For McKee, the thought bubble floats up as it has on a daily basis: He’s so Sidney. McKee played 13 seasons in the NHL, the last one five years ago with Sidney Crosby, then just 22, just after The Kid raised the Stanley Cup. On the ice McKee sees the parallels in their skill sets and, even more, their make-up. Off the ice and in the room, though, the similarities are even more striking: special talents who almost desperately avoid special treatment, or even the appearance of it; who want nothing more than to blend in even though they so conspicuously stand out; who are by nature reserved and humble, but by force of their gifts have to accept leadership roles and adapt. They have their differences, of course: Crosby seems incapable of taking a day off or giving as little as 99 percent in his off-ice work while, McKee says, McDavid doesn’t always bring it in the gym, much more like an average kid on that count. Still, unlike stars who don’t give a rat’s ass about anyone else (and they are legion), Crosby and McDavid care what people think of them, their teammates most of all.
McKee thinks about the one moment, the passage of two seconds, when it all kicked in. He can see it. We’re up a goal late and they pull the goalie. McDavid makes a play in the neutral zone, fleeces a defenceman, puck is knocked over to Remi Elie and there they are, on a two-man breakaway on an empty net, sorta side by side. Elie has it, and in a situation like that you give the puck back to the guy who made the play, but McDavid doesn’t let him. He’s skating beside Elie and keeps his stick in the air. He wants his linemate to get the goal, doesn’t give him any choice. And Elie has to take the shot because it’s still a one-goal game. Yeah, in a split second he thought of it. Just like Crosby would.
And when someone asks about McDavid coming in for his exit interview, McKee will say that he would never blow off anything like that. What would his teammates think of him? By coming in when he could easily have begged off sick, McDavid was reinforcing the coaches’ authority.
