Frank Magazine Issue 600.pdf - Besthostingplanever.com

THANK GOD FOR SIDNEY,
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“I am honoured and thrilled to have the opportunity
to carry the Olympic flame in my home
province of Nova Scotia,” reads the passage.
“The torch relay will pass through so many
communities and hands on the way to Vancouver
and I’m privileged to be part of that special
group as the Olympic Flame makes its
way to Vancouver for the 2010 Winter
Games”. Scintillating stuff, that.
For rare insight into how Sidney’s series-winning
golden goal may have changed him, we go
to an SI interview with Sid’s Penguins
teammate Bill Guerin. The chapter ends with
thoughts from a dude who went to school in the
same building as Sid 15 years ago:
“It was an intense moment realizing that
Sidney Crosby, who went to the same elementary
school that I did, scored the winning goal
for Canada. It was amazing.” No quote in the
book sums it up better: like Linda Kelly watching
Ellen Page walk down the Oscar red carpet
from the living room of Halifax expats in
Hollywood (Frank 526), we’re on the outside
looking in.
Barring the availability of Sidney himself, his
parents, Troy and Trina, would almost certainly
have given Paul a few hours of their time. Hell,
Paul and wiferoo Tamara’s $250,700-assessed
Lynby Avenue, Dartmouth abode is
all of seven kilometres away from the Crosby’s
modest Hannebury Drive, Cole Harbour bungalow,
and just 10 Ks removed from the mortgage-free
Lochaber Courtt, Westphal pal-
18 ATLANTIC CANADA FRANK DECEMBER 21, 2010
Describing Sidney’s skills on the ice
as a young boy, sez Paul, is like...
“
Explaining the
beauty of a sunset or
why ... Beethoven’s
Symphony No. 5
represent(s) the best
musical composition in
history.”
ace (2010 assessment $539,400) they picked
up last year. Were they even asked to participate?
The tome is at its best when Paul is mining the
few interviews he seems to have conducted
exclusively for the book. We hear from Hockey
Nova Scotia executive director Darren Cossar
and a few others, but even these tidbits fail to
offer up anything that hasn’t been said elsewhere.
Even within the framework of “So-and-so told
somebody else something...” the author fails to
dig up any interesting quotes.
Ever wonder what it was like for Sid to live
with Super Mario at his Pittsburgh mansion?
“(Lemieux)’s got a great family,” Sid the Tim
Horton’s spokesthingy confided to someone a
few years back.
“It’s a good environment for me to be in. I’m
just trying to learn as much as I can.”
There’s an entire page devoted to the fact
that Sidney donated $20,000 to the Cole Harbour
Bel Ayr Minor Hockey Association
after winning the Lester B. Pearson Award
at the NHL’s summer awards banquet in 2007.
The money, we are told, comes with the trophy,
and it is earmarked for charitable donation.
Sidney Crosby goes above and beyond for
charity, anybody even tangentially associated
with hockey knows that. Why devote a whole
page praising him for forking over money that
wasn’t his to keep in the first place?
I’m reminded of a story which has Sidney visiting
a dying kid at the children’s hospital in
Montreal awhile back. I’m not talking about one
of those photo-ops with a hug and an autograph,
but a meaningful visit. On a game day, he
headed over to the hospital right from the morning
skate and spent several hours with the little
guy. They talked, watched tv, and hung out. Sid
missed the team meal, ate hospital food with his
new pal, not turning up at the rink until 90 minutes
before the puck dropped. Unfortunately,
you won’t find a story like that between the
covers of this book.
Sidney Crosby: The Story of a Champion is a
thin gruel sandwiched between an introduction
and conclusion written in effusive prose of the
sort usually seen in 1980s-era Tiger Beat magazine
profiles of Kirk Cameron and Corey
Feldman (He’s soooo dreamy — ed.).
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