Wendel Clark joins for a LEGENDARY interview - CTC Live

Toronto Maple Leafs legend Wendel Clark joins the boys on CTC Live for an incredible look back at his iconic career.

From his hard-hitting style on the ice to his thoughts on the modern NHL, Wendel doesn't hold back. We dive into his favourite stories from the locker room, the grit required to lead the Leafs, and what life has been like since hanging up the skates. Whether you grew up watching him or just appreciate NHL history, this is an interview you don’t want to miss!

In this episode, we discuss:

Wendel’s transition from the WHL to becoming a first-overall pick.
The most memorable moments from his time in Toronto.
His take on the evolution of the game and the current Leafs roster.
Retirement, ranching, and staying connected to the hockey world.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Matt's best two years stats-wise ever. He played wing for Sakick and Wing for Dougie his first year. Oh think if he'd have played wing his whole time. Oh my God. Now he didn't have to battle for in his own end down low. Play 200 feet. Now you're now you're like Wayne. That was Curry going down though. Wayne didn't go back down in his own end.

SPEAKER_02 0:18

No.

SPEAKER_00 0:20

But imagine if Matt's, imagine if he just played wing and you had a Gilmore or a Sakik as your centerman and you're that big six foot five, two thirty-five.net.

SPEAKER_04 0:57

I am your host as always, James Sabalski, alongside my Commodore, Kami, Andrew Raycroft Razor. And Kami, this week's episode, you are no longer our favorite Sasky member of the Clearing the Crease. No, I'm most definitely close, actually. Not even in the case. Not even in the same planet. I'm not even on the same planet. Shipped out to PEI things. I'm out. I'm out. I couldn't agree more. Real Sasky royalty, the one, the only Wendell Clark. How are you, sir?

SPEAKER_00 1:24

I'm good.

SPEAKER_04 1:25

Look well.

SPEAKER_00 1:25

Good to be here. Yeah, no, I'm good. Stay away from the rink skating, and I body gets better.

SPEAKER_04 1:31

And you were just telling us before we got rolling, you're not skating anymore. I quit skating two years ago.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

Do you miss it? So I've no. I never missed it when I retired in 2000. I'm setting fans right now. When I retired in 2000, you don't miss it. But then you said so now I've retired from charity hockey. Real stuff, then now I've retired from charity hockey. It's the body. It reminds you every time you put equipment on, bend over in that hockey stance, it's like, yeah, that's I'm sore. That's why I've and then you're probably more mad at yourself because your mind says do this, and your body says, No, not gonna do it.

SPEAKER_04 2:03

We we often talk with Razor and Razor, you were only two seasons in Toronto, right? And the the pros and cons of sometimes the intensity of playing in Canada and the passion, you know, in Toronto. Um you're a guy who you are revered, right? I mean, when you think of Razor, no, it's yeah, it's Wendell. Wendell, right. And so why were you able to be a bright lights player to handle all of it?

SPEAKER_00 2:29

Uh just because you just play. You can't, and today's no different, no matter all the stuff that goes on. Yeah, is no different. Just worry about playing. All I can do is control how I play. And that's all you can do as a player in any league or any team, doesn't matter what where you're playing at. That's all you can control. You can't control anything outside. And if you try, then you're frustrated, then you're mad at the world, and you can't. So you didn't pay any attention, like, you pay attention to everything. Remember, we had the newspapers, everybody, the visiting team walked in with the three newspapers, they'd be sitting watching our pregame skate on a Saturday because the American teams they come in and they didn't get half the news. USA Today, each one would be this big. So they come into Montreal and Toronto and they get the three papers. It's the only time the whole team's there early for morning skate to read the three papers to see what's going on in the league. Um, but I I think it's I I tell all players the best thing about playing in Canada versus and and then Toronto being the Toronto market, it's not so much the big guys. The big guys are the same in the league. Doesn't matter. You're you're one of the big guys. But if you get to play two years in Toronto as a third, fourth liner, third through seventh defenseman, you can do stuff when you're finished. I do that in New Jersey. I I there's no job. There's no, you know, and it's not about the the hot the the charity stuff we do after, it's about who you meet doing that stuff, and then you might slide into something because of the market. So I always say it's it's that it's that middle of the road of bottom end guys come through this town, like really. And and if you just meet and potatoes and work hard, fans are gonna love you. Media can say what they want, but the if you're meat and potatoes, fans are gonna love you. That that's pretty much the way it is. Um, and that's all you can control.

