Will We Lose Ruutu on a YEAR?

New from TIOPS:

[UPDATE] 10:55 a.m. Yesterday Carolina, Chicago, NYR, Calgary, Dallas and Detroit inquired about Jarkko Ruutu. Penguins still waiting to hear from him. It's believed Ruutu is still fielding offers.

• Penguins don't appear as confident as they were last night regarding Ruutu and Orpik. Still trying to find that common ground with Orpik.
• They expected a decision from Ruutu last night. Still haven't heard from him. His intentions could be known very soon.
• Nothing new on Ruutu. Penguins still waiting to hear from him. He wants three years. Penguins offering two. Could see some movement from him by noon.

I just DO NOT understand this at all. Why can't they give him his 3 years? Dupuis was signed for 3 and if the playoffs are any indication of what the rest of his Penguin career will be like, Ruutu is definitely worth 3 years more than Dupuis is. Can someone explain this to me? Why lose a player for a year? If they do not sign Ruutu, I will be highly disappointed (but I guess you already knew that)!

COME ON, RS!! It's a year. Don't lose a good player for that!! The Pens have all but scheduled a press conference to get on their knees and beg [Rich Winter] for Hossa to stay; can't you give Ruutu a year?! AMAZING!! Yes, I may be biased because he's a favorite of mine, but even so this seems trivial and not worth losing a great role player on your team for!

OTHER NEW POSTS FROM TIOPS:

• 8:30 a.m. Some new stuff on Jagr. According to a source Jagr's agent was approached by Shero as dictated by Lemieux. Mario may contact Jagr this morning. My thoughts on this are a deal is not going to happen but if Hossa goes with somebody else stranger things have happened. As I just wrote just a few minutes ago Markus Naslund has Pittsburgh near the top of his list, but he may not wait around as Pittsburgh continues to wait on Marian Hossa. I'm being told he wants to sign soon. Vancouver making late push since they appear to be out of the Hossa sweepstakes. The Penguins expect some news soon on Hossa but I'm being told Ritch Winter is in no hurry. I would still bet on a decision by the afternoon.


• 8:25 a.m. If the Penguins do miss out on Marian Hossa there are indications they have a interest in both Naslund and Demitra. I was told to look at for Naslund today. He's expected to sign somewhere today and and Pittsburgh is at the top of his list. Det, Van, NYR have offers on the table. MTL has also been in discussions. The longer Brooks Orpik is on the market the likelyhood that more teams are going to get involved. Washington jumped into the sweepstakes late in the game. A few others may be in this to. Min and MTL being mentioned but they can't move on Orpik until they get answers from Huselius,-- Sundin and Hossa respectively.

WOW - Mario expected to make a call to Jagr - that's interesting! Lemieux must've caught the interview they did with JJ when he was in town for the playoffs in which he stated that he owed Mario everything. My husband thinks it gave Mario a "change of heart."