Ahead of Sidney Crosby’s first house opener at Pittsburgh’s now-extinct Mellon Enviornment in October 2005, Mario Lemieux walked while a media scrum encircling Crosby and into the avid gamers’ front room, pouring a cup of lightless espresso.
Smirking, he opined about quickly being “forgotten.” Next, in an surprisingly earnest future, Lemieux predicted Crosby would “own all my records one day,” nodded his head and walked out.
Lemieux may have undersold it. Crosby can have a chance to crack Lemieux’s Penguins data, but additionally NHL data by way of Wayne Gretzky (maximum consecutive seasons averaging no less than some extent in keeping with sport) and Steve Yzerman (maximum consecutive seasons as a workforce captain).
“(Lemieux) really said that?” Crosby mentioned on Monday afternoon, later talking with Pittsburgh media following his annual supply of season tickets to an unsuspecting crowd in Mars, Pa. “Like, really?
“Uh, there’s still a long way to go.”
Now not too lengthy. Crosby wishes 99 targets, 30 assists, and 128 issues to knock Lemieux from the Penguins’ perch in the ones regular-season divisions. He way back prepared the franchise marks for postseason assists (130) and issues (201), and desires simplest six postseason targets to do one higher than Lemieux’s 76.
Nonetheless, later Crosby signed a unused, two-year oath with an $8.7 million reasonable annual worth with the Penguins on Monday, he’ll get no less than 3 extra cracks at a cut price price to notch extra accomplishments.
GO DEEPER
Crosby’s unused Penguins oath is his sweetest help but
Whether or not he drags the Penguins alongside for the journey — and again right into a place of prominence — or turns into the one explanation why to serve a few proud-turned-fledgling franchise may resolve if Crosby does what Lemiex did in Pittsburgh: keep till the tip of his profession.
Crosby has mentioned he desires to play games just for the Penguins. He additionally desires to chase some other Stanley Cup championship.
The Penguins have no longer certified for the endmost two playoffs and can once more input a season with one of the vital NHL’s oldest rosters. Since Kyle Dubas traded for superstar defenseman Erik Karlsson endmost August, the Penguins’ front-office boss’s maximum mischievous acquisitions had been a handful of possibilities.
As soon as a ceremony of passage for Crosby’s Penguins, a postseason look is infrequently assured prior to his unused oath expires. Intriguingly, that oath is structured so he can leverage an progress prior to its ultimate season if Dubas doesn’t briefly go back the Penguins to contender condition.
Crosby’s oath is designated 35-plus, a remarkable condition in keeping with the collective bargaining guarantee between the NHL and its Gamers Affiliation. The oath contains two signing bonuses — a decision, necessarily, by way of Crosby and agent Pat Brisson to get the majority of the unedited cash paid prior to Crosby performs the overall season of the unused do business in.
Crosby will earn $780,000 and $1.09 million in wage respectively in Years 1 and a couple of of the unused oath. However he’s going to had been paid $16.31 million in actual cash prior to taking part in a sport in Date 2.
Who cares how Penguins proprietor Fenway Sports activities Team can pay Crosby as long as it can pay him, proper?
Each and every alternative GM within the league will serve.
With 93.7 p.c of Crosby’s wage paid prior to Date 2 of the unused oath, he would come affordable — once more, relating to unedited cash — in any doable commerce all the way through the 2026 offseason. By way of paying the supermajority of Crosby’s actual cash prior to that 2d oath season, the Penguins may justifiably call for a extra favorable go back in any doable commerce, particularly if, as could be most probably, they took on a sizeable bite of Crosby’s cap clash.
It will be only a one-season clash if Dubas retained even 50 p.c ($4.35 million) to maximise the go back in a commerce that may finish — albeit most probably simplest quickly — one of the vital NHL’s superb love tales.
Crosby didn’t signal this unused oath not to see it thru. He’s mentioned many times, publicly and privately, that he desires to play games just for the Penguins.
He additionally mentioned he desires to win. He reiterated that time a couple of hours later the Penguins introduced his unused oath on Monday.
“I had some conversations with Kyle throughout the process,” Crosby mentioned of the negotiations. “I think that was reassuring — just based on what we discussed as far as there’s still hunger from the organization and ownership to win and a commitment there.
“I think that’s really important. I feel like as players, for all the different guys that have played here over the course of the time that I’ve been here, it’s something that you build as a culture… something’s that’s ingrained. And missing the playoffs for a couple of years, not being in it, is difficult.
“You want to try to find every way possible to get back in there and make sure that we compete for the Stanley Cup. So, I think that was reassuring to hear and that helped. But no, I think it was more just hearing that reassurance.”
Nearest upcoming season, Crosby shall be coming near his thirty ninth birthday, and Dubas can have had 3 complete years to prepared a direction. His franchise icon must be capable of take a look at the roster and assess whether or not it’s a Cup contender. By way of later, Crosby’s view of the status in Pittsburgh may rely as a lot on his opinion of the roster as it would on whether or not he desires to proceed with out Evgeni Malkin (more likely to renounce) and most likely Kris Letang, whose ultimate two contractual seasons don’t seem to be as trade-prohibitive.
Crosby reiterated Monday how particular it’s been to play games 18 seasons with Malkin and Letang as teammates. The Penguins’ Fat 3 isn’t going while 20 seasons, if simplest on account of Malkin’s oath.
If, later upcoming season, one or either one of his expensive buddies have walked away and the Penguins aren’t nearer to successful their first playoff sequence since 2018, who would begrudge Crosby for in need of what might be his ultimate NHL season to be a shot on the Cup elsewhere?
The onus is on Dubas to manufacture Crosby’s determination simple by way of later. By way of preserving his cap clash as is, Crosby equipped Dubas valuable hundreds of thousands to improve the Penguins upcoming offseason and the only later it. If the Penguins are at the upswing later 2025-26, who higher than Crosby to turn their upcoming doubtlessly superb workforce how you can win?
That might be a picture-perfect swan track for Crosby — with the Penguins within the playoffs, one endmost run prior to Deny. 87 is finished.
Next, he can remove then again a lot while away he desires, get started a crowd and go back to the franchise in no matter off-ice capability he chooses. He doesn’t want to turn out to be an proprietor, as Lemieux did, however he may.
Crosby’s middle is with the Penguins. He made that sunlit on Monday.
“It’s probably difficult to put that … into a sound bite,” he mentioned, talking from the again porch of a suburban Pittsburgh house the place he playfully traded high-fives with youngsters dressed in diverse variations of his Deny. 87 Penguins jersey. “Support (from) the people, the fans, the organization, just everything over the years — it’s been really special, and we’ve had some incredible experiences and memories.
“I just want to continue that.”
(Representation: Dan Goldfarb / The Athletic; Pictures: Jeanine Leech and Brandon Sloter / Icon Sportswire / Getty Photographs)