SPEAKER_01 4:20

Saskatoon to to Toronto. Uh how was that coming out east? Had you been out east very often? Was it a tough adjustment, homesick at all?

SPEAKER_00 4:29

No, it's not bad. Um, yeah, it was a great are young. It was Kelvington. It was a Kelvington Saskatoon Blade. I don't know what's Kelvington.

SPEAKER_01 4:37

Yeah, I do know that.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

Yeah, but the but the group of us um that also when I got here in '85, our whole team was 18. You're all kids. I was 18 to 22, our whole team, and then Boris Alming. And Rick Vi was 27. Yeah. So, you know, it was those guys were the old guys, but the rest of us were glorified junior guys. Bester and Reggett and Nett were 20. Lehman, I afraid Nylon, Courtnell. We all just finished junior. So it was a fun young team. So we didn't really even look anything outside. You know, we're too young to even, you know, we had we had none of us had got through grade 12, let alone worrying about what was going on out there.

SPEAKER_01 5:21

High school wasn't big thing, we're all excited.

SPEAKER_00 5:24

Saskatchewan, we Saskatchewan, we only needed 11. We didn't need all the way. I got two I got double the years my dad went, so I'm way better. But uh yeah, so that and so it was probably a good young group, and Boria was just the best. As an old guy, he's just a quiet, show-up, best player still in practice every day. He was Boria. And rookie came off 350 goal seasons, and but so they felt the pressure because they'd been here, and okay, we're us guys, you know, when you're a rookie in the league, the easiest thing to do is be a rookie because you're so happy to your stall, the first time you get a paycheck every two weeks, you're happy to be in the league. So we don't feel it. It's when you're you know, five, six, seven years in the league and on that you understand, okay, this is there's might be changes, or coaches are getting fired, or GMs are changing. That's that's when players everywhere, I think, notice it at the professional level. Not not so much a rookie. And uh as I tell most fans when they're complaining about prices in Toronto, I said, I I had a good seat at my first game, but I had to make the team. I had to make the teams you thought it was expensive going paying to get it to go try and do that. I had to make the team to watch my first game. But but uh yeah, no, it's it's been uh it's been awesome. I I think it there's nothing like it.

SPEAKER_05 6:48

To that point, when did first overall pick, when did you know you were good?

SPEAKER_00 6:55

I don't think you know until I like for NHL wise, probably one of the best things that happened to me, and you never I was hurt so much, I'd like to hate to say it because I missed 500 games with injuries or so, but I broke my foot and it wasn't an intentional block shot either. It wasn't intentional, I got hit, and and so then I wasn't playing for two months, and then you went and you did all the gym stuff and grew up at 18 to 19. So then you put strength on, where you didn't just come in as an 18-year-old. I remember Connor came in as an 18-year-old, dislocated. You know, probably the best thing was breaking his collarbone, just go away and grow up. Yeah, because it's I think it's even harder now because now everybody trains so much. That 18-year-old kid's 18. I don't care what he looks like, he's he's not a man yet. And so when I went away and then come back at Christmas kind of thing, that's when you knew you you could belong. That that that was kind of the not just the the the fighting part, but just you could play, you're playing in every situation, and that that was probably Christmas on my rookie year. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 7:58

We talked about this with Aya Frady, but I I obviously there were some memorable times with the Leafs and especially those early 90 runs, but that core group in the 80s, as you mentioned yourself, Aya Fredi, Reggett, Bester, Courtnell, um, Dan Foos, like there were some really young, skilled guys, and the team kind of got torn apart. Like that core kind of got torn apart before you really got a chance to see it. It was still marinating, it felt like at the time. Do you not feel like that group could have had something more?

