As collaborators in their particular milieu, they just went together seamlessly somehow. Like Sinatra and a saloon song, Steed and Mrs. Peel, Green Eggs and Ham.

Neither man was big, nor blazing fast. Apart they were wonderful, but together simply unmatchable.

	Jari Kurri's 1,043 points with the Oilers ranks second in team history behind Wayne Gretzky's 1,669.

For more years than defensemen care to remember, Wayne Gretzky was the brains behind the operation, and Jari Kurri drove the getaway car. It's difficult now to think of them separately. Nobody, but nobody, used to set it to music like 99 and 17.

And now Kurri joins his buddy again -- following stints with the Edmonton Oilers, of course, and Los Angeles Kings. This time in the NHL Hall of Fame.

"Jari Kurri," says Oilers general manager and former teammate Kevin Lowe, "was underrated as a player. I really believe that. Sounds crazy, as much as he accomplished, but that's the truth."

It's not for nothing that the quiet Finn was among the Top 50 players of the century as selected by The Hockey News. But being Gretzky's sidekick was both a blessing, and a curse.

"What people tended to overlook was that to play with Gretz, a guy needed a lot of natural ability just to be able to read what he was going to do," points out Lowe. "People just thought 'Well, no wonder he scores. He's out there with Gretzky all the time!' Sorry, but it wasn't that simple. Nobody could see a game, think a game, like Wayne. A lot of guys would get out there with him and just be totally lost. He was so far ahead of them.

"He wasn't ahead of Jari. There were on the same wavelength almost from the word 'Go.'"

Says Kurri with undue modesty: "Wayne and I were no secret, really. He was a great passer and I liked to hit the holes and shoot the puck."

Kurri -- as tough a player in a determined, business-like way as any in the game -- was one of the most demanding teammates Gretzky ever had. He also helped smash the stereotype of soft European players, and in the process became the highest-scoring European in NHL history. His impact on a star-studded Oiler team was indelible. So much so that the Edmonton organization raised his jersey No. 17 to the rafters at Skyreach Center on Oct. 6.

"I think my favorite Jari story is the night he punched (Esa) Tikkanen on the bench," laughs Lowe. "Tik was, like always, yapping, yapping, yapping, and finally Jari had just had enough so he reached over and punched him.

"There were a lot of guys on the ice -- most of them on the other team -- that were kind of jealous, because they couldn't get near enough to Tik to do what Jari had done!"

Kurri was one of those players to whom the game seemed to be an extension of himself. Nothing hurried. Nothing melodramatic. Nothing apparently wasted. Yet when he would slide into an open area of ice to receive one of those lovely saucer passes from Gretzky, he had a release as quick, as lethal, as Mike Bossy.

	After spending eight seasons together in Edmonton, Jari Kurri followed Wayne Gretzky to L.A.

"He was so smooth," recalls Lowe, the admiration unmistakable in his voice. "It's hard to think of anyone who could one-time a puck as well as Jari. Robitaille can do it ... kind of. But he's awkward, sort of whacks at the puck. Bernie Nicholls could do it. But Jari, it was so fast, so smooth, so effortless that the puck was in and out of the net before anyone could bat an eye.

"He was just a natural goal scorer; the kind of talent that can't be taught."

Because of his offensive abilities, Kurri wasn't given adequate credit for the almost unparalleled two-way game he played. His commitment to defence allowed Gretzky more freedom to create, to roam, to inflict the sort of damage he alone was capable of.

"The unfortunate thing about Jari is that he played at a time when they didn't vote the Selke Trophy to offensive players," says Lowe. "Either Fedorov or Yzerman won it one year and then it became fashionable. Before that, it was low-scoring players only.

"This guy was good enough defensively that he could've won five or six Selkes."

Gretzky agreed, telling the Edmonton Sun: "Jari Kurri was one of the most unselfish players I ever played with. He could easily have score 20 more goals a year if he'd been more selfish. It was amazing, especially on our hockey club, the way he always put defense ahead of offense.

"He was born that way. It was in his blood."

Like all Hall of Famers, the drive to excel was also in Kurri's blood. He was strong enough and confident enough to allow himself to be known as the Great Sidekick of the Great One; a superb complement to the finest player ever, yet a Hall of Famer on his own merit. Jari Kurri's legacy is one of tremendous offense and underappreciated defense.

"How many players ever had the ability to be flawless at the defensive end of the ice and dangerous at the offensive end?" asks Lowe. "I'll tell you: Not many. Not in that era. Not in this era.

"Jari Kurri was one of those players."

George Johnson is a columnist for the Calgary Herald.