Regular Season in Review: Fan Favorite Power Rankings

All photos : Getty Images

Well THAT went quickly.  The 2012-13 regular season is in the books, and let's face it, it was the most enjoyable season for Pens fans since 1992-93.  And we all know how THAT turned out.  So, while we all try to temper our expectations for the playoffs - while simultaneously telling ourselves that it is ridiculous and superstitious to think that something that happened twenty years ago (exactly) has any bearing on this season - let's look back on an extremely memorable season.

The Fan Favorite Power Rankings are meant to be a barometer for the attitude of the fan base at large for the individuals on the team.  I judged each player in six categories, giving a score from 1-5 based not just on how I felt, but (and this is important) based on public opinion in and around Pittsburgh - as perceived by me.  My criteria are:


Quality of Play: This metric is meant to be relative to the player's expected level of play; for instance, giving Brandon Sutter a rating of 4 and Evgeni Malkin a 3.5 does not mean I think Sutter outplayed Geno.  He didn't.  But he performed better than expected, while Geno didn't play at his usual MVP level.
Personality: Basically, is the guy a beloved character, a badass, or a cardboard cutout?  Most hockey players are pretty boring, so I'm giving some a boost for on-ice personality (read: fist-pumps).
Toughness: This skews the scales unfairly in favor of defensemen and grinders, but the peoples loves their smash-ems.
Intangibles: COULD BE ANYTHING!!!
Nickname: Fans will have a hard time liking you if there isn't something affectionate that they can scream at you.  The cuter the better.
Jersey-buyability: A real word that measures how cool I think a player's jersey is, based on completely biased aesthetic convictions.

Agree?  Disagree?  Tell me what you think in the comments!

"Hey, buddy!  Yeah, so...we made you completely irrelevant.  But keep reaching for those stars, champ!"

27. Dustin Jeffrey

Quality of Play: 1.5
Personality: 1
Toughness: 1.5
Intangibles: 2.5
Nickname: 1.5 (“DJ”)
Jersey-buyability: 1

TOTAL: 10

I had high hopes for Jeffrey this season, but he’s been just about invisible.  He’s had a few decent moments, and even a nice two-point game against the Sens last week, but he’s a spare part on a team that has limited need for those after the trade-deadline windfall.

In almost every respect, DJ is unremarkable; he had approximately zero memorable moments this season (that one game he spent as Geno’s winger notwithstanding), doesn’t seem to have the personality to make him one of those beloved fourth-line players, hell, I’m not even certain I’ve ever heard him speak. 

Favorite thing about him: The fact that his hard-earned ability to serve as a utility man at any forward position resulted in the Penguins shifting him around and denying him a defined role.  I know this is sad and shouldn’t be my favorite thing about him, but shadenfreude exists because we are terrible and enjoy hard-luck stories.

26. Simon Despres

Quality of Play: 2.5
Personality: 1.5
Toughness: 2
Intangibles: 2.5
Nickname: 1
Jersey-buyability: 1
TOTAL: 10.5

Nothing against Despres, but he obviously needs some time before he’s ready to impress at the NHL level.  He showed some flashes this year, and Pens fans are rightly optimistic about his future, and we also saw some of the mistakes that come with being a young defenseman.  If he can learn how to use his size better, and start putting his stick-handling ability to good use, he’ll find a spot in the top four.  That day is a few years down the road, though.

He isn’t helped by the fact that his name is so nickname-resistant (Do we go with “Despy?”  There must be something better.) and his number, 47, so bizarre.  He’ll need to play well enough to own that weird number – like Letang did with 58 – before his jersey becomes marketable.

25. Robert Bortuzzo

Quality of Play: 2
Personality: 2
Toughness: 3
Intangibles: 1.5
Nickname: 1.5 (“Bort”)
Jersey-buyability: 1
TOTAL: 11

Pretty much the same story as Despres, but he gets a boost because of his awesome celebration following his goal against Carolina earlier this month.  Did you know that he played less than half as many games as Despres?  I bet you did not realize that.  I think he will become a fan favorite as he develops, especially if the BORT nickname ever catches on.  If ever there comes a day when they’re selling BORT license plates in the Pens Gear, we’ve all won.

