Eddie Johnston, the general manager who drafted Mario Lemieux 40 years ago this month, had only one concern when he announced the historic selection at the old Montreal Forum. It wasn’t whether Lemieux would pull the Penguins jersey over his head.
Lemieux did not.
Ironically, Lemieux’s first act with the Penguins was to create some distance from the franchise he would personify, influence, and own on and off the ice for the next four decades.
“It wasn’t Mario, it was his agent. He didn’t want to do that,” said Johnston. “Mario and I never talked about it. Not that day. Not until today.
“I did my homework. Now you will hear about the generational outlook. No, Mario wasn’t generational. He was there once in his life, not just as a player, but as a person.
“We (Penguins) wouldn’t be here without Mario.”
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You’ve probably heard something similar before. For those unfamiliar, consider the situation in Pittsburgh before Lemieux arrived in 1984.
- The Penguins are nine years removed from bankruptcy.
- They averaged fewer than 8,500 fans during the 1982-83 season, when they finished with just 45 points and a -137 goal differential despite 81 power-play goals, which was sixth-best.
- They practiced at a suburban high school rink, which was one of the few high school rinks around Pittsburgh at the time.
- They never made it past two rounds of the postseason and were best known for two crushing playoff losses to the New York Islanders. The decisive 5th game in 1982.
- Their owner, Edward DeBartolo, Sr., preferred to sell the franchise to support the Pittsburgh Spirit, a more successful and popular indoor soccer team at the time that also played at Civic Arena.
“I loved coming to Pittsburgh when I played for the Oilers,” Paul Coffey said. “It was a great sports town. Steelers shirts and Pirates hats were everywhere. They are all the same color, including black and gold. We played the Penguins, and to be honest the game wasn’t very competitive. And I would say to people after the game when we were eating a few cups of popcorn, ‘Gee, if they find out about hockey here.’ , this will be the destination.’
“Well, they found out. The correct answer was Mario. I don’t think any player in our game has meant more to the city or the franchise.”
Coming from former teammates of Lemieux, Wayne Gretzky and Steve Yzerman, it’s a big statement. So Coffey, a Hall of Famer like those three, is a qualified professional. And Coffey is not alone in that opinion.
Scotty Bowman, the NHL’s greatest coach, won one of his nine Stanley Cup championships behind the bench in 1992 with Lemieux’s Penguins. The Penguins won their first title in 1991, and Lemieux’s surprise was diminished by back surgery in 1990. -This capriciousness and his ability to play in at least 70 games for only two more seasons earned him the title of the new “Mr. Mister.” Hockey’ (Sports Illustrated) announced after averaging 2.05 points per game en route to back-to-back Stanley Cup/Conn Smythe titles.
“That’s what they call Gordie Howe,” Bowman said. “To give that to Mario, he deserved it, it was special.”
Admittedly, he and the Penguins were at their peak even with his bad back. He started the 1992-93 season with 39 goals and 104 points in 40 games, but was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease (now Hodgkin’s lymphoma) and missed two months.
He returned from eight weeks of treatment and spent little time on the ice, scoring 30 goals and 56 points in his final 20 games.
“He wanted Wayne’s (single-season points) record,” said former Penguins great Kevin Stevens, referring to Gretzky’s 215 points. “If you ask anyone on our team, he’ll cross it off.
“If Mario hadn’t had cancer that season, he would have had 100 goals and 230 points. It’s no joke. Then we won the Cup again and he passed Wayne as the greatest player of all time.”
In the decades-long debate over Gretzky or Lemieux, Gretzky won almost everywhere except Montreal and Pittsburgh. It is in Pittsburgh that Lemieux is universally regarded as the greatest player of all time. It’s not because of the three Hart Trophies, six Art Ross Trophies or two Cup wins.
“He’s the Paul Bunyan of Pittsburgh,” said Bryan Trottier. “I mean, there’s so much to Mario’s story that you can’t believe it’s real.
“When I got to Pittsburgh (1990) he was never healthy. He had your back. He has cancer. His ass was a mess. He couldn’t tie his skates. Through it all, he was still the best player in the league, but in Mario’s case, it was so much more than that.
“He literally made the penguin what it is.”
Again, you’ve probably heard something similar before. For those unfamiliar, consider the situation in Pittsburgh following Lemieux’s diagnosis of Hodgkin’s disease in 1993.
- He appeared in only 22 games in 1993-94 and did not appear in the 1994-95 season.
- He returned to win another Hart Trophy, his third, and two more Art Ross Trophies, his fifth and sixth, but retired more than three seasons after the 1996-97 season.
- He was not paid most of his then-record contract due to financial problems with ownership.
