Then Clark proceeded to cut a swath through the National Hockey League.
All this stuff about being the No. 1 overall NHL draft pick, and the pressures of playing in Toronto neither fazed nor bothered the youngster from Kelvington, already sporting a nice ’stache, bordering on a Fu Manchu.
“Just come and play hockey, no different than what you’ve done your whole life,” Clark was saying this week when queried about the pressures facing the No. 1 pick who will be taken by the Maple Leafs in the NHL Entry Draft later this month.
“We’re hockey players, and we can control anything on that sheet of ice. Don’t worry about the other stuff.
“It’s all going to be a learning experience anyway. Your first year in the NHL is one of your best years. Everything is new, everything is the best. Soak it up and enjoy it. You get a nice paycheque for playing hockey, so don’t get stressed out. Make it fun.”
Piece of cake, right?
Maybe if your Wendel Clark, who, in the eyes of Leaf fans, can walk on melted ice.
Yep, Clark sure was all worked up about his first season back 31 years ago, straight out of the Western Hockey League and the Saskatoon Blades.
All he did was score 34 times and knock the head off anyone who glanced at him sideways, picking up 227 minutes in penalties. And this after being converted from a defenceman to forward.
If only it can be so easy for Auston Matthews, the American who’ll probably be the Leafs’ second No. 1 overall pick in their history.
Matthews’s skills are reportedly sublime, but it’s going to take a special type of player to lace ’em up in Toronto, in front of dozens of media and other prying eyes.
And that’s only on the off-day skates.
Clark, in St. John’s for a golf tournament at Glendenning Golf Course, acknowledges the demands can be difficult, but the first pick will be coming into an organization that has a plan in place, unlike the Harold Ballard-led gong show that awaited Clark.
“I think there’s no better place to play than a Canadian city, especially in a city where they live and breathe hockey,” he said.
“Tuesday night, Saturday night … doesn’t matter. The building is jumping, there’s energy inside and out. It’s fun. People care. When the fans are hard on you, it means they care. It’s better than having nobody in the rink.”
Clark and Matthews are different breeds, a plough horse and a thoroughbred.
While the youngster is a 6-2, 200-pound maestro, Clark bulled his way through 793 NHL games, a heavy wrist shot helping account for 330 career goals.
He was one of the last of the Mohicans, a hockey player who used his hands to score goals and pound on opponents when need be.
Anyone remember the tilt with Marty McSorley, when the ornery Los Angeles Kings defenceman flattened Doug Gilmour?
“Yeah, you don’t see that too much anymore, with the fighting all but gone,” said Clark, who turns 50 this year.
“But there’s lots of room for power forwards. I’d love to see Toronto get a couple of power guy to go with the finesse guys coming in.”
With the likes of Matthews coming on board, joining William Nylander, Mitch Marner and Nikita Soshnikov, the Leafs should have no trouble generating offence in years to come.
“But you need all kinds of different pieces of the puzzle when putting a team together,” he said. “It can’t be just one kind of player.”
Clark, along with Darryl Sittler, is working for the Leafs as an ambassador. So you won’t hear him criticizing the team too much.
But in all honesty, he says he likes the direction Toronto has taken as Brendan Shanahan, Lou Lamoriello and Mike Babcock has stripped the clubs to the studs for an honest-to-goodness rebuild.
“I try to tell the young players, just go out and play,” he said. “We over-analyze more today because everything is on video. Not only did you watch the guy play, now we go home and watch him again on video, and when you get up in the morning, you watch even more video.
“By the time you watch video for the fourth time, you’re saying, ‘You know what? He did something wrong over there.’
“We over-judge a lot of our players sometimes. Let ’em play.”
It worked out pretty well for Wendel.
Then Clark proceeded to cut a swath through the National Hockey League.
All this stuff about being the No. 1 overall NHL draft pick, and the pressures of playing in Toronto neither fazed nor bothered the youngster from Kelvington, already sporting a nice ’stache, bordering on a Fu Manchu.
“Just come and play hockey, no different than what you’ve done your whole life,” Clark was saying this week when queried about the pressures facing the No. 1 pick who will be taken by the Maple Leafs in the NHL Entry Draft later this month.
“We’re hockey players, and we can control anything on that sheet of ice. Don’t worry about the other stuff.
“It’s all going to be a learning experience anyway. Your first year in the NHL is one of your best years. Everything is new, everything is the best. Soak it up and enjoy it. You get a nice paycheque for playing hockey, so don’t get stressed out. Make it fun.”
Piece of cake, right?
Maybe if your Wendel Clark, who, in the eyes of Leaf fans, can walk on melted ice.
Yep, Clark sure was all worked up about his first season back 31 years ago, straight out of the Western Hockey League and the Saskatoon Blades.
All he did was score 34 times and knock the head off anyone who glanced at him sideways, picking up 227 minutes in penalties. And this after being converted from a defenceman to forward.
If only it can be so easy for Auston Matthews, the American who’ll probably be the Leafs’ second No. 1 overall pick in their history.
Matthews’s skills are reportedly sublime, but it’s going to take a special type of player to lace ’em up in Toronto, in front of dozens of media and other prying eyes.
And that’s only on the off-day skates.
Clark, in St. John’s for a golf tournament at Glendenning Golf Course, acknowledges the demands can be difficult, but the first pick will be coming into an organization that has a plan in place, unlike the Harold Ballard-led gong show that awaited Clark.
“I think there’s no better place to play than a Canadian city, especially in a city where they live and breathe hockey,” he said.
“Tuesday night, Saturday night … doesn’t matter. The building is jumping, there’s energy inside and out. It’s fun. People care. When the fans are hard on you, it means they care. It’s better than having nobody in the rink.”
Clark and Matthews are different breeds, a plough horse and a thoroughbred.
While the youngster is a 6-2, 200-pound maestro, Clark bulled his way through 793 NHL games, a heavy wrist shot helping account for 330 career goals.
He was one of the last of the Mohicans, a hockey player who used his hands to score goals and pound on opponents when need be.
Anyone remember the tilt with Marty McSorley, when the ornery Los Angeles Kings defenceman flattened Doug Gilmour?
“Yeah, you don’t see that too much anymore, with the fighting all but gone,” said Clark, who turns 50 this year.
“But there’s lots of room for power forwards. I’d love to see Toronto get a couple of power guy to go with the finesse guys coming in.”
With the likes of Matthews coming on board, joining William Nylander, Mitch Marner and Nikita Soshnikov, the Leafs should have no trouble generating offence in years to come.
“But you need all kinds of different pieces of the puzzle when putting a team together,” he said. “It can’t be just one kind of player.”
Clark, along with Darryl Sittler, is working for the Leafs as an ambassador. So you won’t hear him criticizing the team too much.
But in all honesty, he says he likes the direction Toronto has taken as Brendan Shanahan, Lou Lamoriello and Mike Babcock has stripped the clubs to the studs for an honest-to-goodness rebuild.
“I try to tell the young players, just go out and play,” he said. “We over-analyze more today because everything is on video. Not only did you watch the guy play, now we go home and watch him again on video, and when you get up in the morning, you watch even more video.
“By the time you watch video for the fourth time, you’re saying, ‘You know what? He did something wrong over there.’
“We over-judge a lot of our players sometimes. Let ’em play.”
It worked out pretty well for Wendel.