Jaromir Jagr: "If I can Play Till I Die, That's What I Will Do"

SportsNet – One thing is clear: There’s nobody in hockey quite like Jaromir Jagr.

He’s drawing from 25 years of experience playing pro, he grew up in a communist country, he’s one of the best ever, he’s won everything there is to win in hockey, he’s been called both a sulk and misunderstood, he basically invented hockey hair, he left the NHL and came back at age 39 and he’s still producing like an elite player. And that’s just scratching the surface.

And that right there is what makes Jaromir Jagr one of the best athletes of all time. It’s the reason why he has 730 goals in his NHL career. It’s the reason why he’s 4th all time in NHL history with 1819 career points. It’s the reason why at age 43, Jaromir Jagr is still one of the best players in the world. When people retire, you always hear them say things like “there’s more to life than just hockey”. And for the most part, those guys are right. But not for Jaromir Jagr. Because it’s not like Jags has a wife and kids at home. He married the game and the sport is his family. He lives for hockey and you know that he’s not joking around even a little when he says that he wants to play until he dies. The man is a savage and he is a legend. And if he didn’t take those few years off to go play in the KHL, well then who knows where he’d be right now on the all-time leader board. But maybe if he sticks around for another 10 years or so he’ll have nowhere to look but down. All I know is that the hockey world is a better place with Jagr in it so we can only hope he has a few more years left in the tank.

P.S. – Of course Jagr doesn’t want to get all fat and ugly. The dude still has plenty of 18-year-old Czech supermodels to plow through before he croaks.

P.P.S. – I’m so glad that Jaromir Jagr is still playing in the age of social media because the man has been a delight to follow this year.