With the NHL season on hold, let’s look back at NHL history and remember Hall of Fame center Eric Lindros.
During these articles about NHL history, I’ll name players who may only come to mind as wearing one particular sweater during their career and may be shocked when I reveal to you how many more teams they played for and who they finished their career with. Let’s start off with the greatest Philadelphia Flyers player I’ve ever had the pleasure of watching, Eric Lindros.
Eric was drafted first overall in the 1991 NHL Entry draft by the Quebec Nordiques. He never ended up signing a contract with Quebec and played in the OHL for the Oshawa Generals as well as the Canadian National team.
After that season, Lindros made it known that he would play outside the NHL and re-enter the NHL draft in 1993. Forced with receiving no compensation for the league’s next great star Quebec began shopping the 6’5 center.
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On June 20th, 1992 Eric was traded to both the Philadelphia Flyers and the New York Rangers and after a weeks long arbitration Eric was awarded to the Flyers for six players, 2 draft picks, and $15 million.
In just his first season Lindros went on to record 75 points and 41 goals, two of which came against Quebec in his first NHL game. Lindros finished fourth in Calder voting that season behind Felt Potvin, Joe Juneau, and Calder winner Teemu Selanne who scored 76 goals during his rookie season.
During his tenure in Philadelphia, “Big E” was named to six All-Star teams and took the Flyers to the Stanley Cup Finals in the 1996-97 season. He never played in more than 5 playoff games in any season after that year.
After the 1999-00 season, Lindros never played another game for the Flyers and was traded to rival New York Rangers before the 01-02 season.
Eric went on to play three seasons for the New York Rangers scoring 37 goals in his first year with the team. After the lockout in 2004-05 Eric proceeded to sign with the Toronto Maple Leafs where he went on to tally just 11 goals and 22 points in 33 games.
Now here’s the part you may not have known about “Big E” but that 2005-06 season for the Leafs was his only season in Toronto. 88 actually went on to play one more year for one more team. Any idea who that team would be?
That team would be none other than the Dallas Stars. Lindros went on to play in 49 games for the Stars, tallying just 5 goals and 26 points, making the playoffs for the first time since 1999-00 while with the Flyers. The Stars lost in seven games to the Vancouver Canucks, Lindros played in just three games and did not record a point.
During the course of his 13 seasons in the NHL, Lindros played in just 760 games, tallying 865 points while scoring 372 goals in regular season play.
In 2016 Lindros was inducted into the NHL Hall of Fame and was also named as one of the NHL’s 100 Greatest Players in 2017. The following season Eric’s number 88 was retired by the Philadelphia Flyers, the only sweater I ever imagine worn by my once favorite player.