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Sidney Crosby out a week with mild concussion

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When news broke tonight that Sidney Crosby was a healthy scratch for tonight’s shootout loss to Montreal with an upper body injury, many fans eyebrows raised up wondering what happened. The Penguins stressed that the injury happened during last night’s game against Tampa Bay and tonight after the Pens loss to Montreal head coach Dan Bylsma gave the update on what’s going on with Crosby. As it turns out, Crosby suffered a concussion after being boarded by Tampa Bay’s Victor Hedman.

Bylsma made sure to stress that the injury occurred against Tampa Bay and not against the Capitals at the Winter Classic when David Steckel collided with Crosby towards the end of the second period. Bylsma made it abundantly clear that they would not have played Crosby last night if he was having issues from the hit against Washington.

Asked again after the game, Bylsma said Crosby’s presence in the lineup Wednesday was proof he didn’t get a concussion on New Year’s Day.

“We wouldn’t have thought he was OK to play,” he said. “He certainly saw doctors.”


Of course, that won’t stop fans from asking aloud whether or not they thought Crosby was OK after the hit by Steckel. Last night’s final episode of 24/7 certainly made it look like Crosby had his bell rung after the hit as his stunned look seemed to indicate to all of us armchair neurologists that he had suffered a bit more damage than was let on. Any speculation of that sort is amateur at best and reckless at the worst.

If the Penguins are going to be without Crosby for any amount of time, it’ll make generating offense that much more difficult for the Penguins. They’ve just gotten Jordan Staal back from injury and Evgeni Malkin appeared to be finding his game after dealing with a knee injury earlier in the year. Losing Crosby for any amount of time means taking out the best offensive generator in the NHL out of their lineup. Making up for the sort of production that Crosby produces will be nearly impossible.

With the issue being a concussion, that brings about an entirely different set of thoughts, most of which surround the possibility of having those problems becoming easier to repeat themselves later on in his career. The Pens taking this much precaution with him makes every bit of sense in the world, but if there was any possibility that Crosby was injured after the Winter Classic game, the Pens trainers and doctors are going to have a lot of questions to answer.