One of the questions many fans have is the KHL and 2 lockout theory on his numbers but that is only a partial way of looking at it.
Many players including Messier, Gretz, Iginla, Sakic etc played through at least 1 or 2 lockouts. The question is if it wasn't for the 2005 lockout, would Messier have retired?? I am not sure.
I have also heard from several interviews with Jagr that the grind of the NHL season wore him down in the end. He was playing in NY, a massive media market and was making the big $$ which made him and the other players on the team major targets.
If you look at his numbers during his time they aren't much better than they are now. I think the KHL rejuvenated him as he has mentioned he got tired of playing in the KHL against lesser talent and "3000 person stadiums"
He did come back from the KHL with a lot of different workout methods and a new mindset and this has allowed him to play at a much higher level than anybody including himself probably expected.
This being said when comparing numbers for anybody who played in the 70's I really do think you need to take into consideration the WHA numbers and add them in to compare. When you do that players like Howe, Bobby Hull and even Gretzky have numbers that probably won't ever be touched by players today. I know the argument might be that the WHA wasn't the best league in the world but the truth of the matter is some serious talent played in that league and it was high-quality professional hockey.
The same argument can also be applied to the KHL numbers that someone like Jagr put up. In any event what Jagr has done and continues to do is so impressive for so many reasons. It's one thing to play the games and still maintain the "skill" but the behind the scenes stuff like the daily practices, the travel, the off-season training needed for someone his age, the injuries and daily maintenance/treatment. It takes a lot of love to do that day in and day out.
Congrats #68!
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