By Lee
Manchur
Wednesday, January 23rd, 2002
Gretzky was, undoubtedly, the greatest hockey player in NHL history. He dominated
the record books more than any player previous to him not only in hockey,
but also in all of professional sports. His passes floated over opponents'
sticks and it never failed that it always landed on the tape of his teammates'
stick. It seemed that he never made a mistake when he was on the ice.
Off the ice, however, is a different story.
A month ago, Wayne Gretzky, the general manager of Team Canada 2002, announced
the men's hockey team that would take part at the Olympic Winter Games in
Salt Lake City, Utah. With names like Mario Lemieux, Paul Kariya, Eric Lindros,
Theoren Fleury, and Rob Blake dominating the lineup, it appeared that Canada
would have the most offensive hockey team at the Games; a team of NHL All-Stars,
right?
Wrong.
To date, the captain of Team Canada, Lemieux, has just three goals this season.
Meanwhile, Claude Lemieux, who is unrelated to Mario and by no means has
any of his talented hockey genes, has 27 points this season. That's 88th
of all Canadian NHLers, while Mario's 15 points doesn't put him in the top
100.
Paul Kariya's 34 points is good enough for second among NHL defensemen, it's
just too bad that he's a forward and can't crack 60th when put on the overall
scoring leaders.
The second leading scorer in the NHL, Joe Thornton, isn't on the Canadian
Olympic team. Neither is Adam Oates, who recently obtained his 1,000th career
assist and sits fifth in points among Canadians this NHL season. Had Brendan
Shanahan not started the season on such a hot pace, it's highly unlikely
that he would be heading to Salt Lake City, either, because he "can't skate
as well as he used to be able to." Neither would the league's leading scorer,
Jarome Iginla, simply due to a "lack of experience."
In fact, out of the top 13 scoring Canadian forwards this season (the number
of forwards named to the roster), under half, six - Jarome Iginla, Brendan
Shanahan, Steve Yzerman, Joe Sakic, Simon Gagne, and Theo Fleury - are on
the roster. What's more, is that of those 13 players, all are in the top
32 in overall NHL scoring and four are in the top five, including two named
to the roster, Iginla and Shanahan, and two who will be sitting come February,
Thornton and Eric Daze.
Is Canada sending the best players from the start of the 2001-2002 NHL season,
or are they sending the 1998 North American All-Star team?
Hockey anchor Steve Kouleas from Canadian sports network TheScore
said the day before the announcing of Team Canada that "once the team is
named, the whole country has to stick by it and can no longer debate who
should and shouldn't be on the roster." I'm all for that! - If it comes down
to debating if Steve Sullivan's defensive capabilities are more important
than Anson Carter's timely goals, though both are in the top 13 in Canadian
NHL scoring, then that's a hockey decision that Gretzky and the coaching
staff have made.
However, there's an obvious problem when a guy with a good reputation but
not putting out this season (Lemieux), a guy with repeated head damage and
having only an average season (Lindros), and a guy with family and other
social problems (Fleury) are on the roster while having subpar season, but
two of the top five leading NHL scorers won't be headed to Salt Lake for
the red and white maple leaf.
What makes it worse is that management was gearing for an "offensive hockey
club."
At least 1998 head coach Marc Crawford and his "bright" idea to put defenseman
Ray Bourque in the semifinal shootout instead of the greatest hockey player
of all-time, Wayne Gretzky, won't be there to screw the team over.
This time, when Canada loses a shootout, Gretzky won't be sitting on the
player's bench helpless and crying. He'll be sitting in a soft, cozy chair
in front of a swarm of broken-hearted Canadian media answering questions
about the seven absent top 13 leading NHL scorers, and why they aren't on
an offensively-geared hockey team.
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