Paiement closes career as a Penguin

Wilf Paiement was the second overall pick in the 1974 NHL Entry Draft, taken by the expansion Kansas City Scouts. The 6'4", 210-pound right winger was supposed to be the Scouts' version of Buffalo's Gilbert Perreault, a young superstar around whom the franchise could build.

The Scouts, however, had little else in the way of talent and could barely win a handful of games. After two dismal years in K.C. the team moved to Colorado to become the Rockies, and Paiement went along with them. The scenery changed but the losing continued. Paiement put up some impressive numbers nonetheless, tallying 40 goals in 1976-77 and 87 points the following year. In 1979 he was traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs in the infamous deal for Lanny McDonald, and two years later he went to the Quebec Nordiques.

After one-season stops in New York with the Rangers and Buffalo, Paiement's hockey road wound its way to the Penguins, where he was penciled in as Mario Lemieux's right winger on the Pens' top line to start the 1987-88 campaign.

Paiement got off to a solid start, scoring a goal in each of the team's first two games, but after that it was all downhill. He was demoted to the Penguins' farm team in Muskegon in mid-November - his first ever stint in the minors.

"After we took him off the power play he seemed to stop working," said Pens GM Eddie Johnston at the time. "He definitely hasn't played up to expectations."

Paiement did return for six more games in January but with a nagging knee injury and little production (1 assist in those six games) the writing was on the wall. Wilf Paiement played his final NHL game January 10, 1988 wearing a Penguins uniform - a 7-5 loss to the Red Wings in Detroit.