It doesn’t take a John Rocker to know that, just as in society, racism can exist in sports. Not all the time, not on every team and not always to a headline-producing degree, but it can happen.
To that end, the National Hockey League has worked to try to stay ahead of the curve on the subject and raise awareness at every possibility. After all, this is a league in which 18 countries are represented — making it the most diverse of the four major sports — and the person dressing next to his teammate in the locker room is as likely to speak a different primary language as not.
Last season those efforts took a hit, though not to the degree that Rocker’s recent incendiary comments might have set back baseball’s player relations.
In separate incidents, Washington’s Chris Simon and Craig Berube drew suspensions for directing racial slurs at Edmonton’s Mike Grier and Florida’s Peter Worrell, respectively. In the playoffs, Philadelphia’s Sandy McCarthy, whose father is African-American and mother is Canadian of Native American heritage, accused Toronto’s Tie Domi of slurring him. The league investigated the matter and cleared Domi, who denied the charge.
These incidents merely strengthened the league’s resolve to perfect and publicize its zero-tolerance policy regarding racial slurs and further develop programs already in place to address racism.
The Hawks, like every team in the league, underwent a 90-minute diversity training seminar earlier this season led by Willie O’Ree, who integrated the sport in 1958.
Furthermore, O’Ree and NHL vice president of business development Bryant McBride continue to run the NHL/USA Hockey’s Diversity Task Force, a not-for-profit organization aimed at making hockey more accessible to minority children.
McBride, an African-American born in Chicago and raised in Ontario, played collegiate hockey at West Point.
“People ask me if there’s racism in hockey,” McBride said. “You know what? There is racism and prejudice in life. Sports is a reflection of society … but the league is working to make a difference.”
Ring out the old: As the decade winds down, the lists appear. Here are the game’s leaders for the 1990s, with numbers current through last week:
– Brett Hull scored the most goals in the decade, with 490. Pittsburgh’s Jaromir Jagr was a distant second with 372, while Detroit’s Brendan Shanahan scored 365 to finish third. Rounding out the top five are Theo Fleury and Luc Robitaille.
– Wayne Gretzky, despite retiring after last season, will reign as the leading assist man for the ’90s. The Great One posted 702, while Adam Oates (674), Ron Francis, Doug Gilmour and Joe Sakic complete the top five.
– Not surprisingly, Gretzky also led in points, with 940. Jagr (920) and Oates (901) also cracked the 900-point barrier. Sakic and Hull round out the top five.
– Patrick Roy won 308 games to best Ed Belfour (285) and Curtis Joseph (265) for winningest goaltender of the decade.
– The Red Wings won the most games in the ’90s, with a 427-252-99 mark.
The survivor: With four goals and 12 points in 15 games, Alexandre Daigle won’t make any All-Star teams or set any scoring records this season.
But the fact that the former first overall pick in the 1993 draft is even contributing to the New York Rangers speaks volumes about his character, which has been called into question several times during his rocky career.
Released by Tampa Bay earlier this season, Daigle was called lazy and uncoachable. It was the 6-foot, 200-pound forward’s third team of his spotty career, which featured, really, only one solid season in a 26-goal, 51-point campaign for Ottawa in 1996-97.
The Rangers took a chance on Daigle and assigned him to their minor-league affiliate in Hartford. There, Daigle scored six goals and 19 points in a month.
“I didn’t want to go [to Hartford],” Daigle said. “Anybody who will tell you that they’ve been to the minors and is happy is lying. You don’t want to stay in Hartford. I like the city, but it’s not that great.”
Daigle is earning $100,000 for every 10 games he plays for the Rangers.
Ice chips: Last Thursday, Carolina defenseman Paul Coffey became just the eighth player — and first defenseman — to reach the 1,500-point plateau with a second-period assist against Ottawa.
But the feat was not recognized over the public-address system in Ottawa, a large oversight for a city that prides itself on knowledge of hockey history.
By the way, the 38-year-old Coffey logged a game-high 24 minutes 57 seconds of ice time that game.
Quote of the week goes to Kings defenseman Rob Blake, shortly after the Hawks added to his team’s woes with a blowout victory. At the time, the Kings had allowed 23 goals in three games.
“It’s not the system,” Blake said. “It’s the way we’re playing the system.”
