By: Nick Lanciani
Many teams chose to retire (or honor) jersey numbers based on extraordinary circumstances, dedication to the organization, or legendary status. With that in mind, what will retired numbers look like around the league in the future? Let’s explore what each team around the NHL might do in the coming seasons for former and/or current players that should see their numbers raised to the rafters someday.
Feel free to speak your mind and drop us a line in the comments or tweet to @DtFrozenRiver using #DTFRNumbersGame.
Toronto Maple Leafs
Current Retired Numbers- 5 Bill Barilko, 6 Irvine “Ace” Bailey
Current Honored Numbers- 1 Turk Broda/Johnny Bower, 4 Hap Day/Red Kelly, 7 King Clancy/Tim Horton, 9 Ted Kennedy/Charlie Conacher, 10 Syl Apps/George Armstrong, 13 Mats Sundin, 17 Wendell Clark, 21 Borje Salming, 27 Frank Mahovlich/Darryl Sittler, 93 Doug Gilmour
Recommended Numbers to Honor
15 Tomas Kaberle
Kaberle is the second highest scoring defenseman in franchise history for the Toronto Maple Leafs. That speaks for itself. He may not make an NHL return at this point in his life (and career), but he’s sure to see some well deserved recognition from the Toronto faithful and the organization he spent the most time with in his NHL days.
29 Félix Potvin
Surely Potvin deserves some kind of recognition for the way he broke into the league and his impressive numbers for the number of games he played in a single year and shots faced. Perhaps the Maple Leafs front office might see this one as a bit of a stretch, but it’d likely send a nice submittal message to their current goalie tandem that they too, can stand on their head sometimes and make out just fine as long as the team in front of them doesn’t give up.
Other Notes
Dion Phaneuf certainly isn’t going to be getting that much love (if any at all) any time soon. The only potential bright spot would be if James van Riemsdyk becomes spectacular on a nightly basis. Only then would I have at least one more player to add to the honored player list in Toronto. So yeah, there’s that.
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