SPEAKER_00 8:30

Yeah, it never that era, it never got put together. That that 85 to 87, we had two rounds of playoffs. Yeah, my first year. You had a big upset too, yeah. We upset Chicago, who was second overall. I think we had 68 points and made the playoffs in the Chuck Norris division. You know, so Detroit, that's when they got Joe Murphy the next year. So we are so we had 68 points. We upset three straight, we beat Chicago, who was second overall behind Edmonton that year. So and that's really just and then lost in seven uh to St. Louis, who lost to Cowdery, who lost to Montreal, and the and the and and so that we had a core group, you know, Lehman was defenseman of the year, I was defenseman of the year, Courtney was in the Olympic team, like Bester and Reggett, the tough thing, they were both 20 stepping into the NHL fighting for number one. So you you had so yeah, if that group could have stayed together, and then Borea, he just played 40 minutes and they should have played him 20. Because he was so good, you just keep putting Borea on there. But he was 35. So by the end of the year, he was uh was tired, but he was unbelievable. But that team, that that group had it could have stayed together. Stevie Thomas, nobody mentioned scored 30 in the minors and 30 in the NHL that year. Like he didn't. I think I think he had 30. I think he had 30 in both leagues that year. There's no way that's ever been done. If it's not that, it's close because I'm pretty sure that like he had because he was like a goal game in the American League as coming out at 21 years old, and then come up because we had I think we had five or six or five or six 20-goal guys and up. Yeah, and Stumpy finished with about 400 career goals, right?

SPEAKER_01 10:07

Like every career. Yeah. I forgot about this. I'm glad you brought it up. You're drafted as defenseman, right? Yeah. And you started here as a defenseman?

SPEAKER_00 10:16

No, I started as a forward. I got to training captain that said you're a forward.

SPEAKER_01 10:19

Okay. What'd you think about that?

SPEAKER_00 10:21

So your first time ever playing forward. Well, no, maybe juniors. Okay. Because I tried out D mine my whole life. Blades. And then I got to World Juniors and World Juniors in order to make the team. I uh I thought I was getting that 7 a.m. cut. Remember TSN? 7 a.m. screen call. How about that? The first time a guy's ever been cut, we're gonna put him on national TV today. Ask him how he feels about it. Yeah, I'm gonna go. 16, 17 years old. That was the worst assignment. So I thought I was getting that call, and they said, Well, would you play forward or defense or wherever we put you to make the team? And I said, Well, as long as I'm not going back to Saskatoon, I'll go. I'll play goal. Because they wanted that was that world juniors were in Finland, so they wanted to take um two extra defensemen so in case somebody got hurt. So John Minor from the Regina Pats and myself went as kind of extras, Bobby Bassett, I think, was the centerman. Kind of if we were going to play forward or defense. And um so then uh Dave Gertz broke his leg. So it worked out uh that we took extra D. So I played three games forward in World Juniors and three games defense in World Juniors. So the the Leafs only scouted me for three games. Only three games in two years they scouted me. He's a forward. But uh it's um and I I met uh Jerry McTamara just before he passed. We had a coffee, say, six months ago. Okay, and he had said no, it was in my head the whole time, didn't tell anybody, but that was probably because he never seen me skating backwards. I was always all fence up there in junior you're only going one direction and junior hockey, right? Um but he that was his and so as long as I was staying in the NHL, I it didn't bother me. Had I been drafted to any other team, I would have been a defenseman.

SPEAKER_05 12:08

Really?

SPEAKER_00 12:08

Because I was when I was interviewing with because they had Pittsburgh, where um Simpson went, because they had Mario, so now they're going for the big D because a year later they trap they they traded for coffee.

SPEAKER_03 12:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:22

And Islanders were making a big they had two firsts, and they'd made a trade offer with the Leafs because Pot Van was retiring. Yes. So I'd have been a defenseman there, defenseman or Jersey or Pitt. Everywhere I interviewed, it was a defenseman for sure role. Like that.

