| | He is the most prolific scorer in the history of the league, and now he is gone.
There has been plenty of discussion surrounding who is going to replace Wayne Gretzky as the NHL's ambassador -- Eric Lindros' and Paul Kariya's names seem to surface most often -- but the fact is, Gretzky's influence on the game he loved so much and retired from last spring is a far more significant responsibility than any other single current player could assume.
|  | | Gretzky's farewell will impact the NHL in many ways, and truly, it may change the league's style. |
Simply put, his shoes are too big to fill. Granted, Gretzky's game at the end with the Rangers was diminished from what it was when he was piling up the points in Edmonton and Los Angeles, but the impact of his absence will still be felt in the 1999-2000 season.
For example, the league grew tired of watching so many games end in ties, so now there will be four-on-four in overtime in order to help decide contests. Remember, it was Gretzky who saw that format nixed some 14 years ago because the powerhouse Oilers in general, and Gretzky in particularly, were too formidable.
It goes even deeper than that, many layers deeper. Gretzky is the single biggest reason that hockey has migrated from the frozen tundra of the north to the sunbelt of California, Florida and Texas.
Were it not for Gretzky's trade to the Los Angeles Kings on that fateful day of August 9, 1988, it's very possible that, although the league's aim was to continue expansion, it wouldn't have been the smashing success that it was without Gretzky's blonde, blue-eyed star-quality charm.
He married a beautiful actress named Janet Jones and was the reason Hollywood stars flocked to the Great Western Forum. He was the reason they wanted to spend the most money to sit in the worst seats in the house -- up against the glass in the front row.
He had the allure and charisma of Magic Johnson during the height of Johnson's Laker stardom. He also proved that hockey could be popular in some place other than Canada, some place other than an original six city, a place where palm trees and sunshine were as prevalent at Christmas as snow and ice in Detroit.
Now, teams are flourishing in San Jose and Anaheim, and the Kings are about to move into a flashy new building. On the East Coast, the Tampa Bay Lightning and Florida Panthers are bringing a diverse group of fans into the game and football-crazy Dallas is the defending Stanley Cup champion.
All that may be known, but how about a guy like Bruins coach Pat Burns. Gretzky is the reason Burns ever joined the fraternity because Gretzky was the first person to offer him a substantial coaching opportunity.
One of the more interesting aspects of Gretzky's career is the size factor. He has always been slight -- a wisp of an athlete by Lindros and John Leclair standards -- but he was always smart, always deft, and one of the most opportunistic players ever to lace up skates.
One area where Gretzky influenced the NHL most was making the league a safe and accepting place for highly skilled European players. When the Swedish players first began entering the league, there was built-in bias against them. The same thing happened when other Europeans entered the game. There were bound to be growing pains, as is always the case with anything new and different (even if it's better), and Gretzky made it OK to be highly skilled, and made it OK to be a Canadian hockey player who wasn't a bruiser.
"He changed the league and the league in a lot of ways was molded around him in a lot of different ways; and I think now it's moving into a different climate, a different shape," said Rangers general manager Neil Smith, who signed Gretzky as a free agent on July 21, 1996 and brought him to Gotham. "What that shape is, I can't really describe, but I think it's going to take on a different flavor than it had while he was there."
Smith said there were a myriad of effects Gretzky had on the game he loved. Teams altered their game plan to play against him, attempting to shadow him with mixed results, and Smith said it goes even further.
"I think Wayne was the first megastar in the league -- I hate to use superstar because we use it too often on too many players -- but the first megastar who never had to fight," Smith said. "Bobby Orr had to fight, Phil Esposito had to get in fights, Rocket Richard had to fight, Jean Beliveau had to fight, but Gretzky changed all that. It was OK to be in this league and not ever be in a fight."
By virtue of that, Smith said it made it acceptable for many other star players to follow in the same footsteps as Gretzky.
"I've always said he's the first franchise player who didn't have to fight," Smith said. "Since him, there have been many. For example, Mario Lemieux. Don't confuse that with 'Never did.' It was, 'Didn't have to.'
"Bobby Orr had to. There were people who'd rush in for him, but you were allowed to push somebody to the point where they had to fight for themselves in that era. There was enough stuff going on out there where they had to do that. In other words, there were nights were there were five-on-five fights. How do you get out of fighting when that happens?"
A byproduct of that was having Europeans come into the league and thrive. It took time, but part of the reason it happened to the remarkable degree it has was because of Gretzky's influence.
"We had our first Canadian total skilled player," Smith said. "Before that, Canadians were always a combination of the best in skill and toughness. They were never just pure skill like the Europeans, and of course, the Canadians all wanted to make the Europeans (into) Canadians. Now, what do you do when you've got a Canadian who comes along that's the same as a European? So, you start to say, 'It's OK to be like that right now.' It wasn't OK if you were European. But it's OK to be like that now because we've had Canadians like that."
Gretzky was the best of his generation, certainly, and one of the best of all time. When many in his age group were beginning to hang up their skates, last fall, Gretzky said before he had made the decision himself, that it was a strange feeling.
"It's a sign of age, I guess," he said about a year ago. "I know over time things are going to change, and change is hard for everyone. That's one of the worst things in life. People don't like change. When things are good, I'm sure people in Boston would've loved to see Bobby Orr and Larry Bird play forever, and that's just not going to happen.
"These kind of guys did a great job for the game, they've moved on ... they were classy professionals, and now they've moved on to maybe doing something they want to do just as much. Time does that to you."
And now time has moved Gretzky on to other pursuits. The game is poorer, the fans are poorer without him, but as Smith -- and Gretzky himself -- pointed out, the game is bigger than any single player no matter what their influence.
"He certainly leaves a huge hole in the league, but hockey and the National Hockey League will still go on and it will still be a great league; and it will still be a great sport. But I think it will take on a different flavor," Smith said. "There's a different texture to the game than there was beforehand. I think whenever important eras end for us, we're left with an emptiness, but that emptiness is filled. The void is filled and it just becomes a different flavor."
Nancy Marrapese-Burrell covers hockey for The Boston Globe. | |
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