Pool Outlook for Pittsburgh

Well, there you have it. Having the best two of the top three fantasy scorers in the league did bring some good fortunes to the Penguins in 2009. The Pens were close to not even making the playoffs, but on the shoulders of their superstars, they not only made the playoffs, but won the Cup in the end. After being such a poor team and getting all those good draft picks for years, it had finally paid off in seven games against the Red Wings, thanks to a pair of high-scoring forwards, a good defense corps and a coming-of-age goalie.

It should come as no surprise that the top player in all the fantasy numbers is on the Cup winning team at the end of the year, although it hasn't happened in quite some time. Evgeni Malkin led the league in scoring with 113 points, 35 goals & 78 assists, in 82 GP. He was certainly one of the more consistent players all year and stepped his game up with when Sidney Crosby missed his five games this season. Malkin has gained some momentum in likely going to be the first pick in many pool drafts, as he has been doing quite well in the poll to the left hand side of the blog page. You can't really go wrong with picking him first right now.

The Penguins were not quite as deep in scoring as their rivals in the Cup Finals, but having a guys like Crosby, who finished with 33 goals and 70 assists in 77 GP, doesn't hurt. Crosby's numbers likely would have been a bit better if he didn't miss those games in the season, but you can't really complain. He still carries a good vote for being the first pick overall this Fall as well. Mid-season pick-up, Chris Kunitz, finished third in forwards scoring for the Penguins with 53 points in 82 GP, followed closely by Jordan Staal, who had 49 points in 82 GP, and Bill Guerin who had 48 points in 78 GP. Past Kunitz and Staal, you can't see a player, let alone a forward, who played in all 82 GP in 2009, so scoring also took a hit because of that. For fantasy purposes, you will have to take a closer look at who the team picks up for 2010 before going too crazy at the draft.

It was an injury-plagued year on the back end for the Penguins as well, which allowed for Kristopher Letang to take top honours as the best fantasy defender on the team. Letang finished with 33 points in 74 GP, ranking him 264th in the league and 42nd among defensemen. Of course, the long playoff run and Cup win should help his confidence in being a better scoring blueliner. Alex Goligoski finished second in defensemen scoring with only 20 points in 45 GP, which isn't much, while the usual suspect, Sergei Gonchar, only played in 25 GP, scoring only 19 points. Expect a much better year from the blueline in Pittsburgh in 2010.

Finally, we'll finish off with the goaltending in Pittsburgh, where Marc-Andre Fleury was a 35-game winner in 2009, finishing 9th among goalies in pool scoring with 79 points, thanks to 4 shutouts and an assist as well. The injuries in the team's depth didn't help Fleury out a great deal, as the team had to deal with some inconsistencies, but Fleury was great when he needed to be in the playoffs. It could be fair to expect a little more out of him in the regular season in 2010. In the back-up role, Mathieu Garon was acquired from Edmonton in the middle of the season and he picked up some good minutes between the Oilers and Penguins. Unfortunately, he only picked up 8 wins for 16 points, but he will also hit free agency as well.

2010 Season Outlook
Of course when you have the likes of Malkin, Crosby, Gonchar and Fleury, a team should be considered a pretty good one going forward and they are, without a doubt. Having these players together for at least another year, despite the cap hit, does give the team some options when putting depth into the line-up. These are the kind of players that make other players better, which should make the cap hit worth while.

Forwards	Defense	Goaltenders
Evgeni Malkin	Kris Letang	Marc-Andre Fleury
Sidney Crosby	Sergei Gonchar
Chris Kunitz	Brooks Orpik
Jordan Staal	Mark Eaton
Tyler Kennedy
Matt Cooke
Pascal Dupuis
Maxime Talbot
Erik Godard

The Penguins have a great deal of talent already signed on for 2010, including all of the superstars, 14 in total. They have an approximate salary cap hit of $45.9 million, which leaves them in reasonable condition for the summer, plus they have a number of young players that they might consider to fill in the gaps left behind by some free agents.

It's hard not to start with the UFAs coming out of Pittsburgh, as there are a good number of them, all of which have some value left in them, but the question is, 'how much?' Bill Guerin, Petr Sykora, Ruslan Fedotenko, Miroslav Satan, Rob Scuderi, Mathieu Garon, Hal Gill, Phillipe Boucher, Craig Adams and Mike Zigomanis all head the list of UFAs going to market in a month's time. That is an awful lot of veteran experience going to market, but there is some indication through all the other Outlooks that there is enough UFA experience from other teams that may be more cost effective.

RFAs this summer include Alex Goligoski, Bill Thomas, Tim Wallace, among others, few of which will cause much for salary cap concerns going forward. Goligoski was the only one to play more than 40 games this past season and has made some strides in becoming a full-time defender.

The Penguins are quite high on forward Luca Caputi as a complimentary forward to one of the top two lines in the next couple years. Caputi had a pretty good year in the AHL and may get a good look in training camp come September. At less than a $1 million per year, he would also be very complimentary to the budget as well. According to the Hockey News, the Penguins are also quite high on young defenseman, Alex Grant, who has been likened to Ryan Whitney, as a young defender who was able to make the jump. That's some awfully big praise, but it could put him on the list, since the team was right about Whitney.

The Penguins nucleus has lots to build from, especially when you move past Gonchar and get a year or two more on Kris Letang and Alex Goligoski. Of course, the Penguins are going to be a huge source of fantasy players, no matter who they pick up or lose in the off-season. They have been built well with really good picks. Look for a huge year from Chris Kunitz and Tyler Kennedy in 2010, they'll be huge. Oh yeah, don't forget those other guys as well.