided by one goal and Pittsburgh has lost all but one of them. With each of these close losses, the ineptitude of the power play becomes even more amplified, as a power play goal here or there could really change the fortunes of the Penguins, and perhaps they wouldn’t be stuck at .500 such as they have been for weeks. Alas, they are incredibly and unimaginably incompetent, thus the streak of unsuccessful power plays is up to twenty-six over the last ten games (plus a couple shorthanded goals against as salt in the wound). I’m not sure if having Kris Letang back on the top power play unit is going to be a solution, but apparently that’s what they’re going to try. They have to get the power play going in the right direction somehow.
Yesterday I started a poll on Twitter as Marc-Andre Fleury approaches second all-time in the NHL in wins:
A week ago last year I asked you all the same question along with Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Jaromir Jagr, and Kris Letang. I think it’s pretty obvious that Crosby and Malkin will eventually have their numbers retired, and of course Jagr is having his number retired in February. Right now I have a new poll asking again your opinion on Fleury and Letang.
Loading ...One of the main arguments I read and hear against retiring numbers is that it somehow waters down a franchise’s legacy. Frankly I think that’s crap. Winning and success defines a franchise’s legacy, both as a team and on the individual level. Marc-Andre Fleury, for all of the inconsistency he showed in his time in Pittsburgh, was a three-time Stanley Cup winner and was individually successful. The fact that he had four great years in Vegas underscores the fact that he may not have been given the best conditions to succeed in Pittsburgh, but he overcame that and helped backstop the team to championships. I am pro-number retirement, especially for the greatest players in franchise history, and I think Fleury and Letang both deserve that honor one day.
