It appears that Evgeni Malkin will indeed start to skate.
Expectation is injured PIT C Evgeny Malkin, who has missed most of training camp, will do some light skating today.
— Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) October 4, 2014
Dejan Kovacevic also wrote about Malkin's injury in his latest piece that you can find here:
The Evgeni Malkin drama is nothing, I’m assured. He’s around the team, he’ll be ready to skate soon, and that will be that. The Penguins made a conscious decision to keep it quiet and follow regular-season norms with that sort of thing. Nothing else.
This is obviously good news and with the Penguins not playing until October 9th I believe there is still a possibility (albeit a small one) of Malkin suiting up for the opener.
Last year Malkin's absence would have been crippling to start the year. Fortunately the Penguins have better forwards depth, even if the top six isn't as deadly (for now).
Mike Johnston's system will have the defensemen jumping into the play more often for offensive opportunities and that within itself should assist in making up for any potential Malkin absence. You can never replace Geno, but the Penguins are better suited to do so this year.
As I am typing this more roster news has been broken:
The #Pens have assigned Brian Dumoulin and Bobby Farnham to @WBSPenguins and placed Jeff Zatkoff on waivers. More: http://t.co/zqf9HFdyzi
— Pittsburgh Penguins (@penguins) October 4, 2014
No real surprises here. Brian Dumoulin was always a candidate to be sent down because of his waiver status. What is bad news for Dumoulin appears to be very good news for Harrington. Will Dumoulin be dangled at some point this year in a trade? We'll see.
Taylor Chorney has had a decent enough training camp to this point. Chorney remains with the big club for now. He needs to pass through waivers, unlike Dumoulin.
Jeff Zatkoff is not as good as Thomas Greiss, it is as simple as that. Penguins wouldn't have signed Greiss if they didn't feel he was an upgrade. There was never a "battle" for the #2 spot in my opinion. Penguins were just being polite publicly about it.
Edit 12:16 PM:
In addition to Zatkoff, Penguins have placed Sill, Chorney and Ebbett on waivers. Latter three are still on major-league roster, though.
— Dave Molinari (@MolinariPG) October 4, 2014
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