SPEAKER_01 12:37

I mean, I've watched your highlight reels, you know, you know, pops up online all the time. And I sure I'm sure you would have been just fine as a defenseman, don't get me wrong, but that's crazy to imagine playing D with watching them run everybody all the time. The St.

SPEAKER_04 12:50

Louis Blue guy and then Craig just running them over. I think it's highlight of all time. I had forgotten that. What is the moment you are most often asked about? Or somebody wants to talk to you about?

SPEAKER_00 13:03

Everything is it changed. Okay. It changed. Well, the hit Bruce Bell behind the net is always the hit. That one's the most. But but really it changed. When did fighting kind of stop in the NHL? 06 or something. They it kind of started going down after the lockout a little bit. Well, up till then, you we talked, you know, at all these functions, it was hockey because everybody was still watching fighting.

SPEAKER_03 13:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:27

And then once fighting is just gone, kind of gone way, yeah. Now everybody just wants to know about fighting because they don't see it anymore. Right. So that's it's almost become difficult. Because I'll be at functions, and my opening line is you you know I went first overall. Right. I don't have to talk about fighting. I can talk about other things. But that's that's just because you don't see it anymore on a regular basis. So when when you know, at the end, when I retired in 2000, yeah, I you know, you had Domey and B-Lak were the one two kind of in Toronto. So that was still going on, everybody seen it, and and then when it finished after the lockout there.

SPEAKER_04 14:05

So I want to show share a story to further to that point where everybody wants to talk to you about fighting. You and I worked Hockey Day in Canada event in Kamloops 10 years ago, and we were having a couple of beers, and you shared a story to where I hope I'm not out of line for asking you this, but being the first overall pick, being a guy who on the ice, tough as H E double hockey sticks, like when the rail rolling guys people want to talk about fighting. I asked you about being tested, about maybe sometimes off the ice, maybe people getting in your face, just trying to find out. Take a shot at the title, if you will. You had a story. I want to say you were in Belleville one night in the summer, walking back to the hotel and some guy in the dead of night. Do you remember what this story was? Peterborough. Thank you. You're giving Belle Vegas a cloud name. Don't give Belle Vegas. Do you mind sharing this story?

SPEAKER_00 15:00

Well, no, it was just we were actually doing a charity event and going back to the room because we're we always used to go and play the ball games uh with play the junior team, us leaf alumni, and then you'd play golf the next day at a charity golf tournament, or vice versa. So walking home, the typical guy wanted to fight all the way home. And I and I kept the conversation going because I just said, if you can tell me my upside, I'll do it. Right. But I don't know my upside. Yeah. Whether I win or lose, I have no upside. You have lots of upside in your situation. I I have no upside. So that was, and he was just getting more frustrated. The whole but it happens all the time. Speaking of ball, but didn't you didn't go ahead? He got laid out though, right? Didn't you take a nice? No, no, that wasn't there. That wasn't it? Okay, all right, okay.

SPEAKER_01 15:48

He gave him a pass. He gave him a pass. All right, okay. Speaking of ball, did I, and I I think I've heard you tell this story before, but I'm not sure. Were you part of the those summer, was it fast pitch?

SPEAKER_00 15:59

Yeah, fast ball Saskatchewan Kelvington team. Yeah. Melrose was a catcher.

SPEAKER_01 16:02

Okay, run me through the team again.

SPEAKER_00 16:04

No, Barry Melrose was catching. My older he was a catcher. My older brother played first base.

SPEAKER_01 16:08

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 16:09

Mike Blosky, goaltender, played second base. I played shortstop. Joey kosher played third. Kelly Chase was on left or right field.

