Can Osgood shake
detractors?
Posted: Tue June 9,
1998
Sports Illustrated hockey writer Kostya Kennedy will answer
your
NHL questions through the Stanley Cup
Finals. Click here to send a
question.
At long last the Stanley Cup Finals have arrived and the
Motor City is alive in anticipation. Everyone's wrapped up
in the fervor—it's front-page news, of course. I touch
on the series in this Mailbag, and you can check out my prediction. Also, the lead essay in Scorecard in this week's SI takes a
close look at those powerful Wings. Let's see how good that
Chris Osgood is,
anyway.
Even if the Red Wings win the Stanley Cup, do you see Chris
Osgood receiving the same respect as other
championship-proven goaltenders, such as Mike Richter and
Tom
Barrasso?
—Kyle Moe, Santa Rosa,
Calif.
Well, he still has a series ahead of him and he needs to
play spectacularly. A couple of shutouts in the glare of
the Finals could really alter his image. But right now, I'd
have to say no. He'll probably be looked at as a very
good—but
inconsistent—keeper who was good enough to win on a great
team.
When we read about the Washington Capitals, we see a lot
about "ghosts that are gone" and "finally
making it to the Finals." When we read about the
Detroit Red Wings, we see "Can they repeat?" Does
this public perception hint that the Wings are more
mentally prepared to win, because they do not see their
mission as complete, while the Caps can be happy with
having just made it to the
Finals?
—Lou Tozzi, Fairbanks,
Alaska
Players on both teams are intent on winning the series, and
right now there's no way the Caps would be happy to have
just reached the Finals and lost. Of course the
expectations are higher for Detroit—the Wings are the
defending champions and have a
more talented team. Washington's veterans are well aware of the
opportunity they have. Four great games and they get their
names on the Cup. So from that standpoint they are
certainly mentally prepared (though they could be
distracted by all the
final-series hubbub that most of them are unfamiliar with). All these
angles might foreshadow this: Even if the Wings win, the
Capitals' players, front office and fans will be able to
look back in months to come—after the pain has worn
off—and realize that they had
a fine
season.
I'm sorry, Mr. Kennedy, but when I read your response that
Wayne Gretzky was the greatest hockey player of all
time and that it was beyond permissible debate, it just blew me
away. Gretzky was a great goal-scorer and offensive force
who never knew what a body check felt like until the end of
his career. I would make a strong case for Gordie Howe: He
was a complete hockey player and played most of his career
in the old six-team league where everyone knew everyone
else's every move. I could also make an argument for Rocket
Richard and Bobby Orr. You may favor Gretzky, but it is
hardly beyond debate. There is room for lots and lots of
debate.
—Jason, Toledo,
Ohio
Howe was amazing and deserves to be discussed in the same
breath with Gretzky, of course. Orr, too. But I can't
imagine naming Howe first. We fans and analysts like to
talk about the importance of defense and checking, and
there's no doubt these are
essential elements. But games on NHL ice come down to the same
thing as games on pee-wee rinks: You've got to score goals.
Gretzky is
so far above everyone else in offensive statistics. And, yes,
I saw him this year, for instance, being checked regularly,
as the only offensive force (once Pat LaFontaine went out)
on the Rangers. He finished fifth in the league in
scoring—at age
37.
Of course, if we wanted to consider what Gretzky has done
to popularize the sport, the disparity would be even
greater. As hockey's ambassador, he has kept the most
grueling year-round schedule of anyone in the sport's
history. I'm not going to diminish
Howe in any way—hockey was privileged to have had such
a great, great player, and for so wonderfully long. But
when you get down to picking one player, there's no doubt:
Gretzky is the
man.
I think it was a travesty that Cup-winning coaches like
Jacques Lemaire and Marc Crawford were fired. The Flyers'
coaching situation was a complete joke, with GM Bobby
Clarke going through Terry Murray, Wayne Cashman and Roger
Neilson in two years! Do you think the teams would do much
worse if the players just coached
themselves?
—Wilson Lee, San
Diego
Overheard in the dressing room of a player-coached
team:
O.K., let's go out and run up our offensive numbers. Score,
score, score, score, score. Goals mean money come contract
time.
Because I'm the biggest guy I'm going to take shifts
whenever I want. Don't like it? Well, I'll kick your dear
ass. I'm starting the game, and I'll come off when I'm
tired.
Listen, no beer on the bench, O.K.? It looks bad.
Everybody's got a case at their lockers for between
periods.
And, uh, don't worry about practice tomorrow. I'm teeing
off at 9 a.m. if any of youse want to join
me.
Do you think the Canadian government should grant the tax
breaks recently requested by the owners of the six
remaining teams based in Canada? I realize this is more of
a political issue, but it seems to be the only move left to
prevent the exodus from occurring en masse. American cities
pony up millions of regional and state dollars to build
arenas and thus allow owners to stock franchises with
premium talent, but our tax dollars are not so directed.
Bottom line—the playing field ain't level, and we're
in danger of losing the teams in a country where The Game
was born and which 65% of the players still call
home.
—John
Bunge, Ottawa,
Ontario
You're right, this is a political issue, and I don't think
it's right for me to comment too specifically on it for
that reason. Many political and economic vagaries must be
taken into account. There's widespread debate over whether
or not a sports
franchise boosts a local economy. On the face of it, I find it a
bit disturbing that in the U.S., where nearly 14% of the
population lives in poverty, regional governments are so
heavily funding and subsidizing the sports industry. I
don't think the NHL
should expect Canada to do the same, even though hockey is a far
more important cultural and economical entity in Canada
than in the
U.S.
If the league wants to keep Canadian teams solvent and
competitive—namely, those in Calgary, Edmonton and
your hometown, Ottawa—it needs to get serious
cooperation from the players' association and continue to
divert funds to those franchises. The
Canadian Assistance Fund that the league has in place gives
struggling Canadian teams about $3 million a year. Also, in
some cases a Canadian team attempting to sign a free agent
will have its offer supplemented by the league in order to
compensate for the
exchange rate. Both of those plans are good starts but not
enough. They're also both being contested by the players'
association, which, while it has presented assistance plans
of its own to the league, has not shown a real commitment
to solving the
Canadian problem. The league and the players have to cooperate and
be willing to make sacrifices in order to help these
franchises.
Send a question to Kostya
Kennedy, and check back Friday to read more of
his
responses.
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