Say It Ain't So Sid!

Imagine that you have just won the powerball. What would you do with all of that money? Buy the house, cars, and hey, maybe even a sports team. The Islanders franchise is currently valued at $74.99, so that's ALWAYS an option. Now imagine that all of a sudden you had the house, cars, and every other possession you have ever wanted taken away from you in the blink of an eye. Just like that, you go from being on top of the world to the darkest of places.

Penguins superstar Sidney Crosby and Pens fans (to a much, much, much, lesser extent) could be looking at a scenario quite similar to winning the Powerball and then having it all taken away. Reports have surfaced again that Crosby is still experiencing symptoms from the tag-team of concussions he received in early January of this year.

CTV News , a Canadian TV station, reported Monday that Crosby suspended his training after suffering a recurrence of concussion-like symptoms and wouldn't be ready when the Penguins open training camp next month. A report his agent was quick to dismiss. Kind of.

"Sidney hasn't been shut down by anyone. He has simply adjusted his summer program accordingly to the different needs for the appropriate recovery," Crosby's agent Pat Brisson said in reply to the CTV News report. "Training camp is in three weeks from now. It is too premature to speculate all kinds of deliberate information at his point. Sidney will address the media at the appropriate time in order to give everyone an update. As far as I know training camp hasn't started yet."

Despite the fact that his statement doesn't make any sense from a grammatical perspective, Brisson's defensive and vague statements try to refute the speculation that Crosby has had to shut down his summer workouts, while at the same time not exactly dismissing the claims that his superstar client is actually still experiencing post concussion symptoms.

I am simply playing devils advocate here, but why wouldn't Crosby's agent just explain that his client is fine and will be in training camp when it opens. That would be the easiest way of calming the media storm that is surely to await Crosby when he gets to camp in a matter of weeks. I hate to be pessimistic here, but the fact that Brisson has been so dismissive, instead of just laying out the real truth, leads me to believe that something may actually still be wrong with Crosby.

Crosby's PR team is doing a good job getting in front of this story, as they should. If he was having symptoms they would never admit it anyway. They have nothing to gain from doing that. The question that is begging to be asked is this, what if the rumors are true? What if Crosby still can't train 100% without experiencing symptoms?

It will be an apocalyptic day for Pens fans if it is revealed that he is still having symptoms. We know all about the severity of concussions so I refuse to bore you will all of the meaningless statistics. I would much rather bore you with my incessant rambling. Crosby's head could probably be insured by Lloyd's of London (just like Troy's Polamalu's hair). Pens fans have been blessed ever since Mario was drafted. They have had the best player in the world on their roster for nearly two decades now. If Crosby is not right, that may no longer be the case.

With all due respect to Mario and the moronic winger who shall not be named (his last name starts with a
 j and ends in agr!) , nobody means more to the Pens than Sidney Crosby does as a player. Mario saved the franchise three times, once as a player, once as an owner, and once when he traded the moronic winger who shall not be named to the Capitals (that worked out well for the jagoff).

Crosby saved the franchise once, so if you are keeping score it is 3-1 Mario. However, Crosby/Ovenchicken are the NHL right now. As much as it pains me to admit this, Mario was able to operate under the shadow of Gretzky's huge presence for the majority of his career. He didn't even begin to step out of the shadow of Gretzky until the Canada Cup in '87 when he scored one of the three biggest goals in Canadian hockey history against the USSR. (Oh, by the way, if we are keeping score, Sid has one of the two goals in Canadian hockey history that is bigger than the aforementioned Lemieux goal)

The media spotlight has increased tenfold since Mario entered the league. Even though both Mario and Sid entered the NHL with astronomical expectations, Mario was afforded the luxury of coming into an NHL where players (including himself) smoked cigarettes in between periods. Mario also once said that his offseason training regimen was to "stop ordering french fries with my club sandwich in August."  The media, as well as professional sports in general, are a much different landscape now. Crosby gave his first interview at the age of seven. Since he was 14, he has been hailed as the next Gretzky/Lemieux. He was the Lebron James of hockey (lets just hope that Sid doesn't eventually decide to take his talents to South Canada). Quick sidebar: As soon as I found out the Pens won the draft lottery for the right to take Crosby #1 in 2005,  I called my dad and quickly spat out something to the effect of, "Dad, we need to split season tickets right now, you have no idea how good this Crosby kid is going to be!" He thought about it for a second and replied, "Sound's good, get the tickets." My dad trusts me when it comes to such things as hockey, but if I asked him for $1500 to invest, um...not so much.

The Penguins, their fans, and the NHL will never recover if Crosby fails to get back to 100%. He was absolutely terrorizing opposing defenses every night last year, scoring at a pace that was Lemieux like. In today's NHL, that is really saying something. He is the face of a league that sorely needs to make a more positive impression on the national media.

This can't happen right? One of the most talented players ever isn't supposed to have his career blindsided because of a concussion. Where is the justice in that? I would gladly take 10 more years of Crosby having to play with the Andy Hilbert's of the world, as long as he is healthy.

At the end of the day only Crosby knows how he feels. Pens fans have to wait a few more weeks until Crosby will speak with the media and HOPEFULLY put us all at ease. I refuse to believe that Crosby won't be ready for the start of the season, simply because I dread thinking about the ramifications of him not being healthy in early October. Until Crosby finally speaks, we should all hold our winning powerball tickets with a sense of trepidation.