Practice
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"It's all practice."
- Wayne Gretzky
Many people consider Wayne Gretzky, also referred to as "The Great One," to be the finest ice hockey player ever to grace the game (1). Although now retired, Gretzky still retains more goals, assists, and points than any other player in the history of the National Hockey League (NHL). In point of fact, he has more career assists than any other played has total points.
Gretzky grew up in Brantford, Ontario, Canada, and began skating at the age of 2 years (2). He was taught by his father, Walter Gretzky, on an ice rink that he constructed in their backyard, known as the "Wally Coliseum." Walter actually chose to purchase the house for its flat yard and suitability for an ice rink. He made Wayne and his younger brothers practice how to skate and handle a puck using bleach bottles, tin cans, and scattered hockey sticks on the ice. Importantly, Walter trained his son early on in life, with an important saying, "Skate where the puck's going, not where it's been," which would prove to be seminal advice throughout Wayne's career.
Gretzky's skills accelerated quickly and by the age of 6 years, he was playing on a team of 10-year-olds. The team's coach, Dick Martin, thought Gretzky controlled the puck better than the 10-year-olds (3), stating that "Wayne was so good that you could have a boy of your own who was a tremendous hockey player, and he'd get overlooked because of what the Gretzky kid was doing." Gretzky's sweater was too big for his small frame, forcing him to tuck it into his pants on the right side, which he often continued to do for the remainder of his career. |
Gretzky, playing for the Edmonton Oilers. |
Entering his teenage years, Gretzky was already an incredible ice hockey player, which resulted in intense local pressure. He was often booed when he appeared on the ice, seemingly for no other reason than the fact that he made the other parent's kids look bad. At age 14 years, his family tried to alleviate this by relocating him to a league in Toronto, which included players who were up to 20 years of age. He continued to excel and by the age of 16 years, he was playing in the junior leagues with the Sault Ste Marie Greyhounds. Gretzky wanted to wear the number "9" on his jersey after his hero, Gordie Howe, but as this number was already taken by one of his team-mates, he settled on the number 99, which he continued to wear in the NHL.
Rise
Gretzky played in the NHL for 20 years, during which he devoted the vast majority of his time to three different teams - the Oilers, the Kings, and the Rangers.
Gretzky played for the Edmonton Oilers from 1979 to 1988, winning the Hart Memorial Trophy in his rookie year for being the NHL's most valuable player. Incredibly, he would win that same trophy eight more consecutive times. Gretzky won 137 points in his premier season, which remains to this day remains the record for the most points scored in a rookie year by any player, ever. He then proceeded to break multiple records every year over the next several years, pretty much every year he played for the Oilers. This included leading the Oilers to win their first Stanley Cup win in 1984, then again in 1985, 1987, and 1988, for a total of four Stanley Cups (to date, the Oilers have only won five Stanley Cups).
After nearly a decade, Gretzky was traded to the Los Angeles Kings, where he remained from 1988 to 1996. During Gretzky's first year with the Kings, they had a superbly strong season and there was a noticeable increase in attendance at games, despite Los Angeles not being known for its strong fan support of hockey. During the Smythe Division semifinals, Gretzky helped the Kings defeat his old team and defending Stanley Cup champions, the Oilers. In 1993, the Kings made it to the Stanley Cup finals for the first time in their history, where they were defeated by the Montreal Canadiens. |
Playing for the Los Angeles Kings. |
After a brief stint playing for the Saint Louis Blues, Gretzky played for the New York Rangers, from 1996 to 1999. His final NHL game in Canada was on April 15, 1999, against the Ottawa Senators. Rather than award the three stars to three separate players at the end of the game, which is the usual practice, Gretzky was awarded all three stars.
Legacy
What made Wayne Gretzky so exceptional? It was certainly not his strength or size - at 6 feet tall and 85 kg, he was not strong enough or big enough to do what he wanted. But he had more important advantages.
First, intelligence - Gretzky is widely considered to be the smartest player in the history of the game (4). Thanks in no small part to his father's advice, he was consistently able to move to where the puck was going to be and perform the correct maneuver at the right time. Gretzky was able to improvise on the fly, and his next move was known for being incredibly difficult for other players to predict. Hockey Hall of Famer Igor Larionov stated, "Every time he took the ice, there was some spontaneous decision he would make. That's what made him such a phenomenal player."
Second, Gretzky possessed an uncanny ability to distort the rhythm of the game, such that journalist Peter Gzowski observed that he seemed to be able to "slow down time" (5). When winding up for a slapshot, or skating around with the puck, for example, Gretzky would often pause, for a split second, at an unanticipated moment, releasing the puck after it seemed he was about to take the shot, or sometimes when it seemed he was not yet ready to do so. By upsetting the rhythm of the game, Gretzky kept his opponents on edge, not allowing them to get into a rhythm of their own. |
Playing for the New York Rangers. |
Third, Gretzky was truly strategical, and a team player. He seemed to have extra-sensory perceptions, knowing where all the other players were located at any moment. According to the former NHL goaltender, Ken Dryden, said Gretzky was "like a magician," capable of directing the attention of the other players elsewhere, so that he could move into the open ice (6). Gretzky made his team-mates skill up to his level, which made the whole team perform better. This included lots of passing shots to help his team-mates get the glory of scoring goals, rather than trying to do it all himself. The legendary Bobby Orr once said of Gretzky, "He passes better than anybody I've ever seen" (7).
However, at the end of the day, it is wise to listen to what the man himself had to say about his performance on the ice. Although he had a great start in life through his father, Gretzky stated that the most singular defining feature of his legacy was simply hours upon hours of study and practice, until he understood hockey at such an intuitive level that he knew it better than anyone else. Even better than the back of his glove.
Solace.
References
(1) https://www.britannica.com/biography/Wayne-Gretzky.
(2) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayne_Gretzky.
(3) Gretzky W, Reilly R. 1990. Gretzky: An Autobiography. HarperCollins.
(4) https://web.archive.org/web/20160304125259/http://cambridgecitizen.ca/could-anyone-hit-wayne-gretzky/.
(5) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Gzowski.
(6) Dryden K.. 1998. Wayne Gretzky: The Making of the Great One. Dallas: Beckett Publications.
(7) https://web.archive.org/web/20090721060932/http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1126259/index.htm.
