I sent this into Steve Mears on Penguins Live today. I asked him some loaded questions today. Feel free to give me your thoughts too.
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Jedi Master Mears!
Happy Monday. Rough loss yesterday but some interesting turn of events that look like they will set the scene for the playoffs. I have a few things to say and a question for you.
You’ve mentioned this on the show before and I’ve talked about it on a number of occasions as well, the Pens haven’t been doing a good job stepping up to answer the cheap shots taken on their stars. Yesterday they did. Vitale did it with class, laying that awesome and perfectly clean, open ice hit. Asham and Engelland followed up with making their fighting presence known that looked to say “the cheap stuff just wont fly anymore”. The crosscheck that Crosby took coming off the ice, long after play had stopped, was just flat out unnecessary. In another light, if Cooke pulls that on someone’s star player, he gets tossed and we all know that’s the truth.
Goal tending hasn’t been what we’re used to, but the defense and turnovers seem to be even worse. Uncharacteristic things for the Pens, like Crosby making blind passes across the front of the net and tons of pucks being turned over in the neutral zone – they’re killing us. Letang and Orpik being split to babysit Z and Martin is just nerve-wracking because teams seem to have figured out how to take advantage of that now. Where do the Pens start cleaning it all up? How do you see the Pens being able to get back to their game on all ends of the ice, but especially on the defensive end of the red line?
LETS GO PENS!!!
-The Pittsburgh Jedi