24. Joe Vitale

Quality of Play: 2.5
Personality: 2
Toughness: 3
Intangibles: 2.5
Nickname: 1
Jersey-buyability: 1

TOTAL: 12

Pretty impressive 5-point season for Joe Vitality.  He was a stalwart in the faceoff circle, and hustled his ass off throughout the season.  He flashed way more speed than I remembered coming into the year, and was featured in countless momentum-shifting shifts in which he, Glass, and Adams controlled the puck, frustrated the opponent, and did everything but score.  His number and stature still make him look too much like TK.

23. Tyler Kennedy

Quality of Play: 1.5
Personality: 2
Toughness: 2
Intangibles: 3
Nickname: 1.5 (“TK”/”Pig Boy”)
Jersey-buyability: 3
TOTAL: 13

A very crappy year from Tyler Kennedy, who seems at this point genetically incapable of hitting the net with a shot.  He also can’t stay on his skates, and we pay him $2 million dollars a year.   And despite, and perhaps because of, all of us complaining about him, Kennedy will almost definitely be scoring a big goal or two during the playoffs.  Say what you will about him, the dude’s got timing – he waits for the haters to reach a boiling point, then nets some unlikely goal while you’re mid-TK complaint.

People will buy his jersey because some people find him cute, and because he’s got a good-looking last name (presidential, even) and number.

The hockey equivalent of a Bigfoot sighting

21. (tie) Tanner Glass

Quality of Play: 2
Personality: 3.5
Toughness: 4
Intangibles: 3.5
Nickname: 1 (“Mr. Glass” never caught on)
Jersey-buyability: 1.5 (Cool last name)
TOTAL: 15.5

Not sure how you can score two points in a season and not have the fans turn on you, but Mr. Glass brings other qualities to the show.  Namely, he is one of the best hitters on the team, and clearly one of the hardest forecheckers we have (along with Kunitz).  He’s also been a surprisingly solid penalty killer and a decent enforcer for a team with no room for dead weight.

He gets an extra Jersey-buyability point for having a cool last name, and loses half a point for the fact that he changed numbers midseason.

21. Deryk Engelland

Quality of Play: 2.5
Personality: 2
Toughness: 4
Intangibles: 2.5
Nickname: 3 (“Engo”)
Jersey-buyability: 1.5
TOTAL: 15.5

Engo impressed me last year with his strong play, and took a slight step back this season.  He hasn’t been bad, per se, but I noticed his mistakes more this year.  He’s certainly improved as the season progressed, but I think we’ve just about seen his ceiling.  He’s not bad, but he’s not good enough for any of us to memorize how to spell his name.

19. (tie) Matt Niskanen

Quality of Play: 3.5
Personality: 1.5
Toughness: 2
Intangibles: 3.5
Nickname: 3.5 (“Nisky”)
Jersey-buyability: 2
TOTAL: 16

Niskanen continues to surprise the Pens, as they continued to expand his role just to see how far he could take it.  As a result, we’ve gotten to watch him grow into one of our most dependable blue-liners - don’t look now, but dude’s developed the hardest, most accurate slapshot on the Pens’ back.    We also got to see what his limits are when Martin and Letang were out; Nisky struggled when he was asked to be the team’s top offensive D-man and first-unit power play quarterback, but that’s not what we expected from him.  In fact, we didn’t expect anything from him.  He was a throw-in in the James Neal trade, and any contributions we get from him are just gravy.  And gravy is delicious.

I might have given him more points for jersey-buyability if his name didn’t sound like he he’s trying to pass as Finnish, when he’s really just Canadian.

19. Beau Bennett

Quality of Play: 3.5
Personality: 3.5
Toughness: 1.5
Intangibles: 3.5
Nickname: 1.5 (Don’t need one when your name is Beau)
Jersey-buyability: 2.5
TOTAL: 16

I fully expect Beau to climb this list pretty quickly.  I, for one, was ready to be disappointed by Bennet after all the “let’s put him on Malkin’s wing” hype in the preseason, but he came in and proved to be as talented as advertised.  He displayed soft hands, tremendous awareness on the ice, and a few star-caliber moves.  Add to that his California-casual style, rollerblading back-story, and tweener adorability, and I think he’s going to be a popular Penguin for years to come, and let’s not sleep on the fact that he has the chance to become the first forward drafted and developed by the Pens to become an actual offensive threat since Jordy Staal.   I doubt we’ll see much of him in the playoffs, but he earned some playing time.  Underrated jersey purchase for those who want to be in the “I had a Bennett jersey before it was cool” crowd.

