This in for your summer hockey fix, two bits of Edmonton Oilers history, first that former Boston Bruins coach Don Cherry was once promised a job as a scout with the Edmonton Oilers, the second that Oilers great Mark Messier asked to be trade away from Edmonton.
Once Cherry recalled how he was in trouble on Hockey Night in Canada for something he had said — a regular occurrence even in the ruder, brasher, more free-wheeling 20th Century — when Oilers hockey boss Glen Sather came up and said, “I hear you’re going to get fired?”
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Cherry affirmed this might well be the case.
“Well,” Sather said, “You got a job with us scouting anyhow if you ever do get fired.”
Cherry related this story on his latest Grapevine podcast, adding of the offer, “It made me feel pretty good. I would have taken a pretty big cut in salary.”
As for the Messier story, the former Oilers great was on the Spittin’ Chiclets podcast where he said in 1991 he knew it was time for a change after winning five Stanley Cups in Edmonton. His Oilers had made it to the Final Four in 1991, but had been eliminated.
“It just felt at the end that, I don’t know, you just know in your heart that I needed a change. The team needed to kind of restructure. Wayne had gone. Paul had gone. Grant had gone. I personally needed a different challenge, professionally, and I just said to Glen, I knew when that last buzzer went, I went, ‘Wow, this is the last game I’m ever going to play for the Edmonton Oilers.’ I phoned Glen and I said, ‘Glen, you guys need to restructure the team. It’s been 12 years. This has been more than we ever were expecting, I’m sure.’ We knew Wayne was going to win but did we ever think we were going to win five Stanley Cups? Probably not. He goes, ‘Where would you like to go?’ And I go, ‘If you have a chance, I’m 31 years old, I wouldn’t mind going to play in New York City.’ So he was able to make a trade with New York.”
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This is a happy end to the Messier trade story, as it was never known at the time that Messier asked out. It was reported at the time that Messier and the Oilers were in a contract dispute.
There was bitterness in Edmonton that Edmonton didn’t get a great deal of value in return for Messier. There were also angry rumours that simmered for years that Edmonton was shorted when it came to getting New York players in return for Messier because Oilers owner Peter Pocklington demanded millions in cash as part of the return. I finally confirmed this fact, once and for all, in a 2010 interview with Pocklington, that he got $2 million in the deal.
Of course, back in 1991, many Edmonton fans would have been upset, even outraged, had they known that Messier wanted out. I likely would have felt that way. But that was 34 years ago. It was a different world then and certainly a different NHL.
We’ve all become much more used to the idea that NHL players get to have a major say in where they play. I’m glad for Messier he was able to live out his NHL dream in New York.
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