Tampa Bay claimed Penguins left winger Andre Roy on waivers today.

Because Roy, who had been assigned to the Penguins' minor-league team in Wilkes-Barre earlier this week, was on "re-entry waivers," the Penguins will be responsible for paying a pro-rated portion of his $1 million salary for the balance of this season, and half of his $1 million salary in 2007-08.

Roy, signed as a free agent from the Lightning in 2005, had no points and 12 penalty minutes in five appearances with the Penguins this season.

He played in 104 games with the Lightning between 2002 and 2004, putting up 12 goals, nine assists and 260 penalty minutes during that span. He played in 21 games during the 2004 playoffs, when Tampa Bay won the Stanley Cup.

"It was never our intention or our desire to lose Andre Roy in the first place," Lightning general manager Jay Feaster said in a prepared statement. "However, when the new (collective bargaining agreement) was put in place, we knew that in a salary cap world we could not afford to match what some teams were going to be prepared to pay Andre and thus we lost him to unrestricted free agency.

"Having lost him, we never regained that tough, physical, gritty element that Andre brings. Now, for the first time, the new CBA has helped us in that through re-entry waivers we have been able to bring back a very important player to our hockey team at a salary and cap hit that make sense."