On the Pronger trade and Hockey and Family and Life
On the Pronger "situation" : At first I didn’t understand why Pronger wanted to leave Edmonton. I read the rumors online too and didn’t know what to believe. I was intensely curious about why a player who starred on a team, who was obviously adored by the home fans and praised by management, would want to leave a team that had just come so close to winning the Stanley Cup. Honestly, I’m still curious enough to want to know just why Pronger requested his trade. However, I thought back to Mario Lemieux’s return to hockey in 2001 for a second. (Hang with me; I really do have a point.) When Lemieux returned to the game that year, he had the highest point per game average in hockey history—over 2 points a game. When Lemieux retired this past year, he’d lost that gaudy statistic. I’m sure Lemieux the hockey player wishes he still had the obscene 2+/points per game average. I’m also sure that Lemieux the father is glad his son Austin was able to see him play when he was still capable of playing at a high level. Ask Austin what he remembers about his dad in twenty years, and it’s not going to be his father’s statistics as much as it’s going to be memories of watching his daddy dominate the game as he did upon his return in 2001. The point? As Mario Lemieux, father of Austin and no longer the player who maintained a 2.0+/points per game average, understands, sometimes family is more important than your place in hockey history. I don’t know if Pronger’s reasons for wanting out of Edmonton were what myself and other reasonable people would deem legitimate or not—it’s likely that fans would not deem such reasons legitimate. I’m tempted to cut Pronger a break, though—because I know it was way more important for Mario to play hockey when his son could see him play than it was to keep that phenomenal average points per game record. And when Mario retired for health reasons to ensure his kids would have a father, he admitted there were things way more important than capturing another Stanley Cup. Hard as it is for hockey diehards to admit, some things are more important than winning and losing hockey games, even championship hockey games.
(Aside: I am in no way saying that the Pronger trade request and Lemieux’s situations are even parallel demands. I am saying that the last sentence of my post holds true, regardless of whether fans deem a player’s "personal and private" concerns legitimate or illegitimate.)