| Super Mario is Making a Comeback! | |
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It's a great day for
hockey in Pittsburgh. Nearly four years after his retirement from playing
professional hockey, Mario Lemieux is planning to
return to the ice with his beloved Penguins, perhaps before year-end. If it happens, he will become the first team owner in the history of
major professional sports to employ himself as a player.
The Penguins are expected to formally announce Friday that their 35-year-old owner, Mario Lemieux, will rejoin the team sometime around Jan 1, 2001. He has been secretly working out for the past month on his own and is intent on making a comeback that will last longer than one season. The NHL has approved the move as long as Mario does not represent the team on the league's board of governors, according to Tom Rooney, the Penguins executive vice president and chief operating officer.
"It's just the greatest thing for our city," right winger Jaromir Jagr said. "I can't think of anything better that's happened to Pittsburgh since I've been here."
Pittsburgh and the hockey world are abuzz with the amazing and unexpected news. This is not just a great player returning to the sport he once dominated after everyone was sure he had hung up his jersey for good. This is the man who saved the floundering Penguins when he joined as a rookie in 1984. This is the man who is the greatest player in Penguins history and one of the greatest to ever play the game. This is the man who has already made two amazing comebacks after battling Hodgkin's Disease in 1993-94 and back trouble in 1995. This is the man who is the first former hockey player in history to own a hockey team and who fought long and hard to keep the Penguins in Pittsburgh.
From 1984 to 1997, Mario Lemieux was the heart and soul of the Pittsburgh Penguins. His natural ability and desire to succeed make him the greatest all-around player in the game. The six time scoring champion has won three MVP awards and led the Penguins to two Stanley Cup championships (1991 & 1992). In 1997, Mario was unanimously inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame, without having to wait the customary three years after retirement. And in November 1997, the number 66 was raised to the rafters of the Civic Arena in Pittsburgh, making him the first Penguins player to have his number retired.
So why is he doing it? Mario says he thinks he can help the team and views them as a contender to bring the Stanley Cup back to Pittsburgh this year. He also wants his four children to be able to watch him play hockey. I think watching his team struggle this year may have just stoked that competitive fire and started it burning again.
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