As Sidney Crosby reaches 1,000 games, teammates share what makes him great
Numbers will largely define Sidney Crosby the player.
Heck, the 87 on his back kind of tells his story considering he was born on the seventh day of the eighth month of 1987.
Statistics will paint a pretty vivid picture of the Penguins’ longtime captain when his career is evaluated. And he’s scheduled to add another milestone Saturday when he appears in his 1,000th career regular season game.
It’s a mark that is not only important for the man but the Penguins as well. It quantifies the time he’s been in Pittsburgh and his impact on the Penguins, having elevated them from the franchise’s doldrums it experienced in the mid-2000s to the heights of becoming one of the NHL’s elite franchises throughout the past decade.
Sidney Crosby has a lot of numbers.
But he has a lot of stories too over his nearly 1,000 games.
Over the past week, a number of his teammates from his 16 seasons with the Penguins shared some of those tales that also define Crosby.
Expectations
Dylan Reese was probably one of the relatively few people from Western Pennsylvania who knew of Sidney Crosby in the early 2000s. Their paths crossed at an agency camp early in this century when Crosby was 14 and Reese was 17.
A native of Upper St. Clair, Reese was one of the first individuals from the Pittsburgh area to play in the NHL as a defenseman who appeared 78 NHL games throughout the late 2000s and early 2010s, including three contests with the Penguins in 2012-13.
When the Penguins landed the top overall pick in the 2005 draft and a chance to draft Crosby, the Harvard-educated Reese, celebrated the occasion like a lot of people from Western Pennsylvania, albeit remotely.
“I was with (a friend) doing a summer of London School of Economics, studying abroad when I was in college.” Reese said. “We woke up the next morning, and we found out that it was the Penguins, and we knew it was going to be Sidney. We were ecstatic.
“It was exciting for me to watch him evolve and carry the city. The Penguins (threatened) to move to Kansas City and then they draft Sidney Crosby and all of a sudden hockey becomes what it was in 1991 and 1992 when I started playing. He’s meant so much to the city.”
Comparisons
Even before he entered the NHL, Crosby was already drawing comparisons to the NHL’s all-time greats. No less of an authority on the subject than Wayne Gretzky labeled Crosby as the league’s next great player when the latter was only 16.
One of the few people who could make a direct comparison between “The Great One” and “The Next One” is former NHL enforcer Ryan VandenBussche.
The beginning of VandenBussche’s career came in the late 1990s with the New York Rangers as a teammate of Gretzky, who was in his final NHL seasons. Conversely, the final 20 games of VandenBussche’s career came with the Penguins in 2005-06 when Crosby was a rookie.
“Gretzky I do remember, we’re skating (for practice), we were in kind of a down streak there,” VandenBussche said. “And the coach thought he would skate us when we were doing these laps. I happened to be behind Gretzky when we were doing these laps, and I saw him look up at the coach and shake his head. Thirty seconds later, practice was over. There wasn’t a ton of intensity at the end of his career, I don’t think, but he is Wayne Gretzky. He saved his energy for the (games) obviously. The way he practiced (in his late 30s) as opposed to an 18-year-old Sidney Crosby was a night-and-day difference.
“His pregame warmup was tougher than my postgame workout. The only difference was he played over 20 minutes a game, and I was lucky to get two to four minutes a game. The one game, prior to, we were doing our warmup, and I was going to do it with him. About halfway through, I couldn’t finish. I didn’t want to finish because I thought I’d be tired for the game.”
Obsession
Crosby’s devotion to his craft is a common theme when discussing his elite play. Seemingly minor details are not overlooked by Crosby and he obsessively refines them.
For example, faceoffs.
In his first two NHL seasons, Crosby only won 48% percent of the draws he took.
Since then, over his next 14 seasons, that number has improved to 52.7%, and he has become one of the NHL’s most reliable faceoff specialists.
That didn’t happen organically.
In October of 2008, the Penguins traded for fourth-line center Mike Zigomanis, partly due to his acumen in the faceoff dot.
“He took a little bit of heat the year before I got there on his faceoffs,” said Zigomanis, now a radio broadcaster in Toronto. “Even the start of that year in (2008-09). He would just come up to me before practice and say, ‘Hey, would you want to go work on draws? I don’t know of too many first liners in the league that go out to work on your draws. It’s not on the top of your list. That’s just the type of guy he was.
“He would ask me different things on what would work, what wouldn’t work. We had a good chat on faceoffs. Some of the stuff that I suggested that works well, I still see him use today when I watch the games.”
Another area Crosby excels at is tips and re-directions around the cage. Again, not an accident.
“He’s very specific about the work that he puts in,” said former Penguins forward Craig Adams. “He’s not just out there after practice or before practice working hard. A lot of people are. He was always very deliberate about what he was doing and what he was working.
“If he was working on his shot, he was working on a specific shot from a specific spot on the ice. If it was like the day after a game … and something had happened in the game the night before – a specific spot on the ice where maybe had had a chance on the ice where he didn’t score on or a play that he didn’t make — that’s what he wanted to work on the next day.”
