To say the Penguins have been hit by the injury bug over the past 400 days would be an understatement. The Pens are in full-blown soap opera mode. And the worst part? The latest injury news doesn’t even involve Sidney Crosby or ConcussionGate.
On the day Dan Bylsma was supposed to give us an update on Tyler Kennedy’s status, and tell us that Jordan Staal and Simon Despres were ready to return from knee injuries, our morale was supposed to get a boost. Instead, we just got the latest episode of “As the Pens Turn.”
Staal’s saga seems to be coming to an end. His knee seems healthy and with Colin McDonald and Jason Williams being sent back down to Wilkes-Bare, it can only mean someone’s coming of the injured list. Staal took a stick to the face at practice this monring and needed stitches but he’s a hockey player, so he should still be in the lineup for Saturday’s matinee against the Jets.
Despres, on the other hand, wasn’t so lucky. It wasn’t a certainty that he was going to make his return this weekend but he was pretty damn close…until this morning. He limped off the ice before the end of practice and it looks like he tweeked his bad knee so he may have set himself back.
But the worst news Bylsma dropped on as at his presser was that Kennedy has a high anle sprain, and to yinzers, that injury has become more feared than a positive AIDS test. First Fleury, then Sid, the Big Ben, then Pouncey, now TK?! OK, so Kennedy doesn’t quite fit in with the rest of those guys but the news of his diagnosis is still bad news.
The sprain will keep him out about five weeks, and although the Pens aren’t necessarily missing TK’s 22 points (6 G, 16 A) in 42 games but if Kennedy is out as long as Bylsma predicts, he’ll still be chilling on his couch by the time the Trade Deadline rolls around.
With the way the Pens are scoring right, or lack thereof (Geno and Neal excluded), even if Sid does return for the stretch run, the Pens still need to find some secondary scoring. There’s no indication that TK was ever even on the trading block but of all the players on the Pens’ roster, he has the most trade value given his potential and salary.
If Ray Shero was planning on using Kennedy as scoring bait, it might not be as easy to move him now. Sure, once a high anle sprain is healed there are no lingering side effects, but GMs could become skeptical of aquiring TK seeing as how the Deadline falls right in the middle of his recovery. What if the recovery takes longer than expected, or there’s a setback, or TK isn’t the player he used to be after he returns (is that a bad thing?)?
Shero already promised us the playoffs, and we believe him. But today was supposed to give Pens fans hope that a Stanley Cup run wasn’t out of the question either. Instead, it’s just another layer on the Pens’ **** sandwich. These are the Days of our Pens…
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