Brendan Shanahan may have the most thankless job in hockey. After an initial honeymoon period that faded quickly, the NHL's senior vice-president of player safety and hockey operations spent most of his first year on the job coming under heavy fire over his rulings on player discipline.
Don Cherry was one of the first to pile on the new sheriff, but he was hardly alone. Shanahan had plenty of critics in the media, reports indicated that some general managers were uncomfortable with his rulings, and plenty of fans voiced their concerns.
At the very least, you might assume that Shanahan's discipline decisions are the only area where he is feeling the heat. But you'd be wrong. According to my top-secret sources, the hockey world has a long list of issues and grievances with Shanahan that date back to the early days of his career.
Here's a sample of some of the hockey world's other complaints about Brendan Shanahan.
- In a cruel practical joke, spent his entire rookie year with the Devils whispering moronic coaching strategies into the ear of sleeping roommate John MacLean.
- Completely screwed up his shoot-out attempt at the Nagano Olympics when he failed to be Wayne Gretzky.
- Has been an NHL VP for almost two years now and has spent lots of time with Gary Bettman, yet has apparently still not taken him aside and convinced him to stop doing that “get overly defensive and make the whole press conference uncomfortable” thing.
- Whenever I get a penalty I don't agree with and then do the secret signal where I tug on my ear three times in the penalty box, the referee still has a job the next day. (Submitted by Gregory Campbell.)
- People are always going on and on about him having the second-most career goals by a left-winger, as if somebody's politics should be part of the story.
- He was supposed to be this noble tough guy who'd always stick up for a teammate, but when Claude Lemieux drilled Kris Draper into the boards from behind all he did was make excuses about how he “wasn't on the ice” and “didn't see the hit” and “was actually playing for the Hartford Whalers that year.”
- He signed a very fair and reasonable contract with Glen Sather and the New York Rangers as an unrestricted free agent in 2006, so he's obviously the world's worst negotiator.
- Whenever you walk up to him and say, “Hey, nice belt, but I would have thought you'd be more into suspenders!” and then punch him playfully on the shoulder and laugh hysterically, he just stares at you like you're some kind of idiot.
- Oh sure, those videos he makes to explain his suspension decisions are nice, but how about dialing back the enthusiasm a little there, Mr. Electricity! (Submitted by Sidney Crosby.)
- He was traded straight up for both a young Chris Pronger and a young Scott Stevens at different points in his career, so who's really causing the head injuries around here, Brendan?
- Unlike the easygoing Colin Campbell, he's always hassling the IT guys with boring questions about whether there's a way to delete his old emails.
- Look, we all know “curse” is a strong word, so let's just say that every single team that ever traded him away mid-season ceased to exist within a year.
- He was drafted by the Devils and went on to play for the Rangers, and if there's one thing we know about guys like that it's that they end up being overpaid bums that ruin your salary cap for years, according to Habs fans.
- He was the second overall pick in the 1987 entry draft, so I'm not sure what you're talking about because I don't even remember him. (Submitted by Alexandre Daigle.)
- He was being completely reasonable and even-handed when he was suspending all those guys from other teams, but somehow became a complete idiot when he suspended a player from the team you like.