SPEAKER_02 16:16

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 16:17

Neil Clark, another cousin, was in center left. Carrie Clark would have been my younger brother, even younger. So he was in and out of the lineup as a youngster. Then we'd have uh extra fillers come in. So you'd have Trent Yanni coming in and out, Killer Kaminsky coming in and out. Then you had some local Daryl Schultz, uh Schultz. How old are you with this group? Yeah, how many? I started at 14 or 14. 14, and I finished playing my last ball, fastball, second year NHL. We were still playing in the summer. Oh, yeah. We used to go back and play every every summer. That's when it was our weekends. And uh might be the toughest. Yeah, yeah. And then our pitcher, Brian Finch, was probably the toughest guy because he'd pitch all game, throw 90 miles an hour. Yeah. I would be the early morning pitch, and then I'd go play regular because then we had to have the good pitcher in for Sunday tournaments. So he said, just get us through game one. I got the rest of the day. But wow. That's when Joey would have had the younger, had the you know, he's still a babyface at 65. Yeah. But he would have been a babyface. Imagine him and the you're gonna mouth off. That's the first guy if you don't recognize or go. Let's go get this young kid. Yeah, so yeah, the the joke used to be you had to have 200 penalty minutes or you couldn't play in the team. You didn't have 200 minutes to run. You couldn't, you couldn't team. That's incredible. Hey, but more penalty minutes than batting average, I guess, right? Barry Melrose used to say, because I've never seen a guy hit a ball. He used the only guy who used the wooden bat still. We used he could hit all runs like nobody's business. And he'd say, We don't steal many bases, but we always run just on the inside. So that first baseman, if he's not quick, he may he may be getting clipped. He landed in the outfield.

SPEAKER_03 18:01

So funny.

SPEAKER_00 18:02

But it was it was it was the fun Sundays like that was small town all over everywhere in Canada, I guess. Baseball was on the way out then, and fastball was kind of what we played.

SPEAKER_04 18:14

Yeah. Where um our ozone well moment of this conversation, a lot of people love to bring up when I was mentioning we were gonna be talking to you. I had three people mention Marty McSorley. Marty McSorley. Um, what do you remember from that one? 93.

SPEAKER_00 18:31

Uh well, Marty is my first two fights in the NHL ever. Really? 85 in training camp. It's amazing how you two seem to be always links. Yeah, well, that's he's hated me since my rookie series. No, Marty was uh it was the first two and then 93. It's just because it was, you know, semifinals or last third round semifinals of the playoffs. Engines are running hot, yeah. That's just big for playoff hockey. So that's why that became so big of the situation. But but you know, Marty was my first in Edmonton, then in Toronto, and then all the time going on. It was something going on.

SPEAKER_04 19:07

And I always wanted it's like a cancer.

SPEAKER_00 19:09

Well, I always, you know, because I ran around. Yeah. So then if I'm left D running around, they're gonna put tough guy right defenseman. So it'd be like him or you know, Bobby Rouse is probably one of the quiet tough guys ever. Yeah. But they never thought I'll just told us about you. And Roberts and Robert's talk about because Rouser and I started in junior playing. He was in Lethbridge, I was in Saskatoon, and then he was in Minnesota and Washington, then we played together in in Toronto. But he was he was probably the I every team would love four rousers in the playoffs, in the playoffs. Because he go, he knew how to be the meanest guy without taking penalties. Like like that, which is so needed some this time of year. So the forwards, I I'm not going near the front of the net. That that that was and he was as and and uh but big big strong could play. But Marty and I, with that that just started in from day one. From day one, and then to Marty's credit, you think of Marty started just as a tough guy in Pittsburgh and made himself a player. All of a sudden now he's a 22-minute player defenseman. I said, So that's so now you're running in even more because he's playing all the time. And as are you, and and he's defense, I'm forward. So you're I always lined up against because I was gonna, I wasn't very smart as an 18, 19 year old. So you you run around Grade 11, right? Grade 11. No, it's we don't look we don't figure it out, man, until we were 26, 27, that it hurts. I had to look at the high school trades cover up. By then you're really hurt. But it's and and in the old days, that was the guys that like when I say like I had 120 fights, two years junior, two years pro. And and that was normal for anybody that battled, you know, the kosher and pro birds, they were probably 150, 160 or more because they daxed, that was their job.

