Mario's money - The Fans Speak Out - Letter to the Editor

Hockey Digest, April, 2003 by Damn Matteson

I'd like to respond to the letter in your February issue in which someone blamed Mario Lemieux for the Penguins losing Jaromir Jagr to the Capitals. Lemieux's salary had nothing to do with the defection of Jagr. At the end of the 2001 season, Pittsburgh GM Craig Patrick told Jagr that the Penguins were willing to do whatever was necessary to keep him. Jagr turned him down and demanded a trade. Lemieux is a favorite son of Pittsburgh. He is one of a vanishing breed--the franchise hockey player. Among active players, only Lemieux and Steve Yzerman have remained on the teams that initially drafted them for this long. The two of them are the only active players to have stuck by their teams through the highs and lows and helped their teams win long-awaited Stanley Cups. And to cap it all off, whether or not Lemieux's return to the ice was "selfish" (as many nay-sayers are quick to say), he did keep the Penguins from being relocated or dissolved. Do his true intentions really matter if the end result kept the Penguins in Pittsburgh? And say what you will about his game, but he's playing better at the age of 37 than "the Great One" was at that age.

Damn Matteson

Chicago