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Thursday, July 9, 2009 2:56 PM

Kudos for Sakic from Gretzky

Before he teed off in the opening round of the Ford Wayne Gretzky Classic on Thursday, the tournament host and Hockey Hall of Famer paid homage to Joe Sakic, who announced his retirement this afternoon.

The two spent 11 seasons battling each other and almost became teammates with the New York Rangers in 1997, when the Rangers signed Sakic to three-year, $21-million (U.S.) offer sheet that called for $15-million up front. The Colorado Avalanche matched the offer to keep their captain.

Gretzky and Sakic were Canadian teammates for the 1991 Canada Cup, 1996 World Cup of Hockey and the 1998 Olympics as well as several NHL all-star games.

As executive director of the successful 2002 Canadian men’s Olympic hockey team, Gretzky relied on Sakic as a key member.

“He’s had an outstanding, brilliant career,” Gretzky said. “He’s been a tremendous asset to the National Hockey League. He’s been a Stanley Cup champion and just as important he was a huge part of the [Olympic] gold medal in 2002.

“He was a winner. The thing about Joe is he did it with so much class and so much dignity. He is very humble, very quiet, almost shy. But when he got on the ice he was dynamic and very unselfish. The thing about Joe is that he worked hard every shift, every game.”

Gretzky hung up his skates a decade ago, and reflected on the reasons for his decision to retire.

“For me, I knew it was time,” Gretzky said. “People ask me all the time if I miss it. Of course, I miss it. From my point of view, the reason I retired is that was because I felt that in order to stay successful at that level I had to train that much harder each and every summer.

“So if you trained three hours a day, you bump that to four hours a day. When I decided to retire at 39, it wasn’t because of the game itself, the travel or the practices. Everything that goes with it was all fine. For me, it was more of a question I knew mentally and physically I didn’t have the energy in me to concentrate and put the work effort and workload in to get ready for September.”

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Globe On Hockey Contributors

David Shoalts

David Shoalts, a native of Wainfleet, Ont., joined The Globe in 1984 as a layout and copy editor in the sports section. He attended the University of Waterloo and Conestoga College. After graduating from Conestoga with a journalism diploma in 1978, Shoalts worked at the Calgary Herald and the Calgary Sun, and later the Toronto Sun.

In 1986, Shoalts went back to the writing side of the business. He was the CFL reporter for The Globe for four years and then switched to hockey. He has covered the Toronto Maple Leafs and the NHL ever since and became a hockey columnist in 2003. Among the most memorable events Shoalts has covered are the final hockey game at the old Chicago Stadium (between the Maple Leafs and Blackhawks) and the men's and women's gold-medal hockey games at the 2002 Winter Olympics. He is also the author of a book of humour, Tales From The Toronto Maple Leafs, and co-author with retired Globe columnist William Houston of Greed and Glory, The Fall of Hockey Czar Alan Eagleson.

 
Allan Maki

Allan Maki

Allan Maki joined the Globe in 1997, after spending 19 years as a reporter and columnist at the Calgary Herald. Born in Thunder Bay, Ont., Maki graduated from the Ryerson School of Journalism in 1977.

A past president of the Football Writers of Canada, Maki has covered every Grey Cup since 1980. He's been to seven Olympic Games and covered everything from rodeos to the World Series to the Super Bowl.

A regular commentator on radio and television, Maki hosted a sports program for two years on CBC Newsworld. He has won several awards for his writing and was nominated for a National Newspaper Award in 1995.

 
Eric Duhatschek

Eric Duhatschek

Eric Duhatschek was the winner of the Hockey Hall Of Fame's Elmer Ferguson award for "distinguished contributions to hockey writing" in 2001. A graduate of the University of Western Ontario's grad school of journalism, he began covering hockey in 1978 and after spending 20 years covering the NHL and the Calgary Flames, joined globeandmail.com in September, 2000, where he writes a five-time-a-week NHL column.

A frequent contributor to Hockey Night in Canada's Satellite Hot Stove segment, he has covered four Winter Olympics, 19 Stanley Cup finals, every Canada Cup and World Cup since 1981, plus two world championships. Most recently, he was appointed as the newest member of the Hockey Hall Of Fame's annual Selection Committee.