SPEAKER_01 20:57

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:58

And and so you're you'd start, you know, on a road trip, and your first two games you're fighting because you're running around, so you somebody got to own up to whatever you did.

SPEAKER_01 21:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:09

And so then your hand is sore and your face is sore. So the third game on the road trip, I'm not running around because everything's sore. And really, that's how the tough guys police the game. If you want to run around, that's fine, but you have to answer the bell.

SPEAKER_01 21:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:22

So I feel bad for skill guys in today's game.

unknown 21:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:26

Because there is no answering the bell. Yeah. Because even in our day, the ref would say, stop running around. Because the guy may just one punch you right at the face office and he gets two minutes. Accountability, right? And he said, if you're gonna run around, I'm letting the big guys come after you. Right, yeah. Because you're making the game hard for me as a ref, even. Yeah, because I know this is getting heated because of how you're playing. Yeah. So he'll let the tough guy do what he has to do. Because he wants the game calmed down too. Yeah, for sure. Um, so that's really, and the skilled guys never had to worry about tough guys because it if you're done. Playing that way, nobody ever bothers you. Playoffs different because that's but it's not fighting, that's just as we all see today. It's still, you know, Montreal and Tampa don't play that tough all regular season where that was a hell of a game last night. That was a hell of a game. You know what I mean? Like that and both sides. So that's playoffs. But in general, uh that's how the tough guys kind of policed it to keep the flies off the skill guys. You guys just go and play and settle the game. We'll make sure everybody else stays. And that's kind of how it it was. And you that tough guy may only play 40 games on everybody's team, but it did mean something during the season. There's a 40-game window there where it's needed, and then maybe in playoffs you're not dressed if you're not a good enough player. That's but it is it was needed, depending when it matters, the game's still hard, right? In the Chuck Norris division, or if we went into Boston or Philly.

SPEAKER_04 22:52

I love that name.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

Because well, Detroit was tough, kosher and probert, Mini was always tough, and St. Louis was always tough, Chicago. So you never wanted to be up to or down two goals.

SPEAKER_03 23:03

Right.

SPEAKER_00 23:05

Because it, as I said, the other guys get to play. We don't want the other guys playing on either team. So never get up to or down to, and that was Philly and Boston. That's how they played, especially Boston in this small barn. Yeah. And Philly, they invented all that in the 70s.

SPEAKER_04 23:20

You got a Probert story? Uh Bob McGill tells a story of turning around after Bester got taken out by Probert. And Bob said, and Bob was a tough guy. And he said easy, I hit Bob Probert, blindsided him with my best shot, and he barely blinked.

SPEAKER_00 23:36

And he's like, I just gotta hold on. I remember six to nine times Proby and I fought. Yeah. And I think one time it was two, if not three times, his first time he was allowed back in Canada. It was a Saturday night. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 23:48

He wasn't allowed back. Remember?

SPEAKER_00 23:49

So all of a sudden he's playing, and it was two or three times in Toronto. And he's dancing with you. And I go, What are we doing? He goes, My mom's at the game, she hasn't seen me play in Canada. Who fights in front of their mother? Try handle on the park. But he was, and Proby was his, I uh I always put him down as probably your toughest or one of the, not because of fighting any one time. At 3536, when he was in Chicago, he was still answering the bell for every heavyweight, every 18, 19, 20-year-old coming in, he would do it because he did it when he was a kid. I said, that's a level of mental toughness that's that Jody. Yeah, that that's a level. Because all I as I, you know, like at the end of the at the end of every tough guy's career, he's holding on, he's not fighting. At this first eight years of his career, he is actually really trying to hurt the guys fighting. Because that guy's trying to hurt him.

SPEAKER_03 24:44

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:45

But at the end, he's just trying to get four more years of a contract and a life that he so he'll pretend he's gonna do. He's not scared to fight it, but he's not opening up and throwing, he's holding and wrestling. You can see you watch guys how they change their fighting as they get older.

SPEAKER_04 24:58

Respectfully, I think we saw that with Ryan Reeves, right?

