TORONTO - There aren't too many dates on the hockey calendar that warrant Hollywood treatment. The Hall of Fame induction night is one of them.
The red carpet was rolled out Monday to welcome dozens of the sport's greats, all on hand to honor the Hall's newest members - Martin Brodeur, Martin St. Louis, Jayna Hefford, Alexander Yakushev, Willie O'Ree, and Gary Bettman.
Here are some things we learned on the carpet:
Gretzky may have a favorite
If anybody can talk a teammate into the Hall of Fame, it's Wayne Gretzky.
Asked to provide the name of someone who deserves to be enshrined but hasn't gotten the call, "The Great One" enthusiastically put forth Kevin Lowe.
Gretzky and Lowe, a rugged NHL defenseman for 19 seasons from 1979 to 1997, played together in Edmonton for nearly a decade. The latter is tied for 10th on the all-time list in NHL titles won.
"I'm biased, I'm a teammate. You win six Stanley Cups and you're an unselfish player and you’re part of a dynasty and part of what makes a team great," Gretzky said of Lowe, now 59.
"When you're kids, it’s all about having fun, scoring goals, and just enjoying it. When you're a professional athlete, it’s about winning. Championships to me are everything."
Lamoriello is in Gary's corner
About an hour before Gary Bettman wisecracked about getting into the Hall despite facing a barrage of boos every time he appears in public, Lou Lamoriello came to the defense of the longtime NHL commissioner.
Lamoriello, a 2009 Hall of Fame inductee, urged prickly fans to consider Bettman's 25-year body of work.
"I think if you take a step back and look at what the commissioner has done for this game, how he's expanded the game, how he’s been aggressive in changing the game as the players changed - the speed and strength of the game - it needed changes to allow the game to be the greatest game it is today," Lamoriello said.
"You have to be special to do that, and you have to satisfy a lot of ownership to get a lot of these decisions made, and he has a way of getting everybody to come together. We hear boos in different buildings, but sometimes I think that's a lot of respect too."
Healy's motivated to help
It was a little odd that the NHL and a group of retired players reached a tentative settlement in a concussion lawsuit on Monday, of all days.
Maybe a coincidence, or perhaps a strategic public relations move by the league and its lawyers to pair the so-called win with Bettman's induction?
Either way, NHL Alumni Association president Glenn Healy is motivated by the $18.9-million payout, even though it falls way short of the settlement that NFL players received from their league.
"I think the biggest thing for us is that it's a step. It's a real step in the right direction to get hope back to families," Healy said. "The calls that I get are never from the player. They're always from the wives, always from the kids that say to me, 'I want Dad back.' And so, it's a step in the right direction today to try to get some help and some hope for players.
"This is not the end game. We're not done here. The Alumni is going to dig in with this as well. There will never be an out of bounds. There will always be an issue with this. This is a fast, dangerous game, and we're not going to stop until we can help every player."
Brodeur can (or at least could) ball
Martin Brodeur did just about everything over the course of a 22-year career.
He won three Stanley Cups, two Olympic gold medals, four Vezina Trophies, claimed the all-time wins record, and scored multiple goals.
According to old teammate and ex-Devils captain Scott Niedermayer, Brodeur's athletic accomplishments extended beyond hockey.
"I remember we were playing some basketball one day down in Florida. We had a day off," Niedermayer said. "Most of us are terrible, couldn't make a shot, and there’s Marty. It looks like he's played basketball for 30 years. He was just a natural. He was a heck of an athlete."
St. Louis may never change
Understandably, given the hockey world's resentment towards players his size at the time, Martin St. Louis had a chip on his shoulder when he broke into the NHL.
Dave Andreychuk, one of St. Louis' mentors and a 2017 inductee, insists the Marty-vs-the-world mentality persisted within the 5-foot-8 winger, remaining a part of his attitude through an illustrious career.
"I don't think it ever left. Right until the end, right?" Andreychuk said. "He was trying to prove to the world that he belongs and that’s his demeanor. That's who he is. When you think about the career path for Marty, and what he did, I’m in amazement just like everybody else."
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