St. Louis – When the NHL’s Colorado Rockies were sold and moved to New Jersey in 1982, I was switched to cover the Nuggets. During trips to Salt Lake City for Nuggets-Jazz games, I often sat virtually next to Jazz executive Dave Checketts, whose floor-side seat was adjacent to press row.
Don’t tell anyone, but Checketts was pretty much like any other young, well-dressed fan in a great seat. He yelled at the officials and sometimes heckled – if not to the point of obnoxiousness – opposing players.
A quarter-century later, the long-negotiated purchase of the St. Louis Blues by Checketts and his partnership group has reached the stage where only league approval stands in the way. So he was introduced to the St. Louis media Friday as owner-in-waiting of the troubled franchise.
Checketts, who spent a decade as the head of Madison Square Garden, opened by telling reporters a story about a sign he saw while walking in New York during the long negotiations with previous Blues owners Bill and Nancy Laurie.
The sign read: “One person who believes is worth more than 99 who have an interest.”
Most longtime hockey fans understand how passionate St. Louis has been for the sport – in spurts. The noise in the old Checkerdome was amazing, and it didn’t even take putting childish “YELL” on a scoreboard for it to be that way. This is a hockey market fallen on hard times, and the Lauries were part of that deterioration after their purchase of the Nuggets and Avalanche fell through and they bought the Blues and unsuccessfully sought the Vancouver Grizzlies for St. Louis. At one point, NHL commissioner Gary Bettman cited Bill Laurie as a prime example of how even a basketball fan could get turned on to hockey when exposed to it, as Laurie was during his tenure as the Avalanche’s owner-in-waiting.
But it didn’t work, despite the fact that under Joel Quenneville the Blues had a lot of on-ice success. They won the Presidents Trophy in 1999-2000 (but lost in the first round of the playoffs) and reached the conference finals against the Avalanche the next year, and even had 99 points in 2002-03.
Citing huge losses, the Lauries cut back and gutted the franchise – from the dressing room through the team offices – in preparation for a possible sale, and Quenneville was lucky to get fired from the Blues when he did, late in the 2003-04 season.
Now the issue becomes whether Checketts’ financial self-interest and his sporting savvy can help fuel not just a turnaround on the ice, but rekindle the passion for the Blues in the city.
“I know this about Blues fans: They’re fiercely loyal, they’re loud, they pay their dues without complaints, they block out Saturday nights from October to April,” Checketts said Friday at the news conference.
“I do know that. Back when this franchise was launched in the late 1960s, they said the fans were worth a goal a game for the Blues. I think 40 years later we can say that that’s still true. Next season we’ll move ahead as one, our team, our fans, and begin working for the ultimate goal of a Stanley Cup championship. That’s what I think is very possible and I want our fans to clearly know that.”
And it’s a lesson for a market such as Denver, where the Avalanche at least officially hasn’t had an unsold ticket in 10 1/2 years – but is a rotten season or two from significant slippage at the box office.
Laurie’s explanation
Asked why he was selling the Blues now, Laurie responded: “We’ve been extremely involved with this hockey team and as you well know, in past years, we’ve been very aggressive in trying to achieve what everybody in St. Louis wants, a Stanley Cup. We went about as far as we could and did everything possible there, and it didn’t happen, for whatever reason – injuries, sickness, wrong personnel, who knows. But we’ve had a good run and enjoyed it. We feel like the new CBA is absolutely the best thing for the National Hockey League. But right now our family is just ready to move on.”
Root for Ruff
Buffalo coach Lindy Ruff’s younger brother, Brent, was among four major junior players who died in the Swift Current Broncos’ bus crash in 1988. (Joe Sakic was one of the survivors.) Last week, Lindy Ruff’s 11-year-old daughter had brain surgery in Buffalo as doctors removed a small tumor. They say they discovered the tumor in time.
Scheduling
Just a couple more examples of scheduling silliness down the stretch:
Five of the Carolina Hurricanes’ final 13 games are against the Washington Capitals. That’s one reason the ‘Canes probably will end up the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference, ahead of the Ottawa Senators.
The Oilers and Canucks played three straight times, finishing up Saturday night at Vancouver. Among the Canucks’ remaining 10 games, Vancouver has back-to-backs against Minnesota and San Jose.
Kings’ ex
The major surprise tied to the Kings’ firing of longtime coach Andy Murray last week was his successor, at least on an interim basis. General manager Dave Taylor’s choice was a sign that he believes there’s not much to lose, and that maybe a choice outside the envelope could serve to further shock the Kings out of their lethargy.
The interim coach, John Torchetti, was a Tampa Bay assistant for two seasons and spent one season as an assistant with Florida, where he also was the interim coach for 27 games. This season he was out of the game, and Taylor passed him over when choosing a coach for the Kings’ Manchester, N.H., affiliate in the American Hockey League.
Torchetti proudly tells how he was a cab driver to support himself when serving as an unpaid coaching intern with the Greensboro Monarchs of the ECHL from 1993-95. Taylor must have figured it was worth a try.
Terry Frei can be reached at 303-820-1895 or tfrei@denverpost.com.
