SIMMONS SAYS: The things that made Cliff Fletcher so special to be around

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THIS AND THAT

The Hall of Famers that Fletcher traded for: Doug Gilmour (twice), Sundin, Lanny McDonald, Joey Mullen, Grant Fuhr, Dave Andreychuk, Glenn Anderson, Mike Gartner and Larry Murphy. Who compiles a list like that anymore? The Hall of Famers and almost-Hall of Famers he drafted: Al MacInnis, Mike Vernon, Joe Nieuwendyk, Brett Hull, Gary Suter, Kent Nilsson, Paul Reinhart, Tom Lysiak, Theo Fleury, Gary Roberts, Hakan Loob, Sergei Makarov, Jim Craig, Rick Bowness. Who has a list of players and people to match what Fletcher did in his career in Atlanta, Calgary, and Toronto and later in Tampa Bay and Arizona? He made the Flames relevant during the years that the Wayne Gretzky/Edmonton Oilers dynasty ruled and hockey in Alberta became the best in the world. He then made the Leafs relevant as they haven’t been since their Stanley Cup seasons. He did it all with grace, humility, modesty and an expense account that never quit … New Leafs almost-boss Mats Sundin, on the passing of Fletcher: “Cliff gave me the opportunity to represent the greatest hockey franchise in the world. He was a great leader, a brilliant hockey mind, and was respected throughout the league simply by his presence. Most importantly, he was a good man. Our sincere condolences to his family.” … The deal Fletcher had to explain for most of his life and career was the trading away of Hull in Calgary. He knew Hull was going to become a big scorer. He thought it would be 50 goals a year. Hull retired with 741 career goals that included individual seasons of 86, 72 and 70 goals. But the deal for Rob Ramage and Rick Wamsley, particularly for Ramage, helped the Flames win the Stanley Cup in 1989. It was the only Cup of Fletcher’s storied career, although he probably should have won in 1990 as well and maybe in 1986. He won his only Cup after trading away a generational goal-scorer. He would do the deal again, he said many times over the years. Condolences and prayers to the Fletcher family, to Linda his wife, to his children Chuck and Kristy, and his many friends inside and outside hockey.

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HEAR AND THERE

Because they’re the Maple Leafs, they should have first dibs on the great available people in hockey. Isn’t that the way it’s supposed to work? So how is it that Nashville, with a roster less than the Leafs have, wound up nabbing Colorado general manager Chris MacFarland and the Leafs wound up with John Chayka, who nobody else in hockey necessarily wanted? And the Predators got former Kings GM Rob Blake as second in command while the Leafs got the inexperienced Sundin. Chayka may turn out to be fabulous at the job, but the difference is: MacFarland might be GM of the Year in the NHL as his Avalanche won the Presidents’ Trophy. Chayka was nobody’s GM of the year … Here is the tiny list of players who have outscored Mitch Marner since he entered the NHL: Connor McDavid, Leon Draisaitl, Nathan MacKinnon, Nikita Kucherov, Artemi Panarin, David Pastrnak and Sidney Crosby. That’s all. Pretty good company. He’s eighth in his time in the NHL. Ten years in, 10 times in the playoffs. Top 10 paid players of all-time. If those are his dark days of Toronto, where can I sign up for them? … The third line of the Vegas Golden Knights includes Mark Stone and Tomas Hertl. The third line of the Carolina Hurricanes has Jordan Staal, Nik Ehlers and occasionally Seth Jarvis. The Maple Leafs third line has who? Nick Robertson and Dakota Joshua? You need a great third line to win a Cup … Some hockey players are defined by statistics. Some are defined by their innate ability to win. Staal is one of those where stats mean nothing and the same is true of Vegas centre William Karlsson. Don’t read the numbers of those players, just read the Ws … Bet you didn’t know that when new Vancouver GM Ryan Johnson played for St. Louis in 2004, his roommate was none other than Mike Danton … Any reason why the Leafs didn’t attempt to bring Manny Malhotra home to coach the hockey club? Not sure what kind of coach Malhotra is, but I know what kind of person he is … Before this post-season disappearance, Sebastian Aho had been one of the rare NHL stars who had accumulated more points per game in the playoffs than he had in the regular season. That number is taking a beating heading into Game 3 of the Stanley Cup final.

