Pittsburgh Penguins looking to open talks with Jaromir Jagr

Despite playing the last three seasons overseas in Russia for the KHL, the name Jaromir Jagr still holds clout with fans of the Pittsburgh Penguins as Jagr was a vital part of Pittsburgh’s dominance in the early 1990’s and the team’s two Stanley Cup championships in 1991 and 1992. In Pittsburgh hockey lore, Jagr’s name remains right up there with Mario Lemieux as a franchise player despite not playing in the city for nearly a decade.

Penguins GM Ray Shero may have a plan to change that, however.

Penguins management has reportedly had trouble getting in touch with Jagr in recent years, but Shero hopes to open a line of communication with Jagr at the IIHF World Hockey Championships and extend an invitation to the former Penguins star for several upcoming commemorative events within the Penguins’ organization this summer. Ultimately, those invitations could lead to talks about Jagr possibly returning to the NHL and a reunion with the Pittsburgh Penguins franchise that drafted him in 1990.

Jagr won’t tip his hand yet about a return to the NHL, however, while he focuses on the World Championships where he has two goals and three assists in six games with the Czech Repubic at the tournament.

“It’s too early for me, I don’t really know what I want to do next year,” Jagr said Tuesday. “I don’t know where I want to play. Right now I just want to concentrate for this tournament, it’s not going to be more than one week. Then I have to make a decision.

Rumors have swirled around Jagr’s future after a very public falling out with the coach of his Russian KHL team, Avangard Omsk, after the team lost in the playoffs. Jagr remains without a contract and has expressed interest in returning to the NHL in previous off seasons and had nothing but good things to say about the fans of the Pittsburgh Pnguins – a team that he asked to be traded from in 2001.

“The fans in Pittsburgh, they all wanted to help me and they all liked me when I was younger,” Jagr said. “Plus the biggest thing is I had a chance to watch and play with the best player ever (Lemiuex) and that’s probably the best thing that happened to me in my life.”

You can bet that whatever lines of communications open between Shero and Jagr at the World Championships will ultimately lead to talks about a return to Pittsburgh next season. After scoring 50 points in 49 games last season with Avangard Omsk, it’s apparent that the 39-year-old Jagr still has some fuel left in the tank, and returning to the place where he started his career to play with a new generation of super stars, namely Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, could be a fitting end to an outstanding career.