18. Craig Adams

Quality of Play: 4
Personality: 3
Toughness: 4
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 1
Jersey-buyability: 1
TOTAL: 17

Had to give credit to Craig Adams for his amazing season as a defensive forward – so good he merited mention in Pierre Lebrun’s Selke Trophy ballot on ESPN.com.  The guy is an intangibles machine (read: he doesn’t score), and he’s going to have to set the tone for the penalty kill in the playoffs if we’re going to put up a better showing than last year.

Adams is beloved in Pittsburgh for his work ethic and oft-mentioned intelligence (Harvard!), but he has a boring name and ADAMS 27 is just an aesthically displeasing jersey.  Sorry, man.

17. Mark Eaton

Quality of Play: 4
Personality: 1
Toughness: 3
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 3 (“Eats”)
Jersey-buyability: 2
TOTAL: 18

So glad to have Eats back in the fold.  I always loved him as the quintessential defenseman who you don’t notice – but that’s a good thing! – and he came back to Pittsburgh and assumed that role like nothing had happened.  He is such a steady presence on the back end; let’s hope that he gets lots of run in the dance.

An Eaton jersey is a cool way to advertise that you are a connoisseur of fine defensive play, and also that you’re being a bit too cute with your jersey buying.

A lucky Canadien bears witness to the Legend of Sutter 

15. (tie) Brandon Sutter

Quality of Play: 4
Personality: 3
Toughness: 3
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 1
Jersey-buyability: 3.5

TOTAL: 18.5

The Legend of Sutter got off to a nice start this year.  Although Sutter is not, and may never be, the game-altering physical force that Jordy Staal could sometimes be, he made up for his lack of domination with a flair for the dramatic.  Every single one of his goals seemed like a big one, and sure enough, 5 of his 11 goals were game winners.  So many of us penciled Sutter into Staal’s role on the team that we unfairly conflated the two, when their styles of play are actually very different.  Where Staal used his size to remove players from the puck, Sutter is more of a positional defender.  Staal’s reach and relentless challenge made him a perfect penalty killer, while Sutter was used surprisingly little on the PK; Sutter’s talent lies more in transitioning from defense to offense, laying in the weeds before intercepting the puck and moving it back up the ice.  He’s much smoother than I expected, and he’s already developed a signature play: streaking down the left side one-on-one with a defender, using said defender as a screen, and beating the goalie with a tidy wrister.  It’s such a hockey play, the kind of play that feels too fundamental to work anymore; when Sutter executes it, as he did multiple times this year, it seems almost anachronistic.  They just don’t make goals like that nowadays.

Solid jersey for those, like myself, who gravitate toward the less-heralded Pens centermen like Ronnie Francis and Jordy.  Wearing a Sutter tells the world that you like your skill tempered with a measure of humility.

15. Brooks Orpik

Quality of Play: 2.5
Personality: 2.5
Toughness: 4.5
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 1
Jersey-buyability: 4
TOTAL: 18.5

Brooks had an ugly first half of the season, resulting in copious reaction shots of 44 looking pissed and out of position after an opponent’s goal.  He’s tightened things up recently, before an injury knocked him out of the lineup, and he remains one of the teams most respected leaders.  Brother brings the toughness and intangibles, but sadly his name does not lend itself to nicknames as much as it seems it should, so he is stuck with the lazy “Brooksy” or the Doc Emrick-inspired “Orr-peck.”

As a lifelong Penguin with a badass name and number, his jersey is a classic - with extra points for the Team USA sweater.

13. (tie) Paul Martin

Quality of Play: 5
Personality: 2.5
Toughness: 3.5
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 1
Jersey-buyability: 3
 TOTAL: 19

One of the great tragedies of this season was that Martin was robbed of the opportunity to finish off a redemptory season for the ages.  After being ripped to shreds last year, we wanted him gone.  His contract was going to make him impossible to move – we had to trade Michalek instead, since he still had value – so we were stuck with him. Then he spent the first half of the season making us feel like idiots.  Suddenly he was the player we were promised when we acquired him, smooth as silk, positionally sound, and able to dictate the pace of the game.   Even if we expected improvement from Martin, I don’t think anyone saw him pulling a full Gonchar, going from whipping boy to franchise defenseman through sheer force of awesomeness.  If it weren’t for Crosby’s, Martin’s injury would have been the most lamentable.  The guy deserved to enjoy a full victory lap for his transformation.

