Does Sidney Crosby have the Mumps?
The mumps don’t care if you’re a fourth line plugger or if you’re the face of the league, they’ll get you all the same as the Pittsburgh Penguins announced earlier today that Sidney Crosby will miss the next two games as a precaution after pictures of him surfaced with half his face blown up, a common symptom with the illness.
Yes, the Penguins haven’t admitted that Sidney Crosby has the disease, but it doesn’t take a MENSA member to put the pieces together. Of immediate concern though for the Penguins is they’ll be without their captain against Calgary and Columbus this weekend, and a forward group that was already depleted with injuries will have to withstand another significant blow.
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Crosby is just the latest in a line of NHL’ers who have been infected (or possibly infected) with the mumps: Ryan Suter, Corey Perry, Tanner Glass, and Keith Ballard are among those who have contracted the disease. With players from teams all across the league contracting it, clearly the league has dropped the ball somewhere along the line. Yes, I know…a league that has given us two work stoppages and a canceled season in the past decade also failing to contain a health epidemic…unbelievable, right?
I’m not going to sit here and play doctor and pretend to understand all the causes and symptons of mumps. But I also think it’s fair to hope that a multi-billion dollar corporation like the NHL could have a better understanding of what is happening and how best to control it. Instead the league is doing its best Dr. Nick Riviera impression when dealing with the mumps.
Back to the Penguins though. They are sitting atop the Metropolitan Division with 39 points, and still have superstar Evgeni Malkin to lean on, so all is not lost. However the loss of another forward in Crosby for a few weeks (if confirmed to have mumps) is just the latest setback for a roster that has been plagued by injuries all season and it could cause general manager Jim Rutherford to act sooner rather than later trying to add a forward.
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Teams like the Oilers, Coyotes, Sabres, and Hurricanes are likely to be “sellers” at the trade deadline but could they now use this recent Penguin illness of Crosby to extract a little bit of a higher price out of them in order to compensate for the rash of injuries? Yes, he’s not a center, but would Chris Stewart be a fit for Pittsburgh now? How about Antoine Vermette? It wouldn’t be shocking if you start to hear rumor rumblings from the usual places over the next few days if his illness is serious.
There is also the chance that the mumps, or whatever else could have cause Sidney Crosby’s face to go Stay Puft Marshmallow Man on us, spreads throughout the Penguins’ locker room and further decimates their lineup. For now you figure the Penguins will keep Crosby in a bubble and handle the situation with kid gloves (even moreso than they already do, some would say) and the league can figure out what the heck is going on before it starts spreading any further.