After years of attempting to dismiss any suggestion that he may want to leave Pittsburgh someday, both Sidney Crosby and his agent fanned the flames of that conversation this week.
As recently as June, Crosby’s agent, Pat Brisson, called rumors of Crosby being willing to accept a trade to Colorado “baseless.”
He was singing a different tune while speaking with Pierre LeBrun of The Athletic on Monday.
“He had another great year last season. He just keeps going. The comparison is Tom Brady,” Brisson said. “We want Sidney to hopefully be in the playoffs every year. We want him to hopefully win another Cup or two. So, each year the team that he’s playing for fails to make the playoffs, it creates a lot of speculation. In reality, he’s not getting any younger. We’re here to support him. It’s the beginning of the season here. Let’s see how things are going. Hopefully, they have a great season, and the speculation will go away.”
In case you forgot, Brady — the legendary New England Patriots quarterback — left for Tampa Bay after 20 years in Foxborough. Crosby just completed his 20th season in Pittsburgh.
“But at the same time, the reason we all talk about this is because he’s such a great player still,” added Brisson. “He continues to be such a difference maker. Like a Tom Brady, that’s how I look at it.”
OK. That’s two Brady references.
“I mean, I’m answering something that … let’s put it this way, it’s always a possibility, you know?” Brisson said. “It’s been three years that they haven’t made the playoffs. It all depends on how Sid is going to be and how the team is going to do. I maintain the same position that I believe that he should be playing playoff hockey every year. In my opinion.”
Crosby didn’t exactly tamp down the conversation when he spoke to Matt Larkin of the Daily Faceoff.
“I understand it,” Crosby said of the trade speculation. “It’s not something you want to discuss. You’d rather be talking about who we’re getting at the (trade) deadline or, you know, where we’re at as far as, are we one or two or three in the division? But you know, it’s one of those things. That’s the hard part about losing.”
When I read the comments, the first thing that went through my mind was that this was some sort of attempt at a power play by Brisson and Crosby to exert influence over the looming sale of the franchise.
My initial belief was that Crosby was perhaps dubious of the Hoffmann Family who reportedly wants to buy the club from Fenway Sports Group. Or that he is dubious of any sale at all, and subtracting himself from the equation by trying to force a trade would devalue the franchise.
Furthermore, dangling the idea of wanting out may force the Hoffmann Family into the uncomfortable position of buying the team and then having to play the role of heel immediately by greenlighting a trade of Crosby to Montreal, Colorado, Los Angeles or some other team that may be salivating to get him.
I also had the thought that Brisson and Crosby may be trying to bully FSG into selling the franchise to the Ron Burkle, Mario Lemieux, David Morehouse group that had recently expressed an interest in reacquiring the team, but at a lower price than Hoffmann.
In other words, they may say to FSG, “Sell the team to Mario and company for a price they can afford, or we are going to ask out and attempt to remove ourselves as your most valuable asset before you sell to Hoffmann.”
I even wondered if this was an attempt to get the Hoffmann group to open up their shares of the franchise at a high percentage of ownership to Mario/Burkle/Morehouse as minority investors. After all, the reported asking price of FSG is $1.75 billion. David Hoffmann apparently is “only” worth $2 billion. He may want some heavy hitters to back him at a minority level to offset that cost.
I have since been told that those last two possibilities are untrue and that if Brisson and Crosby are trying to manipulate the sale of the team to their liking, it isn’t being done with the idea of pushing the franchise back into the hands of Lemieux and Burkle as it was when Crosby first came into the league.
Hey, at least not yet. Then again, as Brisson said previously, I suppose “it’s always a possibility.”
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So, if it’s not about the sale, what is it? What’s changed over the last three months? Was the organization’s failure to add anyone of substance to the team for 2025-26 the reality check that Crosby needed to understand how bad the team is going to be in the year?
Has the talk of the team ostensibly tanking to get in the Gavin McKenna lottery acted as some sort of wake-up call to Crosby?
Perhaps he’s hearing that trades of his linemates, Rickard Rakell and Bryan Rust, are percolating. That could be it.
Maybe Crosby was on board with the roster teardown, but that line had to be drawn at … well … his own line. And maybe this is Crosby and Brisson telling general Kyle Dubas, “Enough is enough. If Sid’s linemates go, then he should go too.”
Honestly, I don’t know. I don’t know why Crosby and his agent seem to be pivoting about trade speculation less than three months after they were dismissing it out of hand. Crosby is a smart guy. I don’t know what sort of epiphany he needed to have during the quietest part of the offseason to realize how bad things were going to get on the ice once play resumes.
In fact, I don’t know why he didn’t have a sense of such things when he extended his contract prior to last year. Back then, we all knew, as we heard again before the draft, that 2025-26 was likely going to be the end of Evgeni Malkin’s time in Pittsburgh. And Kris Letang certainly won’t be here beyond the end of his contract in 2028.
So what changed?
Right now, I don’t know and (for the time being) I don’t care. But if Crosby wants a trade, I’d prefer that he officially ask out before this season so that the team can then feel unburdened by trading Rakell and Rust too and really stinking this year in an effort to best position themselves in the McKenna lottery.
I love the idea of Crosby being here to pass the torch to McKennan like Lemieux did to him. But that warm, fuzzy picture is going to be a hard one to paint. Crosby with Rust and Rakell will likely be enough to help the Penguins win just enough games to dilute their chances of winning that sweepstakes.
So, in the meantime, I guess Brisson and Crosby are telling the hockey world to have it when it comes to trade speculation until one happens or until the Penguins magically start winning again.
I’m sure those of us on this side of the equation will be more than willing to oblige.
Tim Benz is a Tribune-Review staff writer. You can contact Tim at tbenz@triblive.com or via X. All tweets could be reposted. All emails are subject to publication unless specified otherwise.
