I've been thinking a lot about who the Pens may sign this off-season, and got inspired to do some statistics today. 

 I figure the best (or at least easiest) measure of the overall value of a player is GVT, or goals versus threshold.  I don't know exactly how this is computed, but I know it similar to baseball's VORP (Value Over Replacement Player).  Tom Award defines GVT as: " the value of a player, in goals, above what a replacement player would have contributed."  But comparing players' value is not enough.  In today's salary cap NHL, all teams must look carefully at what they can afford to pay their players, and search for the best value possible.

Since the Penguins will likely be in the market for a winger, I took a list of all winger free agents and their 2009-2010 salaries from here.  Then I got these players' GVT data from behindthenet.ca here.  To calculate the different wingers' value per salary dollar, I divided their GVT by their salary, and then multiplied by a million to make the numbers comparable.  I then filtered the data to include only players with 2009-2010 salaries of between 1 and 2.5 million, figuring the Pens can't find a scoring winger for less than 1 million, and they can't afford to pay more than 2.5.  Without further ado, here are the top ten results, their salary, GVT, and GVT/Salary:

Well, we have some familiar names on here, and some not so familiar names.  Selanne is  one name I've definitely heard tossed around recently, and this seems to confirm that the Pens should go after him.  (Though he did only play for half of last season...)  Our own Bill Guerin and even Fedotenko make the list.

I know this list has some problems, like maybe some guys are due for a raise, or some are overpaid.  Also some may retire (Tkachuk, Selanne, and Guerin...).  But I think it's a good starting point to look at guys we should be interested in, and could realistically afford.  Who would you like to see the Pens sign?