Fantasy Impact: The Pittsburgh Penguins have acquired winger Lee Stempniak from the Calgary Flames in exchange for a draft pick.
The Penguins get: an on-again, off-again productive player. Stempniak is often “on again” when he joins a new team. Combine that with the fact that he will line up with Sidney Crosby (they’re obviously not going to keep Brian Gibbons there), this is a potential goldmine for Stempniak owners. I put my money where my mouth is and used two-thirds of my remaining waiver-wire auction budget on a bid for Stempniak.
Fantasy Players Impacted: While Stempniak could just be another Alexei Ponikarovksy, whom the Penguins snagged in another deadline deal but who turned out to be a bust, Stempniak has shown decent production more recently. And we’ve also seen him join new teams and how he responds. When he first arrived in St. Louis, Toronto, Phoenix and to a lesser extent Calgary he made an immediate splash – especially with Phoenix.
The Penguins had Beau Bennett penciled in on the Evgeni Malkin and James Neal line, with Pascal Dupuis and Chris Kunitz on the Sidney Crosby line. But with Dupuis and Bennett injured long term, the team has had to find other options. Brian Gibbons has been playing with Crosby – but Stempniak will replace him. For the long term, even with Crosby Stempniak is a 55-point player if healthy. But short term, after seeing what he did in Phoenix, I’m convinced that he could post 15 points in 20 games or more.
His departure from Calgary frees up two minutes of power-play time per game. I would imagine that Joe Colborne and Sean Monahan will split that, as well as possibly Sven Bartschi, who could be recalled.
Fantasy Players this helps, in order:
1. Stempniak
big gap
2. Bartschi
Fantasy Players this hurts, in order:
1. Gibbons
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