Question: Who wears black and yellow and turns red to green?

Answer: Mario Lemieux, of course.

	Largest home attendance averages in Penguins history
	Year	Avg.
	1993-94	16,714
	1996-97	16,691
	2000-01	16,329*
	1995-96	16,239
	* - projected.

The return of No. 66 -- as owner and now player -- has altered the previously doomed future of the Pittsburgh Penguins.Yes, the word "sellout" is once again commonplace whether the Penguins are in town or on the road. Television ratings are on the rise and financial stability is at least guaranteed in the franchise's immediate future.

But this isn't the first time Lemieux has saved the Penguins from skating on thin ice.

Seventeen years ago, the Penguins and the New Jersey Devils were fighting for the right to be the worst in the NHL.

It was simple. Whichever team finished with the league's worst record would have their pick of two top-rated junior players -- Mario Lemieux from Laval or Kirk Muller of Guelph -- in the 1984 draft. The Penguins figured out how to responsibly ensure futility.

Center Doug Shedden remembers it well.

"There was such a big hoopla about Mario that (general manager) Eddie Johnston called up players from (minor league) Baltimore at the end," Shedden said. "All we had to do was finish last and we'd get the first pick." Shedden said during the last months of the 1983-84 season four players were claimed off waivers and were inserted into the lineup, and team captain Randy Carlisle was traded away.

"The players thought at the time that we'd have to trade somebody to make sure that we got the number one pick," Carlisle said. "Well I ended up being that somebody. I had value for the wrong reason ... but that's what the business of sports is all about."

Down one veteran, the Pittsburgh Penguins managed to outlose the Devils, including a pivotal game in which the Penguins lost 6-5 to the Devils with 12 games left. The final tally: 16-58-6 and 38 points for Pittsburgh; 17-56-7 and 41 points for New Jersey.

All were aware that the health of the franchise could have been dependent on the 19-year old kid from Montreal. The '83-84 Penguins had the worst attendance in all of the NHL and the second-worst in club history -- 6,839 fans on average showed up per game that year.

"We didn't look forward to Wednesdays," Shedden recalled. "We'd play St.Louis or Hartford and you'd score a goal and hear your girlfriend screaming and clapping in the stands."

	Watching Mario
	The year before Mario Lemieux arrived, Pittsburgh averaged 6,839 fans per game. The numbers since:
	Lemieux's Prime
	Year	Avg.	Change
	84-85	10,018	+ 46.5%
	85-86	12,576	+ 21.3%
	86-87	14,965	+ 16.0%
	87-88	15,734	+ 6.6%
	88-89	15,734	0.0%
	89-90	16,018	+ 1.8%
	90-91	15,927	-0.6% (a)
	91-92	15,993	+ 0.4%
	92-93	16,105	+ 0.7%
	93-94	16,714	+3.6% (b)
	94-95	16,108	-3.6% (c)
	95-96	16,239	+0.8%
	96-97	16,691	+ 2.7%
	Post Lemieux
	Year	Avg.	Change
	97-98	15,069	-9.7%
	98-99	14,825	-1.6%
	99-00	15,517	+ 4.5%
	Lemieux Comeback
	Year	Avg.	Change
	00-01	16,329*	+ 4.4%
	* - projected. (a) - Missed first 50 games recovering from back surgery. (b) - Played only 22 games due to injuries. (c) - did not play.

The Penguins were definitely the third choice among Pittsburgh sports fans. The Steelers had won four out of six Super Bowls from 1975-1980 and the Pirates had won the World Series in 1971 and 1979.

"The team was not on solid ground," said Ken Sawyer, now the Penguins' chief financial officer who was then the CFO of the NHL. "It had strong ownership financially (headed up by Eddie DeBartolo Sr.) but for the amount of games the team was losing, it certainly would have been a struggle to avoid the issue of going out of business." Team ownership once before had declared bankruptcy in 1975.

Drafting Lemieux was exactly what the doctor ordered. In his Rookie-of-the-Year season, the Penguins' attendance went up 46.5 percent to 10,018 fans a game.

"The franchise was in trouble and there was talk about it being up for sale and being moved, but when he came in he provided the stability the club needed," said Moe Mantha, who came to Pittsburgh as part of the Carlisle deal at the end of the '83-84 season. "When Lemieux came, we started at 8,200 fans and it grew to 10,000 by Christmas time and by the end of the year, we were playing in front of 13,000 people."

Mantha said the young boy from Montreal, the embodiment of honest effort and hard work, was someone Pittsburgh's working-class people could respect.

For the first four years, the Penguins finished no better than fifth place in the Patrick Division and never made the playoffs. But, with Lemieux, attendance rose more than 90 percent.

"Everybody touted him as the next dominant superstar and he was delivering on that," Carlisle said. "It became an event to attend a game because of what he was able to do, as an individual, with a puck."

In Lemieux's faux final season in 1996-97, 16,691 fans showed up each game to wish him farewell. After he retired, the team fell on hard times. Attendance dropped 11.6 percent in two years and team owner Roger Marino declared bankruptcy.

Lemieux, however, was still owed millions of dollars on his contract, portions of which had been deferred to ease the team's financial strain. Seeing it as one of the few ways to recoup his money -- as well as help the team survive -- Lemieux headed up a group which purchased the team in September of 1999 for $85 million, just $5 million more than Time Warner paid for the league's new Atlanta franchise to enter the season that year. With Lemieux associated with the Penguins again, attendance was back on the rise despite the fact Lemieux wasn't on the ice and the team finished the season with a .500 record. Since Lemieux's group has taken over ownership of the Penguins, the value of the club has risen 33 percent and out of the bottom third of the NHL, according to the 2000 franchise estimates by Forbes.

Now, 16 games into his comeback it is quite apparent that Lemieux has given the Penguins new life again. With him back on the ice, attendance has increased by 2,000 at Penguins' home games, an increase of 9.3 percent over last season.

Mario just like Mike

The impact of Mario Lemieux's and Michael Jordan's careers are similar. The season before Jordan entered the NBA, the Chicago Bulls were one of three professional teams that drew less than the Penguins for the '83-84 season (6,365 fans per game). Both players won Rookie of the Year honors for their 1984-85 seasons and, like Lemieux, Jordan's presence helped the Bulls' home attendance to increase by 80 percent from the previous season.

For those 16 games -- nine at home and seven on the road -- Penguins games have been sold out. And while that pales in comparison to Michael Jordan's comeback in March of 1995, during which all 263 regular-season games in which he played were sold out, Lemieux is clearly doing his part to revitalize the NHL and the Penguins once again.

"He's repeating history," Mantha said. "He re-energized the team not once, but twice now."

During Lemieux's first tenure as a player, the Penguins expanded and renovated Mellon Arena three times in order to capitalize on his draw. When he was just an owner, Lemieux cautiously explored the construction of a new arena to replace the Penguins' 40-year-old home -- the oldest in the NHL. Now that he is a player and the Penguins are playing in front of sellout crowds, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman has publicly supported the Penguins' need. Because of Lemieux's popularity, and the fact that a new arena is expected to cost $200 million -- which is far less than the Pirates' and Steelers' new stadiums -- a public plea for assistance is expected to be met with approval.

Said Sawyer: "That's why he's called a franchise player."

Darren Rovell, who covers sports business for ESPN.com, can be reached at darren.rovell@espn.com.