Ovechkin keeps climbing past legends
FORMER KINGS GREAT DIONNE SEES CAPS STAR MAKING MORE HISTORY BEFORE CAREER IS OVER
Marcel Dionne is old enough to have seen Rocket Richard play, young enough to have played against Bobby Hull, and mature enough to have an immense appreciation for the scoring exploits of Alex Ovechkin.
Ovechkin is knocking on his door right now, just one goal behind tying Dionne for fifth overall on the all-time NHL scoring list.
“It’s happening,” said Dionne on the phone. “It’s just a question of when. I made a video for him, congratulating him. I was wearing a Los Angeles Kings hat. I said to him: ‘Look at my hat, it’s gold and purple, I want to remember who I was. And when you pass me, I’ll put on a Washington Capitals hat in your honour.’”
Dionne scored 731 goals in his superb NHL career. He had six 50-goal seasons and four 40-plus goal seasons. When he retired, only Gordie Howe, in the entire history of hockey, had scored more. And now Dionne is about to drop to sixth all-time, behind Wayne Gretzky, Howe, Jaromir Jagr, Brett Hull and Ovechkin. And he’s OK with it.
“He’s got a weapon,” said Dionne of Ovechkin. “And he’s a one-dimensional player most the time. But when you watched him in the playoffs, when Washington won the Cup, he was the guy. He did things, holy crap, I’ve never seen before. He was possessed. That’s how you win a Cup. He was a brute. He absolutely dominated the game physically and the team responded to him.
“Here’s what I don’t understand. He plays the off-wing on the power play. I can’t believe all these smart coaches have not put a guy on him, take him out of the power play, and play them 4-on-3. Whatever it is, he still gets the puck, he’s open and he’s so accurate. Bobby Hull had a weapon. Brett Hull had a weapon. I don’t know if anybody’s shot it the way Ovie has.”
Dionne has already done the math on the future. Ovechkin will pass him at 732 goals scored any day now. Then Hull would be next at 741, very early next season.
“What is he, 35 years old? If he plays four more years and scores 40 a year, he passes Gretzky. For the record, no one thought that was possible,” said Dionne.
THIS AND THAT
Another record no one thought possible: Howe’s mark for most games played in a career. On Saturday night, Patrick Marleau tied Howe by playing in his 1,767th game. Dionne is more impressed with Ovechkin than he is with Marleau, who on Monday, barring an injury, will pass Howe. “What is he scoring now, a goal or two a year? I’m not that impressed with that. I give him credit for playing that long. Just not how he’s doing it.” Marleau, for the record, has four goals this season. “I talked to Mark Howe about this. He said they both grew up in Saskatchewan. They must have eaten the same wheat or something.” ... Dionne on records being broken: “This is good for the game. When these things happen, especially now, it’s special. It’s for the fans. We sometimes forget that. Who do you write for? You don’t write for me, you write for the fans. The game is still fascinating and how the players are surviving in all this, I appreciate the effort and all that goes into it. These are frightening times. And we get to watch hockey. Every time I hear somebody complain about the teams are only playing each other over and over again, and it’s boring, I think, ‘what do you think happened in the Original Six?’ That was every season and we loved it.”
HEAR AND THERE
It’s mid-april and the Toronto Raptors’ season continues to spin in circles with no real form and Masai Ujiri has yet to sign a deal that carries him into the future with Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment Ltd. Those who know Ujiri best say he won’t bail on the Raptors in this uncertain state. But the longer he goes without a deal, the longer he goes without committing to the future, the more you’re left wondering, about him, about the team, about what’s next ... So this is the Vladdy Guerrero Jr. we’ve been hearing about. This is fun ... About the left side of the Toronto Blue Jays infield defensively: Never mind ... Stats don’t always tell the story with John Tavares. He had 10 points in January, nine in February and March, and now 10 again in April. That’s consistency, except for one thing: Tavares is playing way better in April than he has at any time in the previous three months ... The top four goaltenders in all-time wins are Martin Brodeur, Patrick Roy, Roberto Luongo and now Marc-andre Fleury. All of them Quebecois. Other than Fleury, there’s not a single Quebec goalie of consequence (apologies to Jonathan Bernier) playing in today’s NHL.
