With Pavel Bure being inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame this Monday (a report on this will be that day), there is a debate in Vancouver as to whether he will see his number 10 retired at some point in the future. You know the pluses and minuses of this, ranging from his on-ice play that saw him net 60 goals in a season twice to his infamous trade demands of the 1998-99 season. The case for this happening is most likely to include how much of an impact he made for the team, as in he was the first true superstar to wear a Canucks jersey, and when you have a superstar on your team, you tend to gain more fans along the way. The case against? Well, it's something of a coincidence that the three players who have had their numbers retired (Stan Smyl and 12, Trevor Linden and 16, and Markus Naslund and 19) all wore the C at one point in their respective careers and were good about giving back to the city. Aside from the trade demand, the only people who would know about Bure's off-ice efforts would be the city of Vancouver (for the sake of this piece, I will only include Vancouver, since they are the ones talking about number retirement). Ultimately, I think the number 10 he wore will be retired at some point, but I do not think it will be for another couple of years. Then again, Patrick Roy smoothed things over with the Canadiens long enough to see his number retired there, so anything can happen.
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