Sometimes an organization forgets what a player meant to the franchise and they don’t honour him/her properly. I believe this to 100% be the case with Joe Nieuwendyk (along with Al MacInnis and Theo Fleury). Nieuwendyk was honoured as a “Forever A Flame,” but not having his number #25 ever retired, which is a crime. The string of players after him that wore that number are an insult to his Flames legacy and it’s high time that get corrected.
Joe Nieuwendyk came to the Flames via Cornell University and the 1985 NHL Entry Draft (2nd round, #27) and he would explode onto the scene in his first full season in 1987-88.