Jaromir Jagr - Improved As A Pro

As Jagr grew more comfortable and matured as a player, his numbers also grew. In his sophomore year, he had thirty-two goals and thirty-seven assists. The Penguins again won the Stanley Cup, his last with the Penguins, though the team would make the playoffs every year in the 1990s. Before his third year, Jagr wanted a renegotiated contract, because a player of similar age and stature, Eric Lindros, was making fifteen times more than him. (At the time, Jagr was only making $200,000 year in base salary.) He went to the media with his salary complaints.

Over the next two seasons, Jagr continued to improve. In 1992-93, he had thirty-four goals and sixty assists. In 1993-94 had thirty-two goals and sixty-seven assists. By the mid-1990s, Jagr had to step up as Lemieux, the acknowledged leader of the team, had injury and health issues, including bad back pain and cancer. Jagr, like Lemieux, had to fight the clutching and grabbing that was common in the NHL at this time.

At the beginning of the 1994-95 season, the NHL players went on strike. During the strike, Jagr played for his old team in Czechoslovakia. Appearing in only eleven games, he posted twenty-two points. When the NHL season started, Jagr returned to score thirty-two goals and thirty-eight assists in the strike-shortened season. This gave him his first Art Ross Trophy as the league's leading scorer. This was a hint of his future scoring explosion. Jagr was finally becoming the star that many thought he could be.