Its all about finding ice to skate on for Malkin.
He is not good standing still playing hockey, and partly because he isn't used to the smaller ice, and partly because Therien got a pretty strict system, Malik had some problems getting his feet moving for the Penguins.
He is not the type of player like Crosby who takes of in no time, he must get some freedom to build up his speed, and he must learn to keep his feet moving in smaller areas too.
For Russia Frolov, Kovalchuk and Malkin are skating around like madmens, all 3 gooing after the puck, no system whatsoever when forechecking. Not saying thats the way to go, they get away with it since they are so damn skilled, when it works it also makes them look extremely good, when it doesn't work a ECHL team could create offense against them...