“Being the backup goalie, I would stay on (after practices) and take shots,” said former Penguins goaltender Jeff Zatkoff, now retired. “He was always out there, always working on tips, weird deflections, net-front plays. So when you see him pull that stuff off in a game, it’s not surprising because he works on those awkward angle tips, and he’s one of the best to do them.
“He’s always on the ice early, on after. That’s the way he’s wired. That’s a big part of the reason why he’s so successful. Yeah, he’s born with natural God-given talent, but he’s also got the work ethic to go with it.”
Competitiveness
Mark Eaton lasted 13 years as a player in the NHL the hard way. He was a shot-blocking defensive defenseman who probably had more bruises and discolorations on his body than the average cadaver.
He had to compete hard to stay in the NHL for as long as he did.
But even with the drive that he possessed, Eaton acknowledges Crosby’s sense of competition existed at a different level of the mesosphere.
“I always thought I was competitive,” said Eaton, now an assistant general manager with the Chicago Blackhawks, “but nothing on the level that he was and I’m sure still is. I think he still has a desire to be the best. Now, it’s a different kind of motivation. You have these younger kids in the league that are trying to take his torch. Knowing him, he’s not going to pass that easily.
“And not just in hockey. He wasn’t a card player, but we sat behind him in the plane while (Crosby and other younger players) were playing (hand-held video game systems). They had their battle games that they played. You knew when things weren’t going his way because the whole plane could hear about it. Anytime we had off days in California or Florida and decided to play beach volleyball or something like that, he’s got to win that too. It didn’t matter what it was or at what level. He wanted to win.”
Even mundane activities in practice were something Crosby had to claim.
“During practice, I remember we were doing these drills after the drill was done, (the coaches) would tell us to do two or three hard laps around the ice,” VandenBussche said. “In my head, or anyone’s head, you don’t want to let anyone beat you or pass you on those spring skates. And this kid kept just blowing by everybody. I may not be the most talented player, but I pride myself in being one of the hardest workers and in the best shape. And this guy just flies by me like I’m standing still. I’m like, ‘What? I can’t let that happen again.’ The next practice, I couldn’t pass him.”
Superstition
Another trait of Crosby that is one of his hallmarks is his routines. Whether it be eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich before games or handling a puck over a corporate logo on the ice during warmups, Crosby is fastidious in mostly inert actions that put him at ease.
Those superstitions are present in the heat of a battle too.
“He would not touch the goalies other than before every (defensive) zone faceoff,” Zatkoff said. “He’ll come and tap you on the pad. He will always go down before any draw in his own end and touch the goalie on one of the pads. So certain little things, everyone has their routine. He obviously has more than most. But you can’t really argue with them because they work.”
For anyone who dares to impede those routines, even unintentionally, Crosby is not shy about letting them know about it.
“At Mellon (Arena), apparently I parked in his spot one time,” Adams said. “He tracked me down in the dressing room and was pretty mad. He was convinced that I had done it on purpose. I had been oblivious to some of his other routines that clearly were more important to him than they were to me. … He couldn’t believe me that I hadn’t done it on purpose. He thought it was quite obvious that I should know all his little idiosyncrasies.”
Support
In the Penguins’ dressing room at PPG Paints Arena or the UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex, the locker stalls near Crosby’s are usually vacant. That’s due in part to the usual crush of media wanting to talk to him.
But on the occasions the Penguins recall a young player from Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, they will be granted a stall near Crosby’s real estate. Oftentimes, Crosby will sit in his stall, with half of his equipment removed, and simply talk to those players about anything and everything in an effort to make them feel more at ease.
Crosby has routinely done this with high-end prospects such as defenseman Olli Maatta, a former first-round pick, or lower-end players, such as Scott Wilson, a former seventh-round pick.
Colby Armstrong, the Penguins’ first-round pick in 2001 and one of Crosby’s first linemates, received this type of guidance.
“He’s like, ‘Listen, you’re on the first line. You need to make these plays. You need to be this guy,’” said Armstrong, now a broadcaster with various outlets. “Then I’d be on the flip side, ‘You’re this guy. This is what you have to do. You’re not this kind of player. This is what makes you good and why you’re you on this line.’ I can make those plays. They’re a little more risky, and if I did that, it would be a different response from the coaching staff than if he did that play if it didn’t work out.
“But he was constantly pushing me. I loved it.”
During the NHL’s 2012 lockout, Crosby was part of a group of players who rented ice time at the team’s former practice facility within the Southpointe complex in Canonsburg four days a week over four months to stay in shape. One of those players was Ben Lovejoy, an undrafted defenseman still trying to make his way in the NHL.
“Sid and I would battle,” said Lovejoy, now retired. “I think that he appreciated that I would play him hard in practice. I couldn’t hold his stick for him on the bench. He was so much better than I was, but he appreciated that I would play him hard. Going into the lockout, I think I had played 96 NHL games. So I was far from an established NHL player. Was sort of in and out of the lineup. … If that lockout had continued through the season, that may have ended my career.
