not a pens fan or anything, but shero/bylsma both ought to be fired soon.
Every team in the NHL facing the pens come playoff time have it figured out. rustle crosby's feathers a bit and he'll be COMPLETELY off his game.
shero has gone out and got skill for him to play with, which doesn't seem like it helps.
Shero tried to add grit to his lineup but got guys who are about 5 years past their prime in playing that role (iginla, morrow, murray).
pens have absolutely zero mechanism of applying resistance to a team playing crosby this way. He's arguably the best player in the league, has health issues, yet it's open season on him come playoff time. need to add guys who are willing to step in and just drop the gloves, instigator or not, on anyone who leans on crosby.
ideally, these are guys who can play at least shift or two every period with crosby and police the situation, who don't care about fighting just about anyone and you don't miss them sitting in the box for lengthy periods of time for fighting. Just some guys who we've seen come thru CGY like this, jackman, westgarth.
what happened to that philosophy of "if you rough up our skill guys, expect the same for your skill guys".
i feel bad for crosby. he is having to defend himself and show some push back, which unfortunately puts him in a pretty negative light, considering he's supposed to be the league's golden boy
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