Here’s why Iginla was my favorite player
CALGARY >> It was an honor to be in the press box at the Scotiabank Saddledome this past weekend in Calgary to watch Jarome Iginla’s jersey retirement ceremony.
Truth be told, however, a red sweater with the “flaming C” on the front and his familiar “12” on the back has been retired in the Ashmore household for quite some time now. It isn’t exactly hanging from the rafters or anything, but an old CCM Iginla jersey is the first thing you see on the wall as soon as you step into the bedroom of our humble home.
Although my “fan” days are long behind me, “Iggy” was always one of my favorite players to watch growing up and became one of my favorite players to cover as I transitioned from the Trenton Devils/Titans beat writer for this paper to my current role as national hockey writer.
He was everything you’d want in a hockey player: Size, skill, finesse, physicality, class. It was hard not to gravitate towards his game.
But, I never knew what it would be like to deal with the man himself.
I first met him during one of the very first NHL games I got to cover; a Flames-Avalanche game in Colorado, and he couldn’t have been nicer. There were several more chats after that; his first game with the Pittsburgh Penguins after the memorable trade out of Calgary was at Madison Square Garden, for example, but the one I remember most was during the 201516 season in the visiting locker room of what was then the Verizon Center in Washington.
Had he retired that day, he’d be a first-ballot Hall of Famer, but you’d never know from the way he handled himself. He granted a lengthy one-on-one, pregame interview with a reporter who I’m sure he’d never heard of for a story in this space that I was quite proud of.
Ask around, as I got to in the Flames dressing room the morning of his jersey retirement ceremony, and tales like that of how he’d treat people when nobody was looking were far from uncommon.
“First and foremost, he taught me a lot about how to treat people on and off the ice and how to carry yourself with a lot of respect,” Flames captain and former teammate Mark Giordano said.
“I think he does that better than anyone I’ve ever seen. But, on the ice, he was the most fierce competitor you can ever imagine. Honestly, if you needed a fight, you needed a goal, you needed a big hit, you needed a goal; he was always trying to find a way to bring the team up and that competitiveness is really what I took away from his game.”
Don’t let the kindness fool you, of course. The 6-foot-1, 210 pounder was the kind of player you could only try to contain, it was impossible to truly ever shut him down.
Jarome Arthur-Leigh Adekunle Tig Junior Elvis Iginla — yes, that’s his full name — won two Maurice “Rocket” Richard trophies as the NHL’s leading goal scorer, and was named the 2002 winner of the Lester B. Pearson Award as the Most Valuable Player as voted on by his peers.
The Flames franchise leader in goals, points, and games played was a six-time All-Star and a two-time 50goal scorer, scored 30 goals in 11 consecutive seasons and finished his career with 625 goals and 1,300 total points to put him 15th and 34th, respectively, on the all-time lists.
Iginla also earned six gold medals in international play with Team Canada, including Olympic golds in 2002 and 2010, and famously captained the Flames to the 2004 Stanley Cup Final as well, falling one game short to the Tampa Bay Lightning.
But even with all that skill? His 1,040 career penalty minutes have him well inside the all-time top 500 in that category, a clear indication that nobody was going to get so much as an inch they didn’t earn against him.
“He was hard to play against,” recalled Flames winger Michael Frolik. “As you can see, he kind of had everything; he had a great shot, and he was a good passer as well, but he could fight too. He was pretty tough. He was the whole package.”
Iginla was soaking it all in at the morning skate on Saturday — his sons, Tij and Joe, got to skate with the Flames players while Jarome had his cellphone out capturing every moment — but he also took one last opportunity to show the skills that earned him the Mark Messier Leadership Award.
He delivered a passionate speech in the locker room, emphasizing that careers go fast, even one like Iginla’s that lasted an incredible two decades.
“I got to play 20 years, and it still feels like that,” Iginla said with a snap of his fingers.
Luckily, nobody who ever got to see him play will ever forget him. Certainly, the same can be said for anyone who’s ever been fortunate enough to meet him.
A jersey retirement ceremony — and one that was wonderfully done, by the way — was a fitting way for a franchise to whom he gave so much to honor his contributions. Soon, it’ll be time for the hockey world as a whole to do the same when it’s time for his sure induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto.