From all indications this past season Jaromir Jagr enjoyed his time playing for the Philadelphia Flyers.
He returned to the NHL and showed he still had enough to play in the best league in the world at age 40. Granted, it was the lowest point total of his NHL career, but that's saying something when that total was 54 points.
Still, it looks like he isn't sold on Philadelphia being the city for him going forward in his NHL career, which Jagr seems to think could still have a few more seasons left in it. It could also mean that we're on the threshold of another ridiculous free agency courtship like the one that Jagr went through last summer when he made his return to the league after a three-year stop in the KHL.
From TSN's Darren Dreger:
Jaromir Jagr enjoyed Phildadelphia, but plans on testing free agency. Also plans to change training to shed some lbs and get faster.
— Darren Dreger (@DarrenDreger) June 18, 2012
It was just a couple of weeks ago that Jagr's agent, Petr Svoboda, said that he hoped to have a new deal worked out with the Flyers before the draft.
"I've talked to Jaromir and I have talked to Paul [Holmgren] and we hope to get something done before the draft,” Svoboda told CSN Philadelphia's Tim Panaccio.
The draft is this upcoming weekend, and it's looking like that isn't going to happen.
As always seems to be the case with Jagr, he's apparently changed his mind. Again. And who knows how many more times it will happen over the next few weeks or what this summer of #jagrwatch will bring to the table.
It's entirely possible that a return to Philadelphia could still happen, but the Flyers are going to have some competition if they still want to retain his services. The question is how much competition?
The two teams that seemed to show the most interest last offseason (before the Flyers surprisingly jumped into the bidding) were the Detroit Red Wings and Jagr's original team, the Pittsburgh Penguins. The courtship between the latter two was, well ... it was more like a soap opera than anything else and contained so much drama and so many burned bridges that we would be pretty surprised (shocked, even) if there turned out to be any interest at all from Pittsburgh.
For more hockey news, rumors and analysis, follow @EyeOnHockey and @agretz on Twitter and like us on Facebook.