Sadly, he’s another boring name/number guy – MARTIN 7 seems a little too “faceless hockey player in a movie” for my liking.

13. James Neal

Quality of Play: 3.5
Personality: 3
Toughness: 3
Intangibles: 3.5
Nickname: 3 (“Real Deal”/”Nealer”)
Jersey-buyability: 3
TOTAL: 19

This was a lost season for Neal.  After a hot start, he had to cope with losing Malkin to injury, and then suffering an injury of his own.  Thank God he came back in the final game of the seaon and scored a hat trick, ending the hemming and hawing about Neal’s streaky scoring.  To me, Neal is about as sure a thing as you can get in the NHL: what he’s got in his tool box – namely, an extremely quick release and excellent shot location – are the things that make goal scorers goal scorers, and they don’t disappear, as Neal so kindly proved to us against the Canes on Saturday.

Since he’s signed long-term and should be a guaranteed 30+ goal guy for the foreseeable future, a Neal jersey is a solid buy, but there’s just something about the blunt simplicity of his last name and the matching blah-ness of his number that just doesn’t quite do it for me.

12. Tomas Vokoun

Quality of Play: 3.5
Personality: 2
Toughness: 3.5
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 2.5 (“Voks”/”Koooon”)
Jersey-buyability: 4
TOTAL: 19.5

Vokoun fulfilled his expectations coming into the season, providing rest for (and competition to) Marc-Andre Fleury all year long.  When he was on, he was outstanding, especially during his franchise-record shutout streak.  When he was off, well, he was off.  Take a gander at his win/loss splits:

Win:  13 games, 20 GA, 351 shots faced, .943 SV%, 1.67 GAA, 3 SO
Loss:    6 games, 20 GA, 128 shots faced, .844 SV%, 4.83 GAA

In wins, Voks put up numbers that would have led the NHL, while his numbers in losses would have put him dead last in the league.  He let up as many goals in 13 wins as he did in fewer than half as many losses, on basically one-third of the shots.  Of course, all goalies will look shaky when you look at these splits, but Vokoun was particularly Jekyll-and-Hyde-ish.  The good news is that most of those Jekyll games (Jekyll’s the bad one, right?) came back in February; since then he’s been lights-out.  If everything goes as plans, Vokoun won’t have much to do this post-season, but if he does get the nod at any point, he should be more Koooooounnnns than Booooos (I was saying Booo-urns).

Voks had to invert his usual number since Fleury also wears 29, but fortunately he ended up with 92, which is a boss number for a goalie.  Add his cool last name and you could do worse in a jersey.

No, I'll never tire of this gif

11. Jussi Jokinen

Quality of Play: 4.5
Personality: 3
Toughness: 2
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 3.5 (“Juicy”)
Jersey-buyability: 3.5
TOTAL: 20.5

Juicy has been a revelation since coming to town at the trade deadline.  When others said that he was washed-up, having fallen short of 20 goals every season since his anomalous 30-goal campaign in 2009-10, Ray Shero saw a veteran who could prosper from a change of scenery (seems to be an ongoing theme with him), and our small sample has seen him pay off like gangbusters.  In 33 games for Carolina, the Juice had scored a paltry six goals and 11 points; in only ten games with the Pens, he’s matched that point total and tallied seven goals.  He has shown that he has big-league talent, winning face-offs and making smart, accurate passes.  Best of all, he’s added a new wrinkle to the power play: he likes to station himself high in the high slot, in between the other team’s defenseman and forwards, where he can accept a chip pass, wait for the opposing team’s box to collapse to him, and distribute the puck to the open wing or point.  It’s a delicate maneuver that requires patience, good hands, and better judgment, and when it works it can completely throw off a PK unit.  As I wrote when we first acquired him, he is way overqualified as a fourth-line center, and I expect him to be shuffled around a bit.

I’m a bit biased toward Juicy as he shares my high school hockey number, but you have to admit that 36 is a nice round one, and Jussi Jokinen is certainly the man with the name you love to say. I docked him a half point because there’s a chance this partial season will be a flash in the pan, and you’ll end up wishing you’d gone with a sweater with more staying power.

10. Matt Cooke

Quality of Play: 3
Personality: 4
Toughness: 4.5
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 4.5 (“Cookie”)
Jersey-buyability: 1
TOTAL: 21

It seems like in the latter half of this season Cooke finally managed to find a balance between his new, tamer, defanged self, and the limit-testing, cheap-shotting pest that made him a pariah around the league.   His penalty minutes are up since last year,  but not to the point where he’s hurting the team, and still far lower than his first few years on the Pens.  But unlike last year, when he seemed tentative and reluctant to lay a finger on the other team, this year (at least recently) he seems to have found a level that is neither cheap nor passive.  In at least three games  this season – against the Habs, Rangers, and Bruins, no less – he’s absolutely gotten into the heads of the other team, like Zac Rinaldo did to us in the playoffs, laying body checks on their top guys and chirping with their bench.  In the meantime, he’s developed into a relentless penalty killer, constantly hounding the puck.  If he can strike that same balance in the playoffs, get other teams off their game without crossing the line, he might finally begin to improve his reputation around the league.

That said, don’t buy a Matt Cooke jersey.  Too much bad karma in his past; you don’t want to take on that baggage, even in the spirit of forgiveness and reformation.

9. Brenden Morrow

Quality of Play: 4.5
Personality: 4
Toughness: 4.5
Intangibles: 4.5
Nickname: 1
Jersey-buyability: 3
TOTAL: 21.5

This guy is like the Platonic ideal of the gritty hockey player, so much so that my dad can’t talk about him without using the phrase “rink rat.”  He’s got a dome that looks like it was chiseled out of a cinderblock, he loves playing in all the hard areas, and he demands respect.  He’s not all sandpaper, though; he’s made a few highlight real plays since coming our way.  Like Juicy, he’s outperformed expectations, scoring three more points as a Penguin than he did as a Star, in half the games.  My favorite thing I’ve seen from him is his ability to strip the puck off of other players along the boards in the offensive zone, especially from behind.  He gets those sneaky turnovers that allow our forwards to get in behind the D.  Like Jokinen, he might not see a lot of time on the top two lines or the top power play unit, as I guessed when the trade was made, Morrow is the kind of professional who will gladly take whatever role you give him and work his ass off to make the team better.


Sadly, he’s another guy without a nickname in sight (particularly egregious in this case because I just can’t say the name “Brenden” without disdain creeping into my voice for some reason), and he chose the number 10, which, come on Penguins organization, needs to be retired like yesterday.  Ron Francis owned that number, and it just doesn’t look right on anyone else.

8. Marc-Andre Fleury

Quality of Play: 4
Personality: 4
Toughness: 2.5
Intangibles: 3
Nickname: 4.5 (“Flower”)
Jersey-buyability: 4
TOTAL: 22

I think we all need to admit that Flower was pretty awesome this year, even if his numbers were characteristically un-mind-blowing.  Pittsburgh has a funny relationship with Fleury, especially after last year’s debacle of a playoff series.  We defend him to the death, because he won us a Cup, and because we know he rises to the occasion.  But then someone points out his numbers, which always look bad and seem to deflate his clutchiness bona fides, and the doubt creeps in.  Like it or not, though, we’re stuck with him, and it’s important to realize that the numbers don’t tell the whole story.  Yes, Fleury seems to be allergic to shutouts, but we’ve seen countless games where he’s dominated for three periods before giving up a cheapie in the waning minutes of a win.  His performance in the April 5^th game against the Rangers, which we won 2-1 in a shootout, was the best I’ve ever seen him play in person, and it was breathtaking.  For all his flaws, I’d still take Fleury over a lot of the netminders who put up better-looking numbers than him.  A strong post-season from him, and he can erase all doubts – but another bed-shitting like the Flyers series and the city will turn on him.  No pressure though!

I saw Kris Letang at Ross Park Mall last month

7. Kris Letang

Quality of Play: 4
Personality: 3
Toughness: 3.5
Intangibles: 5
Nickname: 3.5 (“Tanger”)
Jersey-buyability: 4
TOTAL: 23

For all the high-profile injuries the Penguins suffered through this season, none left the team looking worse than Letang’s.  Without him, the blueline falls apart, and that’s a testament to everything he does for the team.  He is no longer a one-dimensional player; his speed is still his greatest asset on both ends of the ice, but he’s become a rock-solid defender, and his shot, once as wildly inaccurate as Tyler Kennedy’s, is now borderline surgical.  He will always have his flaws (his temper, his tendency to try to force the play, his occasional laziness with the puck), but we should be appreciating what we have, which is a top ten defenseman in the league, and one of the very few who can alter the tempo of an entire game.  He pretty quietly put up 38 points in 35 games, which is pretty damn good, and you have to think he would have been the favorite for the Norris Trophy had he played a full slate of games.

