Ray Bourque in Colorado...

[Jim]

I was just reading about Foote's number being retired in Colorado. The article says he joins Sakic, Roy, Forsberg and Bourque. Sakic I 100% understand, even Roy and Forsberg... but Bourque? He played 1.2 season with them, 94 total games. That would be like the Pens retiring Guerin's number.

I don't get it.

[Gaucho]

I wasn't sure I liked retiring Foote's number, but Bourque? Lame.

While we're at it, I've just seen that the Coyotes have already retired more numbers than the Pens did: Tkachuk, Roenick, and Numminen. I guess you could make a case for Teppo if you really wanted to, but Tkachuk and Jeremy F***ing Roenick? That's just stupid. Just because you never won anything, doesn't mean you should retire random numbers just to appear relevant.

[Digitalgypsy66]

Yeah, the Bourque number retirement is a point of contention between Avs-Wings fans like "Crosby whines/dives" is between Flyers and Pens fans.

[Jim]

I didn't really understand retiring Foote's number until I looked into his stats. He played 16.5 season for that organization. Only 2.5 anywhere else, all Columbus. 967 games played with Colorado/Que, That is a lot of games: 967gp, 56-203-259 +129 1279PIM. For a non-offensive guy, to be a +129 is rather impressive.

That is the kind of guy that you can consider retiring the number of. Someone that played the vast majority of his career with your team and he did a really solid job of it. Ron Francis is #4 in scoring in the history of the game, #4. Only Gretzky, Messier and Howe have more points... But I would vote against retiring his number here. Jagr is #8 overall, but I would vote against him as well. He has only played about 55% of his career NHL games here. Sometimes it seems like team retire numbers just to do something... like the Phoenix stuff that you mentioned. Number retirement should mean something.

[mikey287]

Bourque's was weird. The only thing Bourque had going for him was that he wears a fairly unique number. If Bourque wore #7 (like he used to), it probably wouldn't have happened.

Foote's was a no-brainer. He meant so much to that franchise, more than any box score could conjure up...

[Pitts]

I believe that only players who have played their entire career with a team should have their numbers retired by that team.

Jagr, IMO, is a bit different as he was a scoring title winning machine with the pens.

[JS©]

I didn't really understand retiring Foote's number until I looked into his stats. He played 16.5 season for that organization. Only 2.5 anywhere else, all Columbus. 967 games played with Colorado/Que, That is a lot of games: 967gp, 56-203-259 +129 1279PIM. For a non-offensive guy, to be a +129 is rather impressive.

That is the kind of guy that you can consider retiring the number of. Someone that played the vast majority of his career with your team and he did a really solid job of it. Ron Francis is #4 in scoring in the history of the game, #4. Only Gretzky, Messier and Howe have more points... But I would vote against retiring his number here. Jagr is #8 overall, but I would vote against him as well. He has only played about 55% of his career NHL games here. Sometimes it seems like team retire numbers just to do something... like the Phoenix stuff that you mentioned. Number retirement should mean something.

I'm gonna disagree on both. Jagr and Francis won the majority of their hardware here. I'm obviously leaving off their two Cups from 1991-92 and am more focused on individual awards.

Francis:
2 Byngs, 1 Selke here; 1 Byng and 1 Clancy with the Canes in 2001-02.
Games played: 533 GP, or 30.7% of his 1731 career regular season games. Considering how many games he played, the percentage will probably look a little lower but he was here for 8+ seasons. Francis also had three of his four highest scoring seasons while playing in Pittsburgh.

Jagr:
Awards: 5 Art Ross, 2 Pearsons, 1 Hart and was robbed out of a second Hart in 1999-2000 with the Penguins. Put up 8 of his top 10 scoring seasons with the Penguins. Jags' lone NHL award would be his Art Ross from 2005-06
Games played: 806 out of a possible 1391 games as of the end of the 2012-13 season. That's 57.9% which that number will gradually decline as he plays more games. That number will probably never dip below 50% unless Jagr manages to play 1600+ games. But knowing Jagr I wouldn't put it past him playing until he's 44 or 45.

I would have no issue if either number was retired, but I would understand if neither one was not.

But Bourque? Yeah, the Billy G comparison is quite similar although Guerin won his Cup earlier in his career with the Devils.

[Gaucho]

I believe that only players who have played their entire career with a team should have their numbers retired by that team.

Or at least the vast majority of their career. I certainly have no issue with the Bruins retiring Boruque's number or the Stars retiring Modano's number.

[Gaucho]

Guess what, the Coyotes didn't retire three numbers. They retired FOUR numbers, I forgot Dale Hawerchuk. So that's twice as many retired numbers as the Leafs. What a joke.

[mikey287]

The Leafs don't retire numbers, they honor them. The Leafs aren't the best example to judge against. They didn't retire numbers because they'd be out of low numbers otherwise...like what does Montreal have left? 8 and 11? Anything else below 12?

For the Leafs only death or maiming contributed to number retirement - so Barilko and Bailey, two of the most well known incidents in NHL history. Otherwise, 1, 4, 7, 9, 10, 21, 27 and maybe 93 would be retired. And if they ever make total amends with Davey Keon: 14 as well.

[MRandall25]

Guess what, the Coyotes didn't retire three numbers. They retired FOUR numbers, I forgot Dale Hawerchuk. So that's twice as many retired numbers as the Leafs. What a joke.

Hawerchuk never even played for Phoenix.

[Gaucho]

The Leafs don't retire numbers, they honor them. The Leafs aren't the best example to judge against.

I know, I decided to go for sensationalism.

[shoeshine boy]

Hawerchuk never even played for Phoenix.

[Crankshaft]

Hawerchuk never even played for Phoenix.

[MRandall25]

Hawerchuk never even played for Phoenix.

I'm actually somewhere between acute and right, thank you very much :lol:

[penny lane]

Hawerchuk never even played for Phoenix.

funny

[Why Not Us]

Ideally, 20 years from now, 21-66-68-87-71 hangs from the CEC rafters.

[PensFanInDC]

21?

[Rylan]

21?

Michel Briere. Its already retired.

[Crankshaft]

Ideally, 20 years from now, 21-66-68-87-71 hangs from the CEC rafters.

And if we're lucky and Fleury gets his act together, maybe 29.

[Beveridge]

Blysma will run 27 up the rafters with climbing rope and strength alone if he has too.

[mikey287]

While we're on the topic...just going to float this out there...

Let's say Brooks Orpik stays with us til the end of his career. Let's call that another three or four years on top of this one...let's say we get another Stanley Cup and maybe another SCF appearance at that time, he's a top four d-man for one, kinda a #5ish for the other, doesn't matter which. Even without adjusting for lost games due to work stoppages, Orpik is the longest tenured Penguin in franchise history, he's the only player that's ever played 1000 games in a Penguins uniform (only two players are above 800 even, Jagr [806] and Lemieux [915]).

He's never finished top-10 in anything notable, he's never been close to being voted for any award (last year, he finished t-18th in Norris voting thanks to a renegade local voter of some sort, it's the only vote for anything in his career)...does the 44 go up?

[columbia]

Would or should?

[MRandall25]

Given the precedent the team has set with number retirements, I don't foresee 44 going up.

Perhaps he gets a spot in the Ring of Honor or something, but I don't think we'll see a number retirement.

[mikey287]

Would or should?

First one, then the other...

My thought is: I don't think so...but how many career Penguins have we really had, like career, career...