After Jagr's Picture-Perfect Jersey Retirement, Whose Numbers Are Next for the Penguins?

Jaromir Jagr fell to the Pittsburgh Penguins in the 1990 draft to be with his idol Mario Lemieux, and the team retired his No. 68 in a touching weekend 34 years later.

He played for nine different NHL teams, but in his heart, Jaromir Jagr says he was always a Pittsburgh Penguin.

“That was the city that drafted me,” he told Tom Gulitti of NHL.com ahead of his number retirement ceremony on Sunday. "That’s the city where they treated me like I was their kid."

But it wasn't pure happenstance that the man whose first name is an anagram for 'Mario Jr.' landed on the same squad as the Magnificent One when the Penguins selected him fifth overall in 1990.

The first three picks that year belonged to the Quebec Nordiques, Vancouver Canucks and Detroit Red Wings. For all the cities he played in during the late stages of his career, Jagr never landed in any of those three. And before the draft, he offered some not-so-subtle discouragement to those GMs.

"I never said I don’t want to go to (the other teams)," he told Gulitti. "I said I might have to go to the army (in the former Czechoslovakia). So, it's kind of the same way because it might have scared people away because we had to go to the army for two years there."

Once he landed in Pittsburgh, the military requirement was rendered a non-issue. Jagr became one of a whopping 17 players from his draft class to debut in the NHL in the 1990-91 season. With 27 goals and 30 assists for 57 points in 80 games, he topped them all in goals, points and games played. His closest competitor was No. 4 pick Mike Ricci (21 goals, 20 assists and 41 points in 68 games).

On Sunday, Jagr's No. 68 became just the third number to be raised to the rafters at PPG Paints Arena, alongside Lemieux's No. 66 and the No. 21 of Michel Briere, a third-round pick in the 1969 draft who led the Penguins in scoring as a rookie in their first-ever playoff appearance in 1970. Two weeks after Pittsburgh was eliminated from the post-season by the St. Louis Blues, Briere was badly injured in a car accident outside his hometown of Malartic, Que. He died on April 13, 1971.

For a 56-year-old franchise with five Stanley Cups, that's a remarkably small collection of honored numbers. But it's surprisingly difficult to identify other slam-dunk candidates whose jerseys should be in the rafters today.

Take a look at the Penguins' franchise records, and the categories that Lemieux and Jagr don't lead are headed up by names of three current players. 

Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and Kris Letang should all be slam-dunk candidates when they hang up their skates, but they've got a few years to go still.

What about Marc-Andre Fleury? He's a league legend who's now second all-time in wins, played 691 of his 1,010 games and counting in Pittsburgh and was part of three Cup teams. But for the last two, Matt Murray had become the main man in net. And while Fleury's personal numbers were decent in Pittsburgh, they were better during his four years in Vegas, where he was also named a Vezina Trophy finalist for the first time ever in 2021 — and won.

Of the recently retired players who were part of those championship squads, Chris Kunitz is the best potential candidate. He played 569 of his 1,022 NHL games in Pittsburgh and was an important part of all three Cup runs. But his regular-season numbers with Pittsburgh don't especially pop: 13th on the team's games-played list and 15th in points, at 388.

Beyond Lemieux and Jagr, many of the key players on the Penguins teams who won the Cup in 1991 and 1992 aren't primarily defined by their time in Pittsburgh. 

Players changed teams more frequently back then, and big-time Penguins names such as Paul Coffey, Bryan Trottier, Ron Francis, Joe Mullen and Rick Tocchet established important legacies in other cities. In some cases, their numbers have been retired or they've been inducted into a team Hall of Fame or Ring of Honor in another market.

Francis has the best case for recognition by the Penguins. He's 17th in games played (533) but seventh in points (613). In addition to winning both of his Cups in Pittsburgh, he was also awarded the 1995 Selke Trophy as a Penguin, plus two of his three Lady Byng Trophies (1995 and 1998). When Lemieux was away from the team due to his injury and health issues in the '90s, Francis carried the torch as Pittsburgh's leader. He even gave Jagr a stern pep talk in 1994-95 that the latter was thankful for by the time he became a leader in Pittsburgh as well. Francis is also in the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Kevin Stevens certainly had his best years as a Penguin — a power forward who went better than a point per game, with 555 points in 522 contests, and also logged 1,048 penalty minutes. Stevens also played 352 games for four other teams but managed just 171 points. His Pittsburgh numbers might not get him a retired number, but he certainly deserves consideration for a Ring of Honor-type treatment.

Finally, there's Tom Barrasso, the newly inducted Hockey Hall of Famer who spent 12 years and 460 of his 777 career games with Pittsburgh. He was the main man in net for the Cup runs in 1991 and 1992 and raised his game significantly both years, boasting save percentages of .919 and .907 that were miles better than his regular-season average of .895 during his time in Pittsburgh. As strong as the Penguins were offensively, he was able to deliver big-time performances when it mattered most.