SCENE AND HEARD
Nice touch by the Blue Jays having cut-outs of the cast of Schitt’s Creek, Sandra Oh and some of the Kim’s Convenience people in the stands in Dunedin ... The New York Knicks are winning. Honest. I keep checking the standings and it’s true ... They’re built quite differently — Jimmy Key is 70 pounds lighter than Hyun-jin Ryu — but there is a similarity in the way the two left-handers approach pitching. Now Key pitched at a time when seven-inning starts were expected. But just the way they think the game, Ryu reminds me of Key ... No one is going to take the Norris Trophy from Victor Hedman this year but an emerging candidate for now and the future is the New York Rangers’ Adam Fox, who is only 23. Like most top-end defenceman, he’s a game-changer.
AND ANOTHER THING
With David Savard on defence, I could see the Winnipeg Jets winning the Stanley Cup. Without him, I doubt it. So why not make that move? Tampa Bay already has the best goalie, best defenceman, and maybe the best coach in the NHL. And they add Savard and will add Nikita Kucherov near the end of the season. The Lightning have to be Cup favourites even if repeating is next to impossible ... What nobody predicted: There is about a month left in the NHL season and I can name 14 of the 16 playoff teams today. St. Louis and Arizona are battling in the West for one spot. Nashville, Chicago, and Dallas are battling for one spot in the Central. The lack of playoff races, frankly, is surprising ... Didn’t understand all the praise for GM Steve Yzerman for getting a first-round pick and more for Anthony Mantha. Mantha has a big shot to go along with big shooters like Ovechkin, John Carlson, Nikita Kuznetsov in Washington. The Capitals get a player now. The Red Wings get a player and a draft pick, who might be a player by 2024. Mantha can be a playoff series difference-maker now for Washington ... So happy for Hamilton head coach and former Toronto Argos DB Orlando Steinauer to be elected to the Canadian Football Hall of Fame. The man is a CFL treasure ... And, hey, whatever became of Jonathan Toews?
CFL DESERVES GOVERNMENT AID
The government of Canada pays more than a billion dollars every year to keep the CBC afloat.
It pays millions and millions to enable filmmakers to make movies in Canada, to help the television industry thrive, to provide funds for the arts and the ballet, and culture.
Probably as it should. So why not money for the ailing Canadian Football League?
I don’t necessarily agree with any government assistance going to professional sports but in the climate of today and considering where government money has been targeted historically, I have less of a problem with money going to the CFL, which can’t put fans in the stands right now, to enable it to continue in 2021.
There is a government budget coming on Tuesday and no doubt there will be no handouts for the CFL. At the same time, the CFL board of governors will meet Tuesday and almost certainly will announce either a delay of the upcoming season or possibly a second straight cancellation.
This is the backdrop of the ongoing meetings and negotiations and nonsense that is taking place between the CFL and Dwayne Johnson’s XFL.
Here’s what the CFL has that Canadian movies, for example, do not have: It has an audience. You may not like the audience or think it skews old — it does — but it’s there. It’s almost half-a-million a game in terms of television ratings historically. It’s probably 20,000-plus in live gate audience for regular season games and significantly more than that per game for Grey Cup and playoffs. The television deal with TSN pays about half the league’s revenue. But if there is no live gate now, 50 per cent of revenue is gone with costs up exponentially in Covid-related times. Without help externally, from government or XFL or gambling or elsewhere, I can’t see a CFL playing this season.
CANADIAN HOOPS DEEP
All things being equal and with all players being healthy and with the Olympics in Tokyo going ahead, the starting backcourt for a qualified Canada would have had Jamal Murray alongside Shai Gilgeous-alexander.
Now Murray is out with a knee injury and Gilgeous-alexander seems out with foot problems — for now anyhow — and once again, in these times where there are more questions than answers, the concern is more about pandemic restrictions and the qualifying tournament in Victoria than anything else at this moment.
This remains a remarkable time for Canadian basketball. It isn’t just Murray and Gilgeous-alexander as the stars. The depth of Canadian talent has never been more extreme, both in the NBA and around the world.
Oklahoma City’s Lu Dort just scored 42 points against Utah the other day while covering Donovan Mitchell. That came after fellow Montrealer Chris Boucher scored 38 for the Raptors. Sophomore R.J. Barrett is averaging 17.2 points a game for the emerging Knicks, while the always doubtful Andrew Wiggins is scoring 18.1 for Golden State.
At the same time, Dillon Brooks is averaging 16.4 points in Memphis and, since being traded, Kelly Olynyk is scoring 17.6 points a game in Houston.
That doesn’t count players like Kevin Pangos, who is tearing it up in Europe. The Canadian possibilities are many, even without the great Murray or Gilgeous-alexander. Now it’s a matter of pulling off the logistics, which this year is more complicated than any year before it.