Sidney Crosby is back in familiar territory: a contract year, but without the old Pittsburgh panic attached to it.
Two years ago, there were real doubts about whether he would finish his career with the Penguins. That conversation has faded.
With general manager Kyle Dubas and the organization having steadied the ship, the expectation now is that Crosby will work out another extension in the coming weeks. Josh Yohe of The Athletic reported it could follow a “similar timeline” to the deal he signed on September 16, 2024, when Crosby landed a two-year extension right before training camp.
The idea then was to avoid dragging the situation into the season. This time, the urgency is lower, but the destination appears to be the same.
Back in May, the sense was clear: even as he approaches the later stages of his career, the recently-turned 39-year-old still wants to keep playing as long as he can. A retirement tour in 2026-27, quiet or otherwise, does not seem to be part of the plan.
That makes the picture around Crosby and Alexander Ovechkin even more striking, with both still expected to be around in a season when players like Gavin McKenna will debut. McKenna was born in late 2007, long after Crosby and Ovechkin had already become established stars.
The money side of this should not be a problem. Crosby has never been the type to push hard in negotiations, and Yohe noted that remains the case.
He is currently on a deal carrying the symbolic $8.7MM cap hit, and AFP Analytics projects him as worth another year at that same figure. Pittsburgh has more than $10MM in cap space, and next summer they’ll also see Erik Karlsson and Evgeni Malkin come off the books, along with others.
If anything, the room under the cap points to an offseason that has been fairly cautious so far. The Penguins lost their leading goal scorer Anthony Mantha, and while Jason Robertson came up in blockbuster chatter, Pittsburgh wound up adding his more modest-producing brother Nicholas instead.
Dubas could still make another move through trade or free agency, but there is clearly enough flexibility to fit a Crosby extension and still add carefully.
That is a very different place from where the franchise stood in 2024. At that point, the Penguins were staring at a bleak future and not even sniffing the playoffs, with the idea of one last run looking unrealistic.
Since then, Dubas has built a respected prospect pool, Crosby, Malkin and Kris Letang are still in black and yellow, and the team is back in the playoff mix. Falling in the first round last spring to their in-state rivals hurt, but simply getting there was a major step from where things stood not long ago.
Crosby is still driving the whole thing. His game has become more cerebral, more about controlling the pace and dictating the flow, and it continues to matter every night.
Even if he eventually drifts toward a 3C role around age 40, he would still be a major player because of the skill set he brings. Instead, the 2005 first-overall pick keeps producing like a star, finishing last season with 74 points in 68 games for his 21st straight point-per-game campaign.
He did it while dealing with a knee injury suffered while leading Team Canada at the Olympics, and he still finished eight points ahead of anyone else on the roster.
There are still records in play, too. Crosby and Letang are the only active players from the 2005 draft class, depending on Ryan Reaves’ contract status this fall.
And as Pro Hockey Rumors’ Ryan Long pointed out, Crosby needs just three assists to pass Joe Thornton’s 1,109 and move into seventh place all-time. Fifth place is within reach by the end of the season.
With Ovechkin back in Washington, Patrick Kane back in Chicago and Crosby still anchoring Pittsburgh, 2026-27 is starting to look like a season built on nostalgia. For now, the focus is on getting the next Penguins extension done within the next 30 days so the team can move on to everything else. Once that happens, the bigger question becomes what Crosby still has left to give in what could be a storybook finish.
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For Pittsburgh, it is the kind of move that fits a club looking for low-risk offense without tying itself down for the long haul. Kuzmenko now gets a fresh opportunity to carve out a role and give the Penguins the sort of one-year production boost they have chased before, with the possibility of a season that looks a lot like other successful betting on a proven scorer. [Read more 🡒]