“Sometime in November or December, he came and sat next to me after a practice in one of those (public) dressing rooms at Southpointe. We were the only two left in the locker room. He just said, ‘You’re going to have a (expletive) year.’ That’s something that always just stuck with me. It gave me a ton of confidence. I was traded right after the lockout, right after it ended. But he was right. It was a pretty special moment. He went out of his way to connect with the sixth and seventh defenseman.”
Crosby’s forecast came true. In February of 2013, Lovejoy was dealt to the Anaheim Ducks and became a regular top-four defenseman. By June of 2013, Lovejoy signed his first multi-year, multi-million dollar contract with Anaheim.
Community
A bachelor, Crosby strives to make and maintain connections with not only his teammates or team employees but their families as well.
In July of 2013, defenseman Rob Scuderi re-signed with the Penguins after a four-year stint with the Los Angeles Kings. Upon his return, he purchased a home in Sewickley.
“We lived down the street from one another during my second go-around in Pittsburgh,” said Scuderi, now a development coach with the Nashville Predators. “And it was just nice to have him over on a casual basis. If my wife was making dinner and he wanted to come over have a little something to eat, it didn’t have to be some big production. It was just, ‘Why don’t you come over, have dinner?’ If it’s an off night, maybe have a few drinks and then walk home. Just having those connections, not with just Sid but all your teammates is what makes it such a privilege of being part of an NHL hockey team.”
What was it like for Scuderi’s children to have an icon like Crosby over for dinner?
“They were too young and they didn’t care,’ Scuderi said. “‘Who’s that guy?’ I think that’s the nice thing about Sid is that how he would prefer it. Nobody wants to sit there and have people looking at you in awe of anything. Since I didn’t treat him any differently, my kids didn’t treat him any differently. He was just someone coming over for a bite to eat.”
Adams retired from the NHL in 2015 and today, he is a financial advisor with Merrill Lynch in the Boston area. A few years ago, he returned to Pittsburgh during a Fourth of July weekend for business purposes but also to catch up with Crosby as well as the family of former Penguins forward Chris Kunitz.
“We had come back to town to spent some time with the Kunitzs and Sid,” Adams said. “I was out doing a business thing and the (significant others) were out to dinner. So Sid and Kuny were at Kuny’s place with all my kids and Kuny’s kids. My dinner was running on a little bit. I was trying to politely excuse myself. I had to let this Pittsburgh crew know that Sid and Kuny were babysitting my kids for a few hours and I need to go. When I got there, everybody was happy as can be. The kids now, even to this day, they get a kick out of telling their friends that Sidney Crosby babysat them.
“He’s always been great around them. It’s good for them to be able to say that he’s a buddy.”
Camraderie
While Crosby, by any measure, is a great teammate, he’s not always a nice teammate.
“We were in Vancouver playing against the Canucks,” Armstrong said of a game in 2007-08. “I was on a line with him and (forward Ryan) Malone that night. We were having a good game. I think it was a close game and we had tons of chances. I remember going into the (second) intermission, we (Armstrong and Crosby) starting going at it pretty good.
“Ryan Malone was like, ‘All right guys, bring it in. Hug it out!’ with his raspy voice. There’s the three of us, we didn’t really want to at the time, but he’s having us hug. And we went out there and had a great third period.”
Crosby’s good-natured ribbing with his teammates could sometimes be an expensive folly.
“It was the 2015-16 season, it was April Fool’s Day and we were in New York,” Zatkoff said. “We were going to dinner and I was out doing a little shopping, but I was meeting Sid (and former Penguins forwards Phil Kessel, Nick Bonino and Kunitz). We were going to meet up for dinner.
“Sid texted me, ‘Hey, pick up some wine. It’s BYOB.’ I was just like, ‘The boys need me to deliver. I’ve got to grab some wine!’ So I go into the wine store and pick up four pretty nice bottles. I don’t want to disappoint. I show up to the restaurant with all this wine in my hands. The hostess and the waiters are all looking at me like, ‘What’s this guy doing?’ Then I look over and (his teammates) are all cracking up. Obviously, it’s not bring your own wine.
“I saved two of the bottles from that year just for the story because I’m so gullible.”
Longevity
At 33, Sidney Crosby is definitely on the back nine of his career. But how close is he to the terminus?
He has four years remaining on his contract and given many of the traits outlined above, it’s not far-fetched to see him be a player who continues to excel into his 40s, much like another former Penguins star, Jaromir Jagr.
“The natural gifts – we used to call him ‘The Creature’ – those don’t go away,” Scuderi said. “He’s got natural gifts that allow him to withstand the test of time. Other than that, it’s what you have inside. I always think Sid was very humble about his accomplishments, but he was also hungry for more. That’s a dangerous combination when you’re talking about a person with his level of talent.”
“He’s the complete opposite of one-dimensional,” Reese said. “He can do everything. As time slowly catches up on him and he does slow down, every other piece of his game is there. I just expect he’ll be the player that he is at 42.”
Seth Rorabaugh is a TribLive reporter covering the Pittsburgh Penguins. A North Huntingdon native, he joined the Trib in 2019 and has covered the Penguins since 2007. He can be reached at srorabaugh@triblive.com.
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