It’s also a credit to him that he’s turned the once very weird #58 into a trademark that seems totally fitting to him.  His is a great jersey, provided they resign him.

6. Douglas Murray

Quality of Play: 3.5
Personality: 3
Toughness: 5
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 4.5 (“Crankshaft”)
Jersey-buyability: 3.5
TOTAL: 23.5

Not much to say here: I knew he’d become a fan favorite, and he has.  He’s a hulking monolith of a man, and an absolute deterrent around the net and in the corners.  The playoffs are going to be a love-fest for Mr. Murray.

“MURRAY 3” has some of the straightforward brute force of the man who wears it, and it’s a jersey number that will no doubt be causing nightmares to anyone who becomes intimately familiar with Murray’s shoulder in the playoffs.  Go ahead and get the jersey.

4. (tie) Evgeni Malkin

Quality of Play: 3.5
Personality: 3.5
Toughness: 3
Intangibles: 5
Nickname: 4 (“Geno”)
Jersey-buyability: 5

TOTAL: 24

Pens fans are like parents with two extremely gifted sons: one is brilliant, outgoing, and seemingly perfect, a clean-cut Harvard med school grad and the best heart surgeon in the country.  The other is equally brilliant, but a bit more brooding and eccentric and listens to rock and roll music and loves Russian literature.  He went to MIT and is now working on top-secret cutting-edge engineering projects for the government or something.  The parents are proud of both, but if they’re honest, the second son makes them a little bit uneasy; he’s never done anything wrong, per se, but he seems to march to the beat of a different drummer.  So if the parents dote on the second son a little bit less than their golden boy, it’s not his fault.  The shortcoming is in the parents; they just don’t understand him.  And if Pens fans can’t appreciate the brilliance of Evgeni Malkin – who may be a less polished hockey player than Sidney Crosby, but whose diabolical creativity and sheer physical willfullness make him a one-of-a-kind superstar – then we don’t deserve him.  He was injured this season, and only showed glimpses of his usual self, but if you think he’s anything less than a generational talent and an unselfish, all-world competitor, you’re wrong.

Also, MALKIN 71 might be the best jersey out there.  His number, so distinctive, angular, and  dynamic, fits his game perfectly.

4. Chris Kunitz

Quality of Play: 5
Personality: 3.5
Toughness: 4
Intangibles: 4
Nickname: 3.5 (“Kuni”)
Jersey-buyability: 4
TOTAL: 24

Kunitz’s ascent this year was breathtaking.  After showing a huge improvement last year as a permanent fixture on Malkin and Neal’s left wing, Kunitz proved that he has the instincts to be a sniper in this league with Crosby as his center.  We can’t chalk up Kuni’s transformation to his being the lucky recipient of Crosby’s passes, either; Kunitz has worked his tail of for this team, first developing a physical edge and front-of-the-net game, and then, this year, perfecting the art of finishing a play.  His shot became automatic, and while some of that can be attributed to playing with the best player in the world, he also became a much better stick-handler and a smoother skater, honing his finesse skills while still giving up his body as the team’s best forechecker.  Though his play flagged with Crosby out of the lineup, he still ended up in the top ten IN THE LEAGUE in points and goals scored.  He and Crosby teaming up again in the playoiffs is going to be the best reunion since Pavement.

His jersey number is as wholesome and decent as Kunitz seems to be.  A good jersey to buy for guys who still wear letterman jackets and bring flowers on first dates.

This is why he doesn't get a 1 for Personality.  Miss this, buddy.

3. Sidney Crosby

Quality of Play: 5
Personality: 3
Toughness: 3.5
Intangibles: 5
Nickname: 3 (“Sid”)
Jersey-buyability: 5
TOTAL: 24.5
It’s depressing to look at Crosby’s career stats and think about all the missed opportunities.  He should have multiple Art Ross and Hart Trophies, and would have won both this season if not for a freak puck in the face.   But we shouldn’t lose sight of the spectacular campaign he was having before the injury.  If – and that if is about as big as can be – he can string together a few healthy seasons, he has the potential for a Lebron-like run of dominance, and, for the sake of historical record, I hope he does.  Starting in the playoffs.