- Amid an ownership dispute and massive debt, the Penguins declared bankruptcy for a second time and were at risk of relocation or dissolution in the late 1990s, with Lemieux being their largest debtor.
“The Canadiens and the Rangers were willing to pay him $25 million for one season,” Johnston said. “He could have done that and he could have made most of the money. But he never had a chance. It’s not Mario.
“Penguins meant so much to him.”
So, after accomplishing what was once thought impossible by bringing in the Penguins despite the popularity of the Steelers and Pirates in the early 1990s, Lemieux capped the decade by forming an ownership group to purchase the Penguins out of bankruptcy. A feel-good story – except that instead of participating in the sports facilities bill that Pennsylvania politicians passed for the Pittsburgh and Philadelphia teams, the previous owners got paid to renovate the Civic Arena. Lemieux owned the Penguins, but their financial situation was still bleak, especially due to Jaromir Jagr’s hefty contract and unfavorable revenue agreements on the field.
“Even after he took over our team, things weren’t going well,” said Mike Lange, the Penguins’ longtime voice. “If Mario doesn’t come back in 2000, I don’t know if ‘The Kid’ will last long enough for it to come out a few years later.”
Lange stands for Sidney Crosby. “Sid the Kid” was the first drafted by the Penguins in 2005. A lot was asked of Crosby, but it was nothing compared to what was asked of Lemieux.
“It’s not over yet,” Crosby said in 2016. Crosby briefly played with Lemieux before Lemieux retired for good in 2005 and spent a few seasons in Lemieux’s guest house.
“I mean, if you think about everything we have here — this (practice) facility, the (current) stadium, the expectations — it all comes from what he’s done for the Penguins. That’s what’s special about Mario and this franchise. I don’t know if people outside of Pittsburgh really appreciate it for what it is. It’s unique. “You just don’t see it very often.”
Michael Farber, who wrote frequently about Lemieux in Sports Illustrated, cited Babe Ruth of the New York Yankees and Bill Russell of the Boston Celtics as the only athletes who could compare to Lemieux in terms of impact on a franchise. Unlike Lemieux, both ended up working elsewhere. Ruth served as a player for the Boston Braves and Russell served as a coach/general manager for the Seattle SuperSonics.
Lemieux remains a minority owner of the Penguins.
His ownership group was sold to Fenway Sports Group a few years ago, but Lemieux retained a partial stake. He is not involved in day-to-day decisions. But as was evident when he returned for Jagr’s jersey retirement last February, it’s the Penguins that matter more than anything else.
The Penguins carefully planned Lemieux’s participation in Jagr’s jersey retirement ceremony. He didn’t want to take away Jagr’s big night. Nonetheless, when it came time for Lemieux to be introduced to the sold-out crowd at PPG Paints Arena that evening, extra time was secured because the Penguins’ game night operations team anticipated that fans would want to give Lemieux a lengthy standing ovation.
They did. They always are.
“Of course I do.” Trottier said. “It’s not just because Mario was a great player for Pittsburgh fans. What they’re saying is that they’ve seen him deal with health issues. They see his charity working with local hospitals. They know he saved the team twice.
“And to be honest, the penguin became a penguin because of Mario. Soaring high, scoring high points and becoming big stars like Jags, Crosby and (Evgeni) Malkin. The identity of the franchise is still based on what he did and what he did.”
Mario Lemieux waves to the crowd at Jaromir Jagr’s jersey retirement ceremony in February. (Justin Burl/Getty Images)
Forty years after drafting Lemieux, Johnston shared one of his concerns from that day at a Montreal forum. He had planned to announce the nomination in French, his native language, but was anxious that his excitement would “ruin it.”
He didn’t.
“I spent so much time telling Mr. DeBartolo how special Mario was. He finally said, ‘Eddie, he’s just one guy. No one can follow what you’re telling me,’” said Johnston.
“I told him, ‘Just watch.’ Mario would be the best thing that ever happened to this team. People will be talking about him long after we’re gone.’”
Perhaps no one captured Lemieux’s importance to the Penguins better than Farber.
“Ruth and Russell are pretty good friends,” Farber said. “Even if all you want to do is watch hockey, as always when you talk about Mario, the focus is on Wayne. But Wayne belonged to sports.
“Mario belongs to Penguin. And he finally wore that uniform.”
Lemieux donned his Penguins crest just days after the 1984 NHL Draft. In it is a photo of him standing atop Mount Washington with the Pittsburgh skyline in the background.
Johnston likes that photo.
“Mario, our city in our jersey, that’s all you see and it’s perfect,” he said.
(Top photo: Allsport / Getty Images)
