THEY’RE SORRY
Bobby Ryan gets apology from U.S. Olympic team for caustic comments,
Team USA general manager David Poile has publicly apologized to Ottawa Senators winger Bobby Ryan for the unflattering remarks made by Calgary Flames president Brian Burke about his playing style during an Olympic selection committee meeting.
ESPN.com and USA Today Sports were both allowed access to every U.S. selection committee meetings over a 171-day period, and this Burke quote about Ryan appears in the ESPN.com story: “He is not intense. That word is not in his vocabulary. It’s never going to be in his vocabulary. He can’t spell intense.”
Ryan was not selected for the U.S. team and has since called Burke’s comment “gutless” and said he felt degraded.
“When I asked all of our committee (members) to give me their final roster, (Burke) had Bobby Ryan on his team,” Poile said.
USA Today Sports can also confirm that Burke talked about Ryan’s strengths in other meetings.
“I’m not disputing what was said,” Poile said. “These meetings were very intense and very passionate. But for the things that were said against Bobby Ryan there were many, many things that were said positively about Bobby Ryan.”
“For the things that were said against Bobby Ryan there were many, many things that were said positively about him.” U.S. GM DAVID POILE
Burke’s words came while the committee members were debating which forwards were going to make the team. “It’s been taken totally out of context,” Poile said. “You have to realize in this situation for players who made the team there were critical things said about them and good things said about them. That’s just the way it goes when you are analyzing.” Poile explained Ryan didn’t make the team because of the emergence of other players like James van Riemsdyk and Max Pacioretty. Zach Parise and Dustin Brown were holdovers from the 2010 Olympic squad. Poile said the committee members didn’t have a clear understanding of how media members were going to present the information they gathered. “That’s on us,” Poile said. He added: “What goes on in the room should stay in the room. This was a characterization on whole that was not a characterization of what actually happened.
“If that was said about me or one of my players . . . if I was (Senators general manager) Bryan Murray and the Ottawa Senators or Bobby Ryan specifically or his agent, I would be very upset about this,” Poile said. “I’ve apologized as much as I can.”
Poile and Murray previously worked together with the Washington Capitals and they remain friends. Burke drafted Ryan as general manager in Anaheim. Poile said he has reached out to Murray, and Burke has tried to contact Ryan.
“It’s great to be open and progressive with the media, and in this one particular instance, it probably went further than it should have,” Poile said.