An 87 jersey says you enjoy all the best things in life, and will accept nothing less.  You probably eat steak every night and drink craft beers and get your shirts pressed.  Good for you.

Behold!

2. Jarome Iginla

Quality of Play: 4
Personality: 5
Toughness: 4
Intangibles: 5
Nickname: 4 (“Iggy”)
Jersey-buyability: 5
TOTAL: 27

I still can’t believe we landed him.  In my first post, previewing the season, I began the half-in-jest tradefor Iginla plea (at the time, I suggested a package  Paul Martin, Eric Tangradi, and a first rounder in what I thought was a pretty hilarious offer – turns out I was being FAR too generous), but I never thought it would happen.  Even in the twilight of his career, Iggy is so much fun to watch.  He is teeming with hockey IQ and intangibles literally shoot out of his eyes.  And his shot – sweet Jesus.  On the powerplay, he mirrors Malkin on the left half-wall: with both he and Geno cocking their sticks back waiting for a feed from Letang, defenses are forced to pick their poison.  But what really makes that work is Iginla’s pace: while Malkin likes to play catch back-and-forth, lulling the goalie to sleep before cranking a one-timer, Iginla is much more decisive.  If he gets a pass in his wheelhouse and has a clear shot at the net, he’ll let it rip without a second thought, and his placement is just perfect.  With Iginla in tow, the power play can operate at different speed, keeping the other team on its heels.  On top of that, he’s the pro-iest pro’s pro who has ever pro-ed.  He plays the game like it’s supposed to be played – I mean, EXACTLY like it’s supposed to be played.  If they ever decide to make a HOCKEY manual, they should just follow Iginla around and record everything he does, because that’s what you should do.  Finish your checks.  Put the puck on net early and often.  Drop the gloves when your team needs it.  Brush your teeth three times a day.  Enjoy yourself out there.

Buy his jersey.  I did.  Even if we flame out (no pun intended) in the playoffs and he leaves town after one season, buy it.  It is an instant classic.

1. Pascal Dupuis

Quality of Play: 5
Personality: 5
Toughness: 3.5
Intangibles: 4.5
Nickname: 5 (“Super-Duper”)
Jersey-buyability: 4.5
TOTAL: 27.5

On a team with at least three future first-ballot Hall-of-Famers, and two players who could make a claim as the best in the world right now, the fan favorite in Pittsburgh is the goofy French-Canadian with the caterpillar eyebrows who wasn’t even drafted.  A lot of us wrote off Dupes’ career high 25 goals last season as an isolated incident sure to be followed by a regression to the norm – instead he scored 20 goals in 48 games, a 34 goal pace for an 82 game season.  We lamented missing out on Zack Parise in the offseason, and complained that Dupuis was a sad excuse for a first-line winger – Dupuis matched Parise point-for-point this season.  When Dupes got off to a blazing start, we attributed his success to Crosby – he went on to score 12 points in as many games without Crosby, despite being shifted from line to line.  It’s time to acknowledge that Dupuis metamorphosed from a character actor with exactly one above-average skill into one of the best two-way forwards in the game.  He kills penalties beautifully, led the league in plus/minus, and led the team in takeaways with 29, as many as Henrik Zetterberg.  In the Pens’ last game against the Bruins, it seems like Byslma assigned Dupuis to shadow Jagr, which he did expertly, picking his pocket on a couple of occasions and helping to hold him pointless – this sort of man-on-man assignment is the sort of thing Dupuis could really thrive on if given the opportunity in the playoffs.

Most impressive, though was his development into a timely, and deadly, goal scorer.  His work on the top line with Crosby and Kunitz was so bafflingly good that we actually protested that Dupes should not be relegated to a lower line by Iginla.  By JAROME IGINLA.  Then Crosby went out, and Dupuis proved that he could have chemistry with Morrow, with Jokinen, with Adams – anywhere you stick him, he will rise to the occasion.  He’s the consummate teammate, the life of every post-goal group hug, and the most garrulous guy on the team.  Oh, and he does all of this for $1.5 million dollars a season, $300,000 less than Matt Cooke.  And still you call him “Pasqual?”  Show some respect.

As for his jersey, the single number suits him perfectly, and the loopy 9 (particularly on the navy blue jerseys) is a nice stand-in for Dupes’ ever-present grin.  Buy your mom a Dupuis jersey for Mother’s Day – I can pretty much guarantee he’s her favorite player.