The tale of how Jaromir Jagr screwed four NHL teams.

When you hear a story this crazy you always have to question the source, well in this case the source is a former National Hockey League general manager so it seems pretty solid.

According to Penguins beat writer Josh Yohe former Pittsburgh Penguins general manager Craig Patrick made a shocking admission regarding the 1990 NHL draft and specifically the player he drafted, legendary forward Jaromir Jagr. According to Patrick the reason the Penguins were able to get Jagr at number five was because the soon-to-be NHL superstar told the four teams drafting before him he would not come to the NHL.

The result was four teams that drafted before Pittsburgh getting robbed of an opportunity to draft Jagr, who's motivation to pull off this dirty deed was his desire to play with another NHL legend #66 Mario Lemieux. Of course whatever his motivation was it was little consolation for the four teams involved, the Philadelphia Flyers, Vancouver Canucks, Detroit Red Wings and Quebec Nordiques.

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That's not to say those teams didn't do well in the draft, in fact they all drafted young men who would go on to be fantastic NHL players with Quebec getting Owan Nolan first overall follow by Petr Nedved to Vancouver, Keith Primeau to Detroit and Mike Ricci to Philadelphia. With that said if you're a fan of these teams it's hard not to wonder what could have been. 

One might also wonder why Patrick would go on the record with this story to the media, while there's no doubt that there will be very little blow back for a player as beloved as Jagr, the perception of a player who made this move who did not share Jagr's status would not be favorable.