Time for Sidney Crosby to Stop Nonsense on Ice

by Michael Hurley on Tue, May 4, 2010 at 3:05PM

When exactly will Sid the Kid start acting like Sid the Man?

We thought that maybe, when he lifted the Cup over his head last June in Detroit, the time had come. Yet it turned out that the wispy whiskers he was sporting on his face were as much a sign of his immaturity as it was his complete inability to grow a beard.

So when Sidney Crosby slammed his stick against the post of the Montreal net on Sunday, displaying the emotional control of a 5-year-old getting sent to timeout, it wasn't exactly surprising. It is, however, getting old.

The temper tantrum was the latest in a long line of incidents that makes anyone wonder what Crosby's goal is on the ice. For the most part, Crosby is the fastest, smartest and most-skilled player whenever he's on the ice, but he's never the toughest. And that's fine — he doesn't have to be a fighter to be one of the greats of all time, but he doesn't have to pretend to be, either.

Here are just some of the Crosby incidents that just make you scratch your head:

Punching a player from behind with gloves on last season
The infamous jumping of Brett McLean in one of the worst "fights" in history
Diving behind the Rangers net and getting embarrassed by Henrik Lundqvist (less than a week removed from being Canada's hero)
Violently cross-checking Henrik Zetterberg repeatedly in the back in the closing seconds of a 3-1 Penguins loss

Each incident seemed more unnecessary than the last, and when he snapped his stick behind Jaroslav Halak and then threw what was left of his shaft against the boards, the Stanley Cup champion and gold-medal winner looked no cooler than a squirt who was unhappy with his ice time.

Obviously, nobody can be the perfect player, but when you're supposed to be the face of the NHL, at some point, you have to grow up. In the case of Sid the Kid, we're all still waiting for that to happen.