PITTSBURGH, PA – MAY 26: Sidney Crosby #87 of the Pittsburgh Penguins in action against the Tampa Bay Lightning in Game Seven of the Eastern Conference Final during the 2016 NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs at Consol Energy Center on May 26, 2016 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. (Photo by Justin K. Aller/Getty Images)

It’s difficult to know Sidney Crosby. A hockey prodigy since he was old enough to tie his skates, Crosby has seemingly intentionally cultivated a public persona that’s practically non-existent. He doesn’t have a Twitter account that allows us to peer into his non-hockey thoughts or hobbies. There’s no bushy beard or tattoo sleeve or any offseason photos of Crosby posing with an elk he shot on a hunting trip with friends.

This is all a roundabout way of discussing how we view Crosby’s career. After he retires a decade from now, he will without question be considered his generation’s best player. Much like his personality, the way he plays hockey is just as difficult to understand and explain, which may be why there just doesn’t seem to be an appreciation level that matches the level of excellence he has shown since entering the NHL in 2005.

There’s something strange about hockey culture, in that many of its most predominant media chatterboxes are always looking for someone to knock Crosby off his pedestal. Someone is either passing a torch to Claude Giroux or putting forth the notion that Crosby isn’t even the best player on his team or debating the NHL-fueled marketing idea that Alex Ovechkin, while incredible, is on the same level as Crosby.

Maybe it’s an indirect result of living in an era in which we all get bored of great things more easily than ever and immediately want to whine the second there is a minor problem — Louis CK’s legendary bit about an airline passenger pitching a fit when his wifi isn’t working springs to mind — but Crosby is 28 years old and while he may not be producing like he did before the concussion problems, he’s still an unspeakably dominant player like few have ever been.

When it comes to discussing Crosby’s legacy, there are two facets that must be considered; one is how sane, rational people will remember him long after he hangs up his skates and the other is how the miserable sacks of sadness that are never happy and always looking for a way to tear down the league’s great players remember him.

Should Crosby win a second Stanley Cup in the next two weeks, that should create a dam strong enough and high enough to prevent the flood of stupid takes designed to undercut an individual’s career by saying he hasn’t won enough team championships. Should Crosby retire as, say, the fifth-leading scorer in NHL history but with only one Stanley Cup to his name, those 1,500-plus points will somehow be used against him by the dumbest among us, who are also usually the loudest and most famous among us.

This is a world where a prominent NHL “analyst” says with a straight face that Crosby would be better served to have a work ethic like Jonathan Drouin. Was anyone in 1989 saying Wayne Gretzky should be more like Mikko Makela?

It doesn’t make any sense to say that Crosby is somehow better if he wins as many Stanley Cups as Trevor Lewis, but there’s something to be said for that second one staving off the idiots over the next 10 years.

It’s an odd thing to be sure, arguing that a great player is great. But there is no denying that there has always been significant criticism, valid or not, when it comes to Crosby, who currently sits fifth in career points per game, which is an astounding feat, considering he’s done it while playing exclusively in an time when the NHL seems to be inventing ways to prevent goals.

A possible reason for why Crosby’s game isn’t as beloved as it could be is that it’s a reflection of his personality. It’s unknowable and impossible to fully understand from what we see — ask the cavalcade of wingers who have tried and failed to stay on his line for longer than a cup of coffee — because everything that makes Crosby great is in the subtlety of it all.

Yeah, Crosby complains to referees the way parents do at PTA meetings when they feel their child is being treated unfairly, and that turns people off, but no one is perfect.

Crosby doesn’t have the combination of speed and size like Ovechkin and doesn’t dangle for days around the outside of the zone like Patrick Kane. Crosby has a stealthy game that occasionally yields a highlight reel goal, but what makes him great are things he does that aren’t visible to the naked eye, things like getting to a spot on the boards where the puck will be before anyone else or finding just enough space around the net to slam home a loose puck.

It’s that stealthy nature that works against him, though, and leaves his game susceptible to ridiculous criticism, especially in the playoffs. There’s not much difference between stealth and invisibility, and when the Penguins were hitting walls in the postseason over the past six years, there was this knee-jerk reaction because Crosby’s quiet dominance can go unnoticed.

Crosby scored three game-winning goals during the conference finals against the Tampa Bay Lightning and people were wondering where he was and why he couldn’t be more like Jonathan freaking Drouin.

Crosby assisted on Conor Sheary’s OT winner in Game 2 and designed the play right before the faceoff, which is something people that turned off the TV after the goal would never know.

That’s why a second Stanley Cup for Crosby would be so great for everyone. It would neutralize the fringe loons with megaphones from disparaging one of the all-time greats and allow us to enjoy the rest of his career in relative peace. And maybe, just maybe, it will allow Crosby to let his guard down and reveal his true self, which is probably some level of fun weirdo that does World of Warcraft cosplay in the offseason or collects motivational cat posters.