The Villain-Penguin Committee, or How Pennsylvania Twice-Screwed Quebec

Ladies and gentlemen: Exciting times! The Hall of Filth has hereby trebled in size.

Prologue: It should be noted that "The Great One" Wayne Gretzky was never drafted into the NHL. He chugged into the league aboard the Pompous Peter Pocklington Profiteering Express and together turned the NHL upside down in terms of rule changes and player salary dynamics. But excuse me; Pocklington is not on trial today. Maybe another time. Don't leave town, Peter.

The biggest draft anticipation of hockey's modern era came in 1983-1984 with the "Magnificent One" Mario Lemieux the undisputed Number One Pick headed for draft day. The Pittsburgh Penguins, under the ownership of Mafia Scumbag Edward J. DeBartolo Sr. reacted by hiring new General Manager Eddie Johnston who had a reputation for excellent goaltending in his playing career and a knack for finishing last place as a GM.

Sure enough, Johnston did not disappoint and led his new team to a 16-win season; currently the 18th worst in NHL history (bottom one per cent) thus assuring the Pens would acquire Lemieux.

Predictably Lemieux was a super-star, challenging legends Gretzky and Orr in any conversation regarding "best player of all time" but in six years could not bring Lord Stanley's Cup home to Pittsburgh for it's first ever visit.

No problem. It's 1990. Enter new GM; former headlining goaltender Ron "Hot Head" Hextall; a man and mouth who played by their own rules! But he's no Eddie Johnston. "The Joker" Jaromir Jagr is the creme de la creme of the coming draft but best pick ol' Hexface can come up with is fifth overall. So he calls up Jaromir in the barely-still-existing Czechoslovakia and says, "Hey, Joker-Baby! I know you want out of that poop-hole-ovakia. But you want to come to Pitsburgh don't you? So you can play with the best player in the world; Super Mario. Right? He can teach you how to be a proper super star!"

"Why yes," says the Joker to the Penguin. "Yes I do!"

"Great. So here's what you do. You tell everyone, No, I won't come to North America if you draft me. I'm staying in Europe to play with my friends, my family, my countrymen. Then we draft you anyway! And then you show up and say, Ha ha! fooled you Faggots! You fell for my little joke! Then you play for us, and you and Mario will be the best duo since Lefleur and Cournoyer!"

So that's what they did: leveraged the Magnificent Acquisition they earned by being the worst team in memory and then ran over the league with two elite superstars and immediately snicker-snatched two Stanley Cups!

In fairness it was the Quebec Nordiques who should have had the privilege of drafting Jagr. Instead they landed Mike "The Italian One" Ricci who whelmed the NHL with his Pasta Offence (he got few pucks past-a goalie).

And to make the Quebec story a little more hilarious, they drafted newest sensation Eric Lindros in the very next draft; the guaranteed Gretzky-Lemieux Heir Apparent - what "One" was he? I honestly forget. The "Bull-Headed One" maybe? Or "The Egoist?" And his reaction was "Fuck those losers, I ain't playing for Quebec! Send me to the Pennsylvanias where they know how to manufacture Stanley Cups and Yankee Bucks!"

"Oh. Okay. Whatever you say, Boss." said the league, and he went to the Pencildelphia Flyers and Petr Forsberg went to Quebec as compensation and both players were awesome and both spent half their career injured and the Nordiques sans Jagr or Lindros, fizzled and were dragged away to Denver. Au Revoir mon freres.

Fast-forward to the turn of the century and Penguins fans are still hungry for a third drink from the Cup. Thanks to their glorious bankruptcy accomplishment and rather sensible buy-out arrangement, our old Magnificent friend Mario now owns the team and he and Hextall preside over another toure de farce; another bottom-twenty season in NHL history with "The Sexy One" Sid-the-Kid Crosby gathering everyone's attention.

Things got weird with the following lockout season and a special lottery arrangement in which The Penguin Committee made out with another steal, nabbing superstar Evegny Malkin 2nd overall and still qualifying for best ball entitlement for the following year, sans season, snapping up Crosby first overall. And with the most privileged NHL duo since Lemieux/Jagr they won cups in 2009, 2016 and 2017.

Let's look at the best 16 players of the modern era by point-production on a per-game capita.

1. Mario Lemieux  PITTSBURGH
2. Connor McDavid  Edmonton
3. Sidney Crobsy  PITTSBURGH
4. Peter Forsberg  Coloraado
5. Joe Sakic  Colorado
6. Pat Lafontaine  Buffalo
7. Evgeni Malkin  PITTSBURGH
8. Steve Yzerman  Detroit
9. Eric Lindros   Philadelphia
10. Leon Draisaitl  Edmonton
11. Artemi Panarin  NY Rangers
12. Nikita Drunkerov  Tampa
13. Pavel Bure  Vancouver
14. Jaromir Jagr  PITTSBURGH
15. Alex Ovechkin  Washington
16. Patrick Kane  Chicago

the Penguin Committee managed to acquire 2 of the top 3 players all-time, 3 of the top 7 and 4 of the top 14! None were made great within any superior Penguinese development program. All were drafted pre-great and under peculiar circumstances.

It's a terribly sketchy distribution. 

Broadening the scope above to top 32 players all-time, where in a 32-team league the average organization should have experienced one player at this level in their entire history, here's how long it took teams to acquire fastest multiple examples:

• Edmonton: 5 in 37 years

• Pittsburgh: 4 in 21 years

• Colorado: 3 in 15 years

1. Boston: 2 in 2 years
2. NY Islanders: 2 in 3 years
3. St. Louis: 2 in 11 years
4. Buffalo: 2 in 21 years
5. Chicago: 2 in 24 years

• Anaheim: never
• Arizona: never
• Calgary: never
• Carolina: never
• Columbus: never
• Dallas: never
• Detroit: never
• Florida: never
• Las Vegas: never
• Los Angeles: never
• Minnesota: never
• Montreal: never
• Nashville: never
• New Jersey: never
• NY Rangers: never
• Ottawa: never
• Philadelphia: never
• San Jose: never
• Seattle: never
• Tampa Bay: never
• Toronto: never
• Vancouver: never
• Washington: never
• Winnipeg: never

HoF Proudly inducts the Villain-Penguin Committee to the Hall of Funk:

• Edward J. DeBartolo Sr
• Eddie Johnston
• Mario Lemieux
• Ron Hextall

Indictment: Greedy Hornswoggling

Sentence: 15 months each

What do you think? Who were the worst offenders? The Penguins or the Hitler-Schnitzel Death Machine? Comment, like and subscribe. Just kidding. Take a hike!