Crosby defensively?

[plusandminus]

Selke tends to go to a player who is great at two way play.

Yeah, it seems that way now, Although when guys like Bob Gainey and Guy Carbonneau won it, the voters seemed to focus less on offense. Some years some voters also seem to have given it to guys with many SH goals.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

(Sorry if English is lacking, it's not my native language.)
When I watch games with Penguins, or watch highligts, I often notice that Crosby have a tendency to be far up in the offensive zone, when Penguins lose the puck. It seems to me that many GA have occured that way. He might make a pass that ends up in a breakway. Or he may be positioned behind the opponents goal (or goalline) when counterattacks occur.
Now during the WC, it also seems that Canada gives up more chances against when he is on the ice.

Have you noticied similar things? What do you think?

Crosby is a favorite player of mine. He's excellent with the puck and in the offensive zone. Extremely smart, creative and skilled. So he no doubt is a great player even att age 37. But... has his defence weakened or something?

(Also, if you want... Penguins allowed a lot of GA during the regular season. Why? Goalie? Defencemen? Karlsson? Letang?)

Crosby is ass defensively more than he is insane at it. Is he bad? No, but he's not this selke god at it that the media and some glazing dumb f*** wankers want you to feel he is either. His line was constantly curb stomped when it didn't have Rakell on it the last few seasons and he really needs help on his line in that regard. He is older sure, but I think the last 5+ seasons or so, he has needed that balancing winger on his line and that's fine. He's above average and that is a f***ton better than most in the league.

I think because everyone compiles highlights you see Crosby's best defensive work in sports central and other shit and it's easy to forget that he will make these idiotic passes to no one and turn the puck over, but he will sometimes skate back hard to get the puck back but those are becoming infrequent over the years where he will skate back hard and then his back checking is just very weak, he will kind of skate near and then just curl back up and he could have made a play to break up and be a better defensive player, but elite players get these weird praises for things they sort of do better than average as insanely elite and it is what it is. Sid gets that massive benefit from the media and others that just love him to bits because it's Sid, who doesn't?

We all love the bloke, but to act as if he isn't error prone more often than not is ignorant. He's often needed the best wingers the team has to offer in all aspects, so he can do his thing and it's almost always at the expense of the team that would be better if they didn't do that.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

He’s fine on defense. Not perfect. It’s overblown both ways. Just depends on if you love or hate him. His defense is neither good enough nor bad enough for the amount of discussion it generates.

He has shown that he’s as capable in the defensive zone as he wants to be (in previous seasons), but tbh I want him scoring more than anything. You don’t buy a Ferrari to go 10 under the speed limit.

The issue is he has to really want to play it, but he hasn't been as committed to it for a while. In the playoffs it's also been something that just isn't something he wants to focus on as much. He relies more on keeping posession and focusing on that in the offensive zone, there are far too many times he will dog it back and then just do nothing when he gets there, so you are wowed by how hard he skated back only for him to just sort of coast in the zone and wait for others to do something to get him the puck back.

And honestly, Malkin probably engages far more in the d-zone than Crosby does but everyone whips it out and furiously jerks it to Crosby just farting near the puck in the D-zone while somehow Malkin gets shit on, it's one of the funnier f***ing things about this entire fan base and how the Pens media push "SID IS A GOD, HE PISSES DOM PERIGNON AND SHITS CAVIAR!" stupidity to everyone and then tell you Malkin is old and doesn't have it anymore all the while Crosby gets the best 2-way player on the team and top 6 threat and then also the other top 6 winger that can score 30 goals so he can keep putting up stats for brain dead dipshits to feel happy about something.

I am surely going to piss off blokes here and honestly, they can lick my salty chocolate bollocks and go f*** off.

 

[Honour Over Glory]

There's a lot of stats out there that back this btw.

2023-24 - absolute shit show, when the final dozen games where they won was a bragging point for a lot of blokes, the line of Doc-Sid-Rust was caved in defensively. For as much as they scored, they allowed almost as many goals. Their net positive was almost nominal.

Then the next season, this one that just ended - Sid was so bad defensively that they f***ed up Malkin’s entire game, the flow he was on and everything, to get Sid playing better.

He had a few years where he was good but I think a lot maybe forget Kunitz and Dupuis were f***ing incredible at both ends too and it made Sid have a lot easier job at it. The moment it needed to be him, oh boy was it not good. Does it make him a lesser player for his legendary career?

f*** no.

But I’m not gonna sit here and act like he was ever a Bergeron, Barkov, or even a Stone. The issue is how much the league actually doesn’t give a shit about the Selke. Because it was more about balance of points vs being an incredible shutdown player. Bergeron and Barkov yeah they are legit good at it and also happen to be very good at the other side of it and for like 99% of their careers.

Most of these individual awards are a joke now and have been for a long time. They stripped away the prestige of it when they wouldn’t honour the reason for which those awards stood for in the first place.

 

[Saku11]

He had a few years where he was good

Personally i think way More than that. All Pens Cup runs i thought he was great. 09-11 for regular season too. Then the years mentioned mentioned many times in this thread. Ok he is not as good anymore , but to say he cant play good defence is meme stuff started by Ovi/Kucherov fanboys who hate every North American player

 

[Saku11]

And i think he has always turned up his defensive play in the playoffs

 

[HandshakeLine]

Even Kessel turned up his defensive play in the playoffs though.

 

[plaidchuck]

Dang a couple of bad seasons and some people have been gaslighted into hating crosby now lol

 

[Honour Over Glory]

Dang a couple of bad seasons and some people have been gaslighted into hating crosby now lol

It was the other way around. It was almost like you had to gaslight everyone that Crosby was a defense god that not even a prime Gainey and Carbo could never compare. Because that’s how comical the lore of Crosby became. He could do no wrong, etc blah blah. When really, there was a lot of help that no one wanted to admit.

 

[Saku11]

It was the other way around. It was almost like you had to gaslight everyone that Crosby was a defense god that not even a prime Gainey and Carbo could never compare. Because that’s how comical the lore of Crosby became. He could do no wrong, etc blah blah. When really, there was a lot of help that no one wanted to admit.

It really wasnt. Crosby was as underrated as they come defensively starting from 09 playoffs. I have never heard people say he was defense GOD like you say. Dont hear any complaints of him not ever winning The Selke. Its pretty clear you are anti Sid poster. I dont Even have to guess your favourite player is Malkin. To say Sid wasnt spectacular all-around player in his prime is an insult to him. I remember particularly watching the second Cup playoffs and thinking to myself , how is this guy not considered one of The best two way players ever. If anything his defense side of The game never got The respect it deserved.But The first two sentences of your post reveal your attitude towards Sid. I have never heard media or others say these things ( maybe they should have)