If Bucci Says the Penguins Need a Scoring Winger, Uh Oh

Do we really miss Marian Hossa and Ryan Malone that much? According to John Buccigross of ESPN, "This team is in desperate need of a scoring winger. The Pens' scorers are adequate, but they don't look to have enough to advance far in the postseason. Marian Hossa would have made all the difference."

First of all, we didn't have Hossa until after the trade deadline and we would have made the playoffs without him. Having said that, he certainly helped us in the Playoffs. It only seems like we miss him because of the personal attachment that Penguins fans have with their players, especially players that greatly assist us in our dreams of capturing the Cup.

Second of all, it is really painful to write that. Consider that Pirate fans are used to good players leaving either in free agency or through trade deadline deals. Steelers fans are comfortable with the fact that the Rooneys will pay no one a penny over what their market value is and even then they barely pay that.

Either way Pittsburgh fans trust that the Pirates will be awful because management makes poor decision and the Steelers will always be in contention because the front office makes great choices.

A few years removed from almost leaving the city, the Penguins arrived at the Stanley Cup finals this spring and faced the Red Wings, a team whose roster miraculously fits under the salary cap. Of course we lost in Game 6, and the talk immediately switched to free agency signings and the prospects of next year.

Here's where it gets sad. A player took slightly less money to go a team he thought had a better chance to win a Stanley Cup. That player was Marian Hossa. And, while I usually am more than happy to condemn players for seeking more money, Hossa supposedly is seeking a championship as well. So much so that he signed a one-year deal.

Not only has Hossa hurt my feelings by not returning to the Penguins, not only has he hurt my feelings by playing very well for the Wings, but he may very well be right. The Red Wings are giving up a ton of goals, not completely surprising since they have an eighty year old man in net.

The Penguins aren't scoring goals and Coach Therrien is juggling lines like a circus clown who chugged a fifth of LSD. And yet despite not having the services of two top defenders including our power play quarterback, the Penguins are in seventh place in the Eastern Conference. Hossa and the Wings are in second place in the West.

I miss Hossa. I miss our dominating run through the Eastern Conference playoffs. I miss his tinted visor and Warrior gloves. But Hossa isn't coming back so I will continue to play Dashboard Confessional and lock myself in my room. Malone isn't coming back either. Sure he is, was, a native son of Pittsburgh, but if you know anything about Upper St. Clair then you aren't surprised he left for more money.

Gone are talented scoring wingers. In comes Miroslav Satan. I must confess he strikes me as someone the Pirates might sign, a veteran who used to be considered talented—though God knows what that means—and has character issues.

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