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Malkin won’t be traded during off-season

Evgeni Malkin

Pittsburgh Penguins center Evgeni Malkin (71) of Russia, carries the puck during the third period of an NHL hockey game against the Carolina Hurricanes in Pittsburgh Saturday, March 20, 2010. Carolina won 3-2 in OT.(AP Photo/Don Wright)

AP

Yeah, I too read the headline I just wrote and have to shake my head that something like this is even a story but here we are nonetheless and we’ve all got the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review’s Rob Rossi to thank for it for what he wrote here the other day.

Shero should start making calls to his contemporaries, and his first words should be: “Make me an offer for Malkin.” It must include a top-line wing, a top-pairing defenseman, two roster players and either two top prospects or two first-round picks.

To give up Geno, the Penguins must get the world in return. If they get it, their Cup window won’t be limited to three seasons, as it will be with the three-center plan.

It’s a bold statement and one that got everyone in Pittsburgh talking and got others to sniff around, including the folks at TSN to see if there was any possibility this could happen. Needless to say, of course there isn’t any possibility. Rossi even had to do his own legwork to get this confirmed. Madness ahead.

I’m told the Penguins are not entertaining the possibility of trading C EVGENI MALKIN, the 2009 NHL scoring champion and playoff MVP and, with a $8.7 million salary-cap hit, the franchise’s co-highest paid player.

Well of course they’re not entertaining that talk, Rob, because Malkin has been the key cog for the success of the Penguins. Besides, who would even be in the same realm as getting a fair return on Malkin in a trade? Rick Nash, maybe? Perhaps a now over-30 Jarome Iginla? Nonsensical. Besides, there may be another motivation for this piece at work here.

Rossi has gone through this repeatedly complaining about Malkin, something to which one of the writers at the ubiquitous Penguins fan blog, The Pensblog, took time to make a note of this morning in two separate tweets via Twitter (tweet one, tweet two).

also I’ll throw this out there. Rossi, Madden and some other media people do not like Malkin based on the fact of he still struggles w/eng

Rossi routinely makes fun of Malkins English. To me he speaks better English than Fmr Steeler Willie Parker

OK so that’s a little awkward for Willie Parker to read, but the point remains that sometimes Russian athletes struggle with many Canadian and American media members because they’re not fluent in English and to hold that against them seems supremely unfair.

If a writer holds that against the athlete because they can’t communicate in the most clear and efficient way, it speaks more about the writer’s dedication to being a professional than it does to the player not wanting to get his point across correctly.