The lower-body injury Sidney Crosby sustained at the Olympics will significantly impact the rest of his season. According to a team announcement, the Pittsburgh Penguins have placed their captain on the injured reserve. Additionally, the team has activated veteran defenseman Kris Letang in a corresponding roster move.
Although Team Canada, largely out of respect for the Penguins, failed to clarify the extent of Crosby’s injury; Pittsburgh did. The team shared that Crosby is expected to miss the next four weeks at a minimum, putting his projected return toward the end of March in a best case scenario.
Obviously, Crosby’s absence will have a significant impact on Pittsburgh’s competitiveness to close out the regular season. Despite their strong performance this season, largely led by Crosby offensively, the team is only one point up on the New York Islanders and five points up on the Columbus Blue Jackets and Washington Capitals. Still, the Penguins have a few games in hand on the Islanders and Capitals, respectively.
Even if the Penguins commit to buying at the deadline, there are few options to fill the void left by Crosby, both on and off the ice. In his age-38 campaign, he’s remained a point-per-game player, registering 27 goals and 59 points in 56 games, averaging 19:35 of ice time per night. There’s a 15-point gap between Crosby and fellow veteran Evgeni Malkin for the team-lead in scoring.
If there’s any consolation, Pittsburgh will be able to move Malkin to the first-line center, where he’s filled in on occassion throughout Crosby’s career. Also incumbered by injuries throughout the season, Malkin has had a quality year when healthy, scoring 13 goals and 44 points in 41 games.
It’ll be interesting to see if Crosby’s injury will have any impact on the Penguins’ plans for the trade deadline. Given that they’re surprisingly competitive this season, General Manager Kyle Dubas has been able to add a few NHL pieces in a flurry of trades while also improving the team’s draft capital moving forward.
Meanwhile, Letang returns from injury after a month, though much of that was from the Olympic break. He had been recovering from a broken foot. The 20-year veteran has scored three goals and 25 points in 50 games for the Penguins this season. It’s expected that he’ll resume his role on Pittsburgh’s second defensive-pairing, alongside recent acquisition, Samuel Girard.
Crosby out for a month because of an injury he suffered in a meaningless exhibition, There goes any momentum the Pens may have had leading into the postseason.
Ah yes, the most significant international tournament in hockey that most of the players grow up dreaming of playing in is a “meaningless exhibition”. It’s also odd that the president of the winning team’s country met with the team after, considering how meaningless it was.
New name and all, Wilf is on one of his epic babbling heaters. Seems to believe that his movement of one will stop the scourge of NHL players in Olympic hockey. Too dim to understand that the players wanted to play, chose to play, and knew that injuries were a risk. Let him run – he really doesn’t get more entertaining than when he is smashing his cranium against the end boards.
The Pens have the most difficult remaining strength-of-schedule in the entire league and now have to do a big chunk of it without their best player.
Sell sell sell March 6th coming soon.
While this horse has been beaten into the ground, I’ll add another clarification (which isn’t really needed, let’s face it). There is mainly one group of big-wig individuals who see the Olympics as a “meaningless exhibition”, and that is the NHL owners. The players who go there, though, see this as a big deal. Fans are split, with some siding with owners. The owners get nothing out of it, other than massive worry for the health and well-being of their players. The fans who do care will watch (at least some of you can) and usually like what they see, since it’s best-on-best. The players see the uniqueness of this and really cherish the experience. Now, the WCs in the spring don’t carry that level of importance and reverence, as a number of the best players are still horsing around in the NHL playoffs. So, if you still want to call it meaningless, you are entitled to that opinion, but know that the vast majority of fans don’t agree with that assessment. FWIW, I have never seen it as meaningless, going back to ancient times.
The frustrating thing about the Olympics are all those 10-2 games that are meaningless in every respect.
I don’t think that even the owners have a problem with a USA-Canada game.
So, a game time decision on Sunday became 4 weeks minimum…?
Sid was trying to play on one leg.
They need to move Olympic hockey back to the summer if you want to use the NHL players.