Rinks, Russians and one important lesson
Tales of Walter: Father of the Great One meant so much to so many
From afar, Walter Gretzky seemed part deity: father of “The Great One,” Wayne Gretzky, the greatest hockey player in the history in the world.
Up close, he seemed so ordinary: A telephone technician who did what so many other hockey parents do: coach your kids, get involved in the community, make some backyard ice if you can.
He was so much to so many: a widower to Phyllis, father of five, grandfather of 13, survivor of a stroke, benefactor for charities, author of a book, subject of a movie, a helping hand to many, a friend to all.
All the while embodying the absolute best of what it means to be Canadian, even if we attribute more to him than he would to himself.
That famous backyard rink, for example, was more practical than magical.
“The only reason I made the rink in the backyard was so that he would have a place to play and I wouldn’t have to go to the outdoor parks and freeze to death,” Walter Gretzky once told Kevin Smith when the filmmaker visited the Brantford home in 2010.
The stories about Walter Gretzky, who died Thursday at age 82, have a similar strain: the idea of an ordinary man in extraordinary circumstances. Like the Cold War.
Igor Larionov has told the story many times that it was Walter Gretzky who brokered a deal to allow the Soviet Union’s famed KLM Line — Vladimir Krutov, Larionov and Sergei Makarov — to attend a party at Wayne’s house in the run-up to the 1987 Canada Cup.
“Walter went to (legendary coach) Viktor Tikhonov and Viktor said, ‘If I can go, the boys can go, too,’ ” Larionov told TSN.
There was a fifth Russian at the party, a KGB agent keeping an eye on things. When the Russians were offered beer, Larionov answered loudly that they don’t drink, only water. Walter whispered in Larionov’s ear that there was beer in the fridge in the trophy room downstairs. Off they went, one by one, Larionov said.
It’s not so much the stories Walter told about himself. He never thought he did anything special. But he was proud of his family, and always happy to talk about Wayne.
“I remember I got a phone call one night. It was from Wayne,” Walter told the YouTube series “Unpeeled” a year ago. “I said hello. It was 2:30 in the morning. ‘I did it, Dad! I did it, I did it.’ He was screaming. I said: ‘What?’ ‘I did it, Dad. I did it!’ ‘Wayne, what?’
“He was shouting. ‘I got five tonight. Fifty in 39 games.’ When he broke that record, he was so excited. And then what I will always remember: ‘I got to go, Dad. I told them I had to make an important phone call before we had a press conference.’ He thought of his family first before anyone else.”
But it’s the stories people have told about him over the years.
“He’s humble,” Diane Black and Frank Rubin wrote in the forward to Walter’s autobiography. “In his eyes he was just an ordinary hard-working downto-earth guy from Brantford to whom some extraordinary things had happened: like coming back not once but twice from brushes with death and raising the only hockey player in the history of the game called the Great One.”
Wayne himself said his father taught him the most important lesson of his life. The youngster had scored 400 goals one year in Brantford’s minor-hockey system. When the season was over, they were invited to play in an exhibition game. Gretzky’s team lost 8-1, and Gretzky apparently didn’t play well, but also admitted on “In Depth With Graham Bensinger” he probably didn’t care that much.
“I remember we got in the car and my dad said, ‘Well, what do you think?’ And I said, ‘Oh well, we lost. What are you gonna do?’
“And in a nice way my dad said to me, you can’t be like that. I remember thinking, ‘What do you mean?’ He said: ‘You ruined your whole year.’ And I said: ‘How could I ruin my whole year?’ He said: ‘For whatever reason, the Good Lord has chosen you and each and every time you play people want to see what the fuss is all about. You can’t afford not to be ready to play the best you can play each and every night.
“It was a lesson I learned. I prepared for each and every game like it was a Stanley Cup final game, whether it was an exhibition game at the end of September or Game 7 of the Stanley Cup playoffs.”