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The Faces Of The Game

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By CARTER GADDIS, The Tampa Tribune

Published: January 10, 2008

Updated: 01/10/2008 12:13 am

TAMPA - Sidney Crosby was 10 when Vinny Lecavalier was proclaimed the future Michael Jordan of hockey in 1998 by former Tampa Bay Lightning owner Art Williams.

When Lecavalier and his Lightning teammates won the Stanley Cup in 2004, 16-year-old Crosby had just finished his first, record-setting season with the Rimouski Oceanic of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.

Darryl Sydor, current Penguins defenseman and a teammate of Lecavalier on Tampa Bay's Stanley Cup winner, has more than a few seasons on both of them.

From his point of view as a 16-year veteran who has shared a locker room with both of the NHL's biggest stars, Sydor knows what sets them apart.

"They're obviously both dominant players in the league," Sydor said. "They can change momentum in a game. That's something they can do by themselves."

They won't be skating by themselves today as the Penguins and Lightning take the ice at the St. Pete Times Forum. It might only seem that way to the uninitiated.

And it would be understandable; Lecavalier, 27, and Crosby, 20, are the clear choices No. 1 and 1A for the title, Best Player in the World.

Crosby, Pittsburgh's first-year captain and the reigning NHL MVP, endorsed Lecavalier on Wednesday after practice at the Forum.

"He's a great player," said Crosby, who is fourth in the league in scoring with 59 points, four behind NHL leader Lecavalier. "He does everything well, passing, shooting ... obviously, he's a great goal-scorer. He seems to be a complete player."

Crosby can afford to be magnanimous. The public appeal of the youngest captain in NHL history has been unquestioned since the moment he was chosen No. 1 overall by Pittsburgh in the 2005 entry draft and was underscored by his overwhelming margin of victory in the Eastern Conference All-Star balloting announced earlier this week.

Crosby received a league-high 507,274 votes, nearly 200,000 more than Montreal defenseman Andrei Markov (316,136), who received the second-most support in the conference. Lecavalier was second among forwards with 224,661.

Lecavalier and Crosby will start together on a line for the East in Atlanta on Jan. 27, along with 35-year-old Daniel Alfredsson of Ottawa.

With all due respect to Alfredsson, the main attraction that day will be Lecavalier and Crosby working their magic - with, no doubt, the occasional appearance by other members of the Young and Electric Generation, such as Washington's Alex Ovechkin, 22, and Atlanta's Ilya Kovalchuk, 24.

"It's a new group out there," Sydor said, "and they're pushing each other to be better and better."

While Crosby is more than willing to defer to Lecavalier's experience and talent, the first two-plus seasons for the player dubbed the Next One before he was old enough to legally drive a car have laid a career foundation not even Lecavalier could match as a teenager trying to lift a foundering franchise on his shoulders in the late 1990s.

"I think there's a lot of similarities, with him starting in the league so young," Crosby said. "I'm sure he had a lot of pressure, too. When he came to Tampa, the team wasn't doing particularly well, so I'm sure that added pressure, too.

"It's tough when you have high expectations, and you want to make sure that you meet those. But, as well, you're 18 years old and you're just happy to be in the league."

A 39-goal rookie season was followed by last year's 120-point monster, which ended in a first-round playoff ouster by eventual Eastern Conference champion Ottawa. Crosby later skated off with the Hart Trophy, the Lester Pearson Award (MVP, as voted on by the players) and the Art Ross Trophy as the league's youngest-ever leading scorer.

Such precocious accomplishment - Crosby didn't turn 20 until Aug. 7 - leaves observers scrambling for historical comparisons. Only Gretzky, the Great One, eclipsed Crosby's individual achievements before the age of 21.

To find other apt comparisons, it becomes necessary to look away from the ice, toward the golf course (Tiger Woods), the boxing ring (Mike Tyson), the tennis court (Martina Hingis) or the baseball diamond (Dwight Gooden, Alex Rodriguez).

Not that Crosby's Nova Scotia roots allow him to buy into the hype.

"There's not really anyone I do compare myself to," Crosby said. "For me, a role model was always former Red Wings captain Steve Yzerman. He was a guy I always loved to watch. I loved the way he played. His personality, the way he was as a person, I think that was something that I really admired. He was himself. He didn't change. And that's something I really admired."

Historically Precocious

Pittsburgh Penguins center Sidney Crosby, 20, came into the NHL with the kind of hype usually reserved for the historically great. So far, the youngest captain in NHL history has delivered and deserves to be mentioned with other professional athletes whose accomplishments before age 21 belied their youth:

Wayne Gretzky Hockey By the time he turned 21 on Jan. 26, 1982, had won two Hart Trophies as NHL MVP, had scored 50 goals in a season twice and had scored 50 goals in the first 39 games of the 1981-82 season (he finished the year with 92 goals).

Dwight Gooden Baseball By age 21, he was 41-13 with a 2.00 ERA in 56 career starts, had made two All-Star teams and had won the 1985 NL Cy Young Award by going 24-4 for the Mets.

Mike Tyson Boxing On Nov. 22, 1986, at age 20, improved to 28-0 by defeating Trevor Berbick for the WBC heavyweight title, becoming the youngest heavyweight champion in history.

Alex Rodriguez Baseball When he turned 21 on July 21, 1996, he had a career batting average of .325 with 41 home runs, 60 doubles and a .377 on-base percentage. His home runs were the third-most by a player before his 21st birthday.

Tiger Woods Golf By his 21st birthday on Dec. 30, 1996, had won the U.S. Amateur three times, the NCAA title and two PGA Tour events.

Martina Hingis Tennis Before her 21st birthday, she had won five Grand Slam singles titles (three Australian Open, one Wimbledon, one U.S. Open) and had been the youngest world No. 1 at age 16.

LeBron James Basketball Was the youngest player to score 40 points in an NBA game, the youngest to score 50 in an NBA game and the youngest to record a triple-double in an NBA game, all before age 21.

Sidney Crosby Hockey Won the Hart Trophy as MVP and the NHL scoring title with 120 points in 2006-07, becoming the first teenager to win the Art Ross Trophy for scoring. He was the youngest player ever to lead a major North American sports league in scoring - all before he turned 20 on Aug. 7.

Carter Gaddis

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