On Jaromir Jagr and Love for the Game of Hockey

Recently, Jaromir Jagr made it known that he planned on playing “every game” for his Kladno team this season. Today, let’s look at the example that Jagr sets for the rest of the hockey world.

Just 11 years ago, the two men in the headline photo for this article were gearing up for their first season on the same team together. Andy Greene was just 30 years old, and Jaromir Jagr a spry 41. Coming off an offseason where New Jersey Devils fans took a gut punch from one of their top players for the second year in a row, signing Jagr was a rather stereotypical response from Lou Lamiorello, who still has a reputation for giving older players chances where other teams might think the game is passing them by.

Of course, Jagr and Greene proved to be a very effective pair of players to have on the ice together. Despite being in his 40s, Jagr still dominated possession and created many goals — but the unfortunate reality was that he came to the Devils a year or two too late to impact the team beyond the regular season. At that point, I had only been watching hockey for a few years. I had seen the team get so far in 2012 only to fall in the most frustrating ways. And in short order, the two offensive dynamos that gave that team enough power to compete split away.

Adding Jaromir Jagr in response to those losses was in itself not enough — and we all know about those moves in the 2013 offseason that did not work out. But just watching Jagr was a fantastic experience, and you could tell just how much he loved being out there. Jagr was always doing something to keep the Devils on the attack, playing a game where it seemed like he was trying to exhaust the other team. Being 41 years old was no problem when he always had the puck, and was always directing where it was going next. After losing Ilya Kovalchuk, who broke contract and signed another mega deal in the KHL, Jagr was like an antithesis. Where Kovalchuk faltered due to aging, or injuries, or a desire to be elsewhere, Jagr was all in, all the time. Despite the result of that 2013-14 season, it was largely Jagr’s effort, alongside knowing it was likely the end of the line for Martin Brodeur, that made that season easy to watch relative to the other years between the 2012 run and the true return to competitiveness in the 2022-23 season.

You might have expected Jagr to retire by now, especially after Calgary barely gave him ice time and cut ties after around a quarter-season’s worth of games, despite his lines doing very well with him. However, he was only 45 years old, and he still has a lot of hockey left to play. Now, at age 52 — he will be 53 in February — he is still training hard in the offseason, wearing weights over his skates to help him build strength for the season to come.

On the other side of things, Andy Greene, who was Jagr’s teammate for those two seasons before Jagr was traded to Florida, is still in hockey. The 41-year old former Captain is not gearing up for a run of European professional hockey, though, as he was one of the many hirings the Devils recently made that was overshadowed by the appointment of Chuck Fletcher, the former general manager of the Minnesota Wild and Philadelphia Flyers. Greene joining the Devils is most welcome news, as his many years of experience can only benefit the team. That is most true for the defensive staff and their players, who are coming off a very difficult season and can benefit from the perspective of a veteran who has played in today’s NHL. Though, it is funny to me that Greene is rejoining the organization as an advisor at the same age Jaromir Jagr signed with the team to be its leading scorer.

There are a lot of things that watching Jagr can teach the players of today. While Jagr came into the league with great speed, old Jagr continued to perform by achieving close to peak physical fitness with unshakable strength. Having lived and breathed hockey for so long, he still had impeccable vision on the ice and was able to play at a very high level. As we ask how Timo Meier can live up to his contract or if Ondrej Palat is truly a negative force on the ice, I would look to the example of Jagr. In both of Meier and Palat’s situations, hard work is the answer. Meier already plays a style of hockey where he is at his best dominating possession of the puck and imposing his physicality on opponents. Palat showed a flash of how impactful he can be in the 2023 playoffs, and gave IIHF Worlds viewers another glimpse of how chasing big victories — whether they be medals or Cups — gives him another level to achieve.

Having felt the sting of Zach Parise and Ilya Kovalchuk’s departures as a young fan, Jagr’s enthusiasm and winning mentality hooked me right back into hockey. To this day, the players I am going to most enjoy watching are those who are giving it their all on and off the ice — and I hope Palat brings some of that playoff intensity into his regular season performance for the team this season. I look forward to some of the younger guys on the team, especially Meier, Hischier, and Bratt, continuing to build strength so they can become a dominant top line. And I hope that bringing Andy Greene more consistently into the fray helps Luke Hughes become a responsible two-way defender and a leader on the ice.

On the other side of the pond, I hope Jaromir Jagr plays shockingly well this year. I was worried, with him only playing 15 games with four assists (the least he had played since the 2018-19 season), that we might had been dealing with a quiet retirement. In many cases, people don’t appreciate what they have until it’s gone, but Jagr is someone that should hear all of the hockey world’s appreciation before that last game comes.

With that in mind, it would be fantastic if the Hockey Hall of Fame waived its normal professional retirement requirements and inducted him in 2025.

Looking Ahead

For the month of August, I will largely be looking at some more historical things. Next week, I will be talking about two books — Doc Emrick’s memoir, Off Mike: How a Kid from Basketball-Crazy Indiana Became America’s NHL Voice, and Chico Resch’s collaboration with Mike Kerwick, Tales From the Devils Ice. I was going to write about them this week, but I can’t pass up a chance to write about Jaromir Jagr.

After that, I would like to read some player memoirs, but I have not selected any yet. So, if you have any ideas, please let me know in the comments.

Your Thoughts

What do you think about Jaromir Jagr announcing his plan to play every game in 2024-25? Which player on the team do you think could learn the most from a week with the legend? What do you think about Andy Greene officially joining the Devils again? Leave your thoughts in the comments below, and thanks for reading.