[Oli Jokinen!]

Okay, I say Pens has a nice, strong, young squad, but I hate the fact that Crosby and Fluery get a lot of credit when Malkin is silent over there. Crosby and Fleury are okay, buy I say Malkin is the real deal.
Fleury will be like Nabokov at his prime I think.
Ovechkin is better than Crosbinator.
Malkin scores and has 73 points!

[Lefty Noob]

Overrated? How can you say that? Ha ha, they've got the #2 seed in the East right now and are without both their star player and their starting goalie! Going 6-2-2 in their last 10 without Fleury and Crosby... I for one am quite happy with their performance. I guess the hype will never truly be justified until we win a cup, but on the who, I don't think they're overrated one iota.

[The Dude]

They were overrated in previous years, but IMO, I think they're legit contenders now, and here's why....

People heard the Crosby hype and how he was "The Next Wayne Gretzky." They expected him to come up and plow through the competition, scoring hat tricks every night, just like Gretzky used to. Now no one thought to do research and find out that almost double of his points in his two QMJHL Seasons were assists! He was thrown onto a floundering Penguins with the expectation that he'd make them win again, when the only people on his team who could score regularly were Recchi and Malone (Who are NOT marquee players) and a broken down and aging Mario Lemeux, who could only play half the games anyway.

So people being people they rationalized, figuring it was just growing pains for him and that he'd come back with a vengance. Then behold, the team grows up a little, we get some fast, young scorers on the team and Crosby can play hockey again because he has someone to pass to. Such a big shift from the bottom of the league to Playoff contention tends to make fans get their hopes up so when they came up against the almighty Senators, who have been sitting comfortably in their dominance since they picked up Heatley. People expected the Crosby Crew to upset the Senators, but being a young team, with all of their best players making their first playoff appearance, they were throughly demolished by the much more experienced Ottawa Squad.

Now we have a team of young players who are experienced way passed their years due to the media hype surrounding the team for the last few years, as well as a failed attempt at a playoff run. Crosby has evolved from a bratty kid who thinks that he should have goals fed to him into a mature leader, they have young prospects that have evolved into great players, giving Crosby a lot of avenues to pass to, making the Penguins a good, mid pack team who can make the playoffs, but aren't considered a legitimate threat in their current state.

Enter Malkin.

In comes the Russian points machine, the perfect compliment to Crosby playmaking. Now they have an extremely powerful base of young support players who are only going to get better, they have one of the strongest duos in the NHL right now in Malkin/Crosby, they have a goalie that is going to be the best in the NHL some day, and the team can only improve from where they are. Now they can live up to the hype.

To summarize, they were overrated in the first Crosby years becuase they were rebuilding themselves still, but people expected a lot out of them anyway, but now that the rebuilding is complete, they're a legit threat.

[blueandwhite]

I do think all the talk that's been going on over the years is finally more on the mark.
I think some of the players like Staal (but he's really young, isn't he?) have been hicuuping though in pulling their weight.
does anyone have much faith in Conklin or sabourin?
And malkin is just a kid - yeah, if he doesn't hit his head into the boards or get caught with a skate blade - he's going to only get better.
And just re lemieux - yeah he was broken down and played half the games but every time he played? he was magic again.

[Oli Jokinen!]

Has anyone noticed, many of the really great players started off awesome. Crosby has, but he is overrated too. If he was a Gretzky he would have more assists and way more goals.
Also, Fluery isn't exactly a great player. Although what I said is not for goalies, he still wont be the next big Canadian goalie as everyone thinks.
Malkin, the goal scorer, doesn't get credit because, he is silent! Watch him. He has a lot of points... Creeping up on Ovechkin there...

[Oli Jokinen!]

That's just my opinion... Fans may think otherwise.

How is crosby overrated? At age 19 years, eight , Crosby became the youngest player in NHL history to win the Art Ross Trophy as the scoring champion with 120 points in 79 games. And, Crosby is the youngest scoring champion in any major professional sport. He is the only teenager to win the Art Ross Trophy in league history. The next-youngest was Wayne Gretzky, who won the title at 20 years of age at the conclusion of the 1980-81 season.At 19 years, Crosby was the youngest player voted to start the All-Star Game since fan balloting began in 1986.

[Oli Jokinen!]

If he is considered Gretzky, he is overrated.

[Finding_Neo]

Look at the Goalies today! The League has changed a lot. Some of the changes, two line pass, would easily have helped players like Gretzky and Lemeux score even more goals. But those pads today? Look back at some old NHL footage and look at some present, it looks like supermodels are guarding the nets. Which makes a player who can pass that much better, you have to catch them off balance or change angles quickly, or any other number of things.

But, when the Pens are back and healthy, we are quite possibly one of the best teams in the East. Heck, look at how they've been playing now!

[Phils20]

Originally Posted by Oli Jokinen!

If he is considered Gretzky, he is overrated.

Correct. He is no where near that yet.

[The Dude]

Originally Posted by Phils20

Correct. He is no where near that yet.

But he "could" be. He certainly has the skills to play at that level.

[blueandwhite]

Crosby has 63 points as of March 2 and I know he's been gone for weeks now but that puts him on the scoring list at number 21 - that's quite a drop, or maybe he wasn't racking the points up like others, like malkin with 84 points now, Ovechkin 83 and even Sundin who has 67 points now.
Malkin's the dude to deal with, you ask me on the penguins.
Ovechkin leads the league in goals with 48, followed Iginla with 38.

[Phils20]

I think Crosby is over rated, I don't think the Pens are. I'd take quite a few others over him, he whines too much for me.

Give me Ovechkin any day, or Malkin.

There is no whining in hockey, at least not that I can tolerate.

[blueandwhite]

does he whine?

[Phils20]

@#$%@#$%

I typed a long response, and it just vanished!!

Bottom, line, I think so.

If some can convice me otherwise, I'm not close minded, but I just don't like him.