Letang, Goligoski not a sure thing to replace Gonchar's production

The vibe around the league heading into the new year as noted by highly respected columinst Bucky Gleason of the Buffalo News, is that Pittsburgh will let Sergei Gonchar walk via free agency rather than pay him $15-$20 million on a 3 or 4 year contract.

However, independent sources continue to claim that any talk of Gonchar leaving is premature at this point as the first set of substantive talks with Penguins general manager Ray Shero and J.P. Barry the agent for Gonchar will not begin until another couple weeks.

Pittsburgh will break off talks after the trade deadline as Pittsburgh now has a 6-7 week window to strike a deal.

Meanwhile, team sources have confirmed that Gonchar is indeed seeking close to $5 million per season. As a source told me, if Gonchar was willing to take a home-town discount, a deal would have been struck in the summer.

Despite Gonchar wanting to get paid, the Penguins have not ruled out making him an offer close to to his current pay and both sides are going into the first set of talks with an open mind.

Gonchar remains Pittsburgh's top priority and one option that Pittsburgh plans to explore is a base salary in the range of