It’s been over six years because the Flames assigned Jagr to Rytiri Kladno in Czechia, his hometown membership, to play out the again half of a one-year deal he signed with Calgary for the 2017-18 season. That marked the top of his 24-year, 1,733-game NHL profession, but it surely didn’t sign the top of his days taking part in on the skilled stage.
Jagr has been Kladno’s majority proprietor since 2011. The fifth-overall decide of the Penguins in 1990 performed his first two skilled seasons with the membership within the Czechoslovak prime league earlier than being drafted and in addition took the ice there throughout NHL lockouts in 1994, 2004-05 and 2012.
However by the point Jagr returned throughout his age 45 season, Kladno had been demoted from the top-level Czech Extraliga to the nation’s second-tier professional league. Since his return, although, Kladno has managed to remain within the Extraliga for 5 out of the final eight seasons. Jagr was a power in serving to them achieve their preliminary promotion again to the highest stage, scoring 10 targets in 11 qualification video games in 2019 to spice up them again to the Extraliga for the 2019-20 marketing campaign.
Now in his thirty seventh season {of professional} hockey, Jagr is understandably not a premier power on the ice. The best-winger was restricted to fifteen regular-season appearances for Kladno final yr, posting 4 assists and a -4 ranking. He was within the lineup for Kladno’s Extraliga regular-season opener Wednesday, although, posting an help and a -1 ranking in 14:26 of ice time. It was a promising displaying after tearing his hamstring less than a month ago, placing his availability for yesterday’s recreation doubtful.
Jagr’s NHL resume wants no introduction. He could have by no means lifted the Stanley Cup in his prime, solely profitable it back-to-back with Pittsburgh in his first two NHL campaigns, however he was a game-changing risk within the NHL’s most offensively difficult period. Jagr gained 5 scoring titles, together with 4 straight from 1998 to 2001 and in addition gained the Pearson Award (now the Ted Lindsay Award) as probably the most excellent participant as chosen by their friends on three events (1999, 2000, 2006).
On the NHL’s all-time leaderboard, Jagr ranks fourth in video games performed, fourth in targets (766), fifth in assists (1,155) and second in factors (1,921). He’s additionally a member of the Triple Gold Membership, powering the Czechs to a gold medal on the 1998 Winter Olympics and profitable a pair of World Championship gold medals (2005, 2010).
Whereas Jagr donned the sweater of 9 NHL groups — the Penguins, Rangers, Capitals, Panthers, Devils, Flyers, Bruins, Stars and Flames — he’ll all the time greatest be remembered for his peak years in Pittsburgh. That’s the place he’ll doubtless return after his taking part in days are completed subsequent yr. Rossi reported in May that the membership was working to rent Jagr in a front-office position every time he was able to transition to the subsequent chapter of his hockey profession.
