On March 27th 2013, Jarome Iginla was temporarily suspend from play as the NHL suspected an impending trade that would move Iginla out of his longtime home in Calgary. As it was reported, after months of speculation, the Flames had narrowed Iginla's possible suitors down to just two teams willing to trade for the services of the Flames captain. The Bruins who would give up several players, the most notable of which being then AHL blue-liner Matt Bartowski and the Pittsburgh Penguins who were offering up their first round pick along with a few prospects in the college ranks. As time went on, it was suspected that a deal with Boston was done and that the ageing star would be headed to Beantown. Yet as Bostonians reveled in the thought of having a guy who has scored 530 career goals among their ranks, a flightless flock of Pittsburgh Penguins swooped in, shattering Boston's hopes of signing Iginla by pinning him down with a 1 year contract.
At the time, Iginla's intentions were all but crystal clear: after spending a mammoth 15 years in the league and playing over 1,000 games, the longtime Calgary captain still had no cup ring to his name and with his days in the NHL then and still numbered, he was and still is running out of patience.
Now at the time, there was no doubt about it: the Penguins were the better team, Crosby is better than Seguin, Malkin is better than Bergeron (I say that begrudgingly) and logically, the better team will give you a better chance at winning the cup. The only problem was Iginla seemed to forget that hockey is not a game played by numbers and philosophical ideas. Hockey is a sport of the purest upsets and sweetest victories meaning that when the Bruins and Penguins met to battle for the Eastern Conference Championship anything could happen.
Nevertheless, no matter how random hockey could and often ended up being, going into that early June conference final, nobody and I mean nobody believed that the Bruins could even beat the Penguins much less do it in the fashion that they did. Through the 4 games of that mighty series, Boston outscored Iginla and the Penguins by a margin of 12 to 2 and managed to hold the man who passed up on them to just 5 shots and no points.
"When a guy chooses another team over your team, it does light a little bit of a fire underneath you," Milan Lucic said in almost an understatement of a quote. Iginla's decision to forgo the Bruins lit a little more than a tiny spark in the soles of Boston's skates. Jarome Iginla gave Boston reason to basically construct a raging bonfire of hatred and blast it all in the direction of him and his bystanding team knocking them to the ground and sweeping them out of the playoffs.
Well, Iginla waited 16 years for a cup in Calgary yet after 28 games in Pittsburgh the Penguins found themselves too close to the cap to retain Iginla, freeing him instead to the world of free agency. Yet even that didn't last long. Seemingly forgetting about any history between them and the player, the Bruins signed Iginla early this morning as Bruins GM Peter Charelli justified the deal by saying "Yeah, If I were Jarome at that time and we were losing six games in a row or whatever, and Pittsburgh was winning fifteen, I probably would have made that decision. But he’s a guy that we wanted before and now we’ve got him, We’re happy. He’s going to solidify our right side with Loui Eriksson and some young guys in the third line and we’re happy to get him."
Now in that quote, Charlli began to elude to the main reason the Bruins signed the boatload of controversy that Iginla will bring to their roster: the right wing situation.
Jagr, Seguin, Peverly, Horton, all right wings and all now guys who do not play on this team anymore. 4 right wings meaning that before the Iginla signing, Shawn Thornton was Boston's number 2 right wing a fact that no matter how beloved Thornton is in this sports town, that would have to keep Bruins fans up at night.
So on the Bruins side of things, you look at this deal and realize that signing Iginla for 6 million was really a necessary deal to prolong the potency of their 4 line attack.
It seems like a TV show. After pursuing what the Bruins thought they needed, the Penguins stole Boston’s guy. Yet after proving to him what they were really all about, the story ends (at least for now) with Jarome Iginla falling into a Bruins uniform a smile on his face yet still no Cup ring around his finger.
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