Ray Shero, Pittsburgh's wizardly General Manager, said on March 1 following the acquisition of Jordan Leopold from the Florida Panthers, "I'm not really that interested in trading players off our team because I'm trying to strengthen it, not weaken it."
This has been Shero's mentality and when the Olympic "trade-freeze" was lifted Sunday at midnight, he waved his wand.
63 hours later, Jordan Leopold from Florida and Alexei Ponikarovsky from Toronto were turning in their jerseys to don the black and gold until, at least, the end of the season. Toronto also sent over a 2010 sixth-round draft pick.
And what did Pittsburgh lose?
Not much, actually.
To be more specific, a 2010 second-round draft pick in the Leopold deal, Chris Peluso for the draft pick, and Martin Skoula and Luca Caputi in the Ponikarovsky deal.
Skoula went from sitting in the press box to top two defensemen when 90 percent of the Penguins defense was injured. I would be lying if I said he didn't contribute to the team, but with a healthy blue line in tow, he would be useless.
Overall, Skoula was invisible; no glaring m ...
Read Full Article at Bleacher Report - NHL
Article written by Laura Falcon
Ray Shero’s Magic Touch Will Yield Results for Pittsburgh Penguins
March 5th, 2010 by Laura Falcon Leave a reply »
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