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SCENE AND HEARD

Strange timing on the Maple Leafs hiring of new assistant GM Judd Brackett, who formerly headed up scouting for the Minnesota Wild. Normally, a scout would wait until after the draft before leaving his post. That’s usually protocol. In this case, though, the Wild don’t have a draft pick in the first or second round so the ultra-competitive GM Bill Guerin was all right to proceed without Brackett, who hadn’t found a lot of magical picks in his five seasons with the Wild. One of his better picks was Austrian centre Marco Rossi, ninth overall in 2020, since part of the Quinn Hughes trade. But in picking Rossi, Brackett passed on better players such as Jarvis and Anton Lundell, who have surpassed Rossi to date in their careers. Either of them would have been perfect for the Wild … These are Sasha Barkov’s past three seasons: This year, he captained Finland to the world hockey championship. Last year and the year before that, he captained the Florida Panthers to the Stanley Cup. That’s three titles in three seasons for Barkov … The caricature coach, John Tortorella, was wrong to challenge the controversial no-goal call in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup final, even though the puck was in the net. You don’t win that kind of challenge in the NHL. That said, the goal should have counted … The NHL is backing Russia’s attempt to return to international hockey and backing the stalling of Bruce Cassidy’s coaching career. Not often does Gary Bettman double down on bad ideas … Last time I saw Gerry Meehan was at the Hockey Hall of Fame. We were talking about Alexander Mogilny finally getting inducted. As usual with Meehan, the conversation was rich and memorable. On Friday, Meehan passed away at the age of 79. Saw this on his hockey record: He actually played 62 games for Cliff Fletcher in Atlanta, one of his six stops as an NHL player …. The new coach of Zach Hyman’s junior hockey franchise in Brantford is Mike Babcock’s son, Michael. You may not remember that in the formative times of Hyman’s career in Toronto, when it wasn’t certain he would be any kind of NHL player, his biggest supporter was coach Babcock. And even when Auston Matthews was complaining about having to play with him, Babcock supported Hyman, who went on to become a big-time NHL player. Without Babcock’s support, who knows what might have happened? And the favour is now being passed on to Babcock’s son … The lineup at Steve Yzerman’s door to talk to him about Dylan Larkin will be a long one. Larkin isn’t just a terrific NHL player, but he’s terrifically priced in today’s market. Everyone in hockey should want the now-available Larkin and it will be fascinating to see how the normally stubborn Yzerman deals with his captain wanting out of Detroit.

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AND ANOTHER THING

This just sounds right: Speedy Banks, Canadian Football Hall of Fame … Two CFL games to date: Two very good games to watch. Nothing to complain about rules-wise … Jamal Murray, who was the second-best Canadian player in the NBA this season, won’t be playing for Team Canada at the Olympics in 2028. His call. It’s possible that Murray, who played poorly at Paris in 2024, just didn’t enjoy the Team Canada experience and didn’t want to go through it again. Team Canada GM Rowan Barrett isn’t commenting on Murray’s surprising Olympic absence … I hope there’s still a place for Tyler Heineman on the Blue Jays roster once Alejandro Kirk returns from injury. Heineman is one of those guys who has scratched and clawed his way to a tiny big-league career. But with young Brandon Valenzuela growing into the backup catcher role rather nicely, you have to wonder if there will be a place for the soon-to-be 35-year-old Heineman on the team? … I don’t remember seeing a good player such as Chet Holmgren completely disappear the way he did in the Western Conference final for the Oklahoma City Thunder. It was almost embarrassing to watch someone who will be paid $41 million next season, be that ineffective …. This is 13 playoff wins in a row for the New York Knicks. Have to admit, I didn’t see this coming … It’ll be interesting to see what kind of crowds the World Cup of Soccer gets in most American cities. Americans love watching Americans. They don’t seem to care a lot about the rest of the world. Wonder if FIFA prices will translate to smaller crowds when Team USA isn’t playing? … Sean McDonough was named national sportscaster of the year in America, because he happens to be terrific at calling basketball games, or baseball games, or football games. What he isn’t terrific at is hockey, which he tries really hard at. Not every broadcaster has the cadence to do every sport. Canada’s Dan Shulman is a fabulous basketball and baseball announcer. He tried hockey at least one Olympics and it wasn’t his sound. ESPN has many good hockey play-by-play men. They should use one of them on the Stanley Cup final. … This column is always personal. Today, it’s a little more personal than usual. Fletcher was a huge part of my life and my career. I’ve covered only two NHL teams — the Flames in Calgary and the Maple Leafs in Toronto — and he was the GM of both. The final column I wrote for the Calgary Herald in 1987 was a Dear Cliff letter. On my home office wall, beside that framed Dear Cliff column is a cartoon done by the late Dave Elston, with Fletcher poking fun at me. I see that framed column and the cartoon as I work today in an office full of photos of Muhammad Ali, Joe Namath, The Beatles, Bruce Springsteen and Bob Dylan. I work surrounded by legends who mattered most to me. Cliff was one of those legends. I moved to Calgary in 1979, right out of school. He moved to Calgary in 1980, right out of Atlanta. I started work in Toronto, hired by the Sun, in 1987. He started work in Toronto, hired by the Leafs, in 1991. I always felt like I was the lucky one: To be surrounded so often by Fletcher’s gentle emotional wisdom and greatness … Happy birthday to Bjorn Borg (70), Allen Iverson (51), Mick Foley (61), Mike Modano (56), Willi Plett (71), Cam Neely (61), Anson Carter (52), Terry O’Reilly (75), Rueben Mayes (63) and Les Binkley (92) … And hey, whatever became of Bianca Andreescu?

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