Present Day
There are three players currently active in the NHL that I have a hard time watching wearing their new jerseys. One player I love and hope he wins a much deserved Stanley Cup to go with his Olympic Gold Medals, one player I hate; not because of him changing teams but because of the team he used to play for before this season, and one player who should have retired long ago like all of those former New York Rangers before him.
Jarome Iginla
In My Mind: Calgary Flames
Remember When? Pittsburgh Penguins/Boston Bruins
Iggy wasn’t going to win in Calgary but instead of pulling a “Sundin”, he actually let the Flames trade him in order to help the franchise rebuild. What guy, eh? Only thing was, he wanted to pick his destination and provided them with a list of teams. So the Flames traded Iginla to one of the teams on his list … the Boston Bruins! But wait, even though he said he allow a trade to Boston, he actually wanted to go to Pittsburgh more. So the Bruins lost out in the Iginla sweepstakes and he joined his “Golden Goal” line mate Sidney Crosby. With Iginla on board the Penguins were an unstoppable force, who actually happened to be stopped in Eastern Conference Finals by the spurned Boston Bruins! Man, you couldn’t make up a story like that even if you tried! I mean after all of that, what was Jarome gonna do? Go sign in Boston during the offseason? It would never happen …
Daniel Alfredsson
In My Mind: Ottawa Senators
Remember When? Detroit Red Wings
Salming, Forsberg, Naslund, Sundin and then Alfredsson. There’s that Swedish loyalty I was talking about. But seriously, fuck the Sens!
Jaromir Jagr
In My Mind: Pittsburgh Penguins
Remember When? Washington Capitals/Philadelphia Flyers/Dallas Stars/Boston Bruins/New Jersey Devils
My original comment was going to be about how I will always remember Jagr dominating with the Penguins in the ’90s and still being a superstar well into the 2000’s as captain of the New York Rangers before leaving the NHL for the KHL. Never to be heard from again. Then I was going to point out that it was always weird to see him in a Washington Capitals jersey, it just never looked right. But then two years ago Jagr made a return to the NHL which was supposed to be back in Pittsburgh with the Penguins – which would have been awesome! My favourite thing in sports in when athletes returned to their former places of glory and where I fondly remember them playing as a kid. Then Jagr decided against a return to the Penguins, opting instead for this …
In closing
So there you have it! A trip down memory lane at some of our favourite NHL players of all time. A lot of whom at one point in their career were probably on our fantasy hockey rosters. Out of all the players listed above, all of the teams, all of the jerseys; there is still one that bothers me to this day the most …
For this edition of The Nostalgia Blog, I’m Jonathan Neill. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it.