“Sidney Crosby has been undergoing treatment on a right wrist injury that he suffered during the season. Sid is continuing to get medical advice to determine the best path moving forward, including the possibility of arthroscopic surgery. No final decision has been made on surgery at this point. We expect to have a decision by early next week.”

I couldn’t pinpoint a specific incident where Crosby seemed to suffer an injury, but I have a guess as to when it occurred.



If you want to see how different Crosby looks when operating at (or close to) 100 percent, watch his April 3 performance against Winnipeg. Crosby was all over the ice. He didn’t put the puck in the net, but he played one of his best games in recent memory.



Two nights later against Minnesota, Crosby looked dreadful. Really bad. He was avoiding contact, could hardly generate acceleration, and was bailing out of faceoffs right as the puck was dropped.



The following night, he was scratched from a game against Colorado.

Follow me on twitter Follow @GunnerStaal It remains to be seen if Sidney Crosby will indeed move forward with wrist surgery per GM Jim Rutherford Fact is, he was hurt and it did impact his overall play.When did he hurt his wrist? It is tough to pinpoint an exact game but my bets are that it happened in very early AprilMike Colligan wrote this on April 28 well before this injury news broke:I think there is a good chance Mike is correct and I have the data to back that up.On March 30th Sidney Crosby scored two goals against the Chicago Blackhawks in a 4-1 victory. His first goal of the game was an aggressive snipe job that showed no physical limitations. It was a classic Sidney Crosby far side high glove quick wrister.His other goal that game was an empty net tally. Sidney Crosby would not score again until Game 3 against the New York Rangers (14 games). Because of this I have decided to break up Crosby's season into Pre March 31st and post March 31st (including playoffs).Let's have a look.Crosby still put up a points per game rate that most players would kill for after March 31st (.77), but you can see just how far off the pace he was from before (1.32). Heck, the difference between the two scoring rates (.55) is a points per game average most players would love to have. The wrist injury did not neuter him completely from contributing to the offense, but this is totally driven by his assist totals.Shooting the puck on the other hand is something that was clearly affected. Crosby's goals per game plummeted to finish out the season. He was no longer a dynamic finisher. His shooting percentage fell off a cliff as well.Despite not seeing the same tangible offensive results he is accustomed to, Sidney Crosby was still playing quality hockey. His possession numbers were actually very impressive to close out the year.I realize that using an 18 game sample size is not equal to the prior 75 game game sample size, but now knowing that Crosby did indeed suffer an injury it is hard to argue against the drastic changes in results.In hindsight a wrist injury would explain a lot. Crosby was still able to dominate on the possession front, he was just unable to cash in with the puck on his stick.The wrist injury news was good news if you ask me. It is a legitimate cause for his drop in offensive production and can put to rest any of the other silly narratives people are trying to push about him.Crosby's wrist will not be an issue to start the next season. Everybody should fully expect the Hart Trophy, Art Ross Trophy, and Ted Lindsay award winner to continue his other worldly level of play when the Penguins kick off their season on October 9th vs. Anaheim.Thanks for reading!Follow me on twitter Follow @GunnerStaal