SPEAKER_00 25:00

And well, that's you're old. And you're and it's not, and we were all mental when we started. Yep. Because you had to be, yes, or or you didn't make it. That that was you just had to be wild. That that was and and you had fun doing it, or you wouldn't have done it. So when somebody says it was a really tough job early, I said, no, it wasn't. We all had fun doing it.

SPEAKER_03 25:18

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:19

And at the end, no, that's hard. That's different because you're not that young 20-year-old anymore. Yeah, you're that 30-year-old where it feels way different. Right. You know, you're and so that's that's where I give it to Proby, is that that's a level of toughness that 35, 36, and there's some big boys coming in the league now, 90, 98 through 02. Yeah, there's some big young guys that are, and it in our day, you the guy that was tough was just tough. You know, we had a what we have in Saskatoon. We had a 160-pound bench press stack in the corner of the dressing room and a speed bag. The speed bag only lasted the first month because Joey hit it once and it knocked it off. That's how you fight, eh? You just hit the guy once, and that's all the rest of us want to know what we're doing. He just hit it, that was it, it was over. That was it. But and and so the tough guys were just tough. We're now I think that's where the NHL got scared and nervous. Yeah. Is guys were they weren't training to be a better hockey player in the summer. Right. They were training to be tougher because they knew what they had to run into. Boxing. Yeah, and so they were doing, and so that has nothing to do with hockey. Yeah. So I think indirect, I have no facts on that, but I'm just saying that. I would have tracks in terms of the theory and say, and they were but they were training in different so you know that would make the league nervous because there's you know, I have accidents anyway.

SPEAKER_05 26:44

So who is the best player you played with?

SPEAKER_00 26:48

Best player played with is this uh nobody played better than Dougie, those two years, 92 to 94. That that that and then got a chance to play with Sakik in Quebec and Iserman in Detroit, and but that that two-year window, and then in the 80s the the Borea Salming was as good. Like we weren't a great team, but had Borea Salming, when you think of it in that 70s through the 80s, had he got to play Pot Van Four Years, Islanders, or Boston, good deal, like put him on a team, Montreal with Robinson and Savard for the four years. Put Borea Salming on a team that good. And he was probably I still have him easily top five ever. It's not even a I might even have him higher than that. Ever. Okay. Like this period. Like when when we got there, when you think of it, Aya Freddy and Courtney were our fastest guys, and they couldn't touch Boria. He was 35. And those two guys could skate, and they could move, yeah. Like remember the old training camps you'd eight laps one way and eight laps the other way. He'd be done his laps, and we're not done. We've got more to do. Yeah. Like he could skate, and that's a 35. So I always try to remember how good was he in 72, 76, those Canada Cups when he played for Sweden.

SPEAKER_02 28:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:12

Yeah. Like he was the number two guy behind Bob Yore's last best ever in 76 there. Uh when that was his kind of swan song before he went to Chicago. And Boria would have been the second best defenseman at that Canada Cup or something.

SPEAKER_04 28:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 28:26

To flip that question, who was the hardest to play against? Hardest to play against. Who was a one? For me, Bob Rouse played me the hardest because he'd he it was you dump and chase, and I'd be flying in to go get the puck, and he'd be stopped at the dot before we got to the corner. Oh no. You and I are going in at the same time. And he didn't care. Like he was that strong. He just knew how to play. Hard. Where's he from? Hard. Is he an Alberta guy? He's a BC guy, if I remember. He lives in BC now.

SPEAKER_02 28:53

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 28:53

But so I'm I'm gonna say that. But he played in Alberta and just he played hard. And those type of players, Brad McCrimon played me hard. Yeah. I remember like the beast when he and not fighting wise, but just we'd play all game against him in Calgary with uh Dougie and I and first line, and you're we had the puck all night. End of the day, he's plus two, we're he minus two. Yeah, and yet we felt like he was that good at putting you in spots on the ice and just hard to play against. And when I played in Detroit, as far as not a non-hitting guy. I I don't know if it's anybody any better than a Lidstrom. Yeah. As far as just coming, he just came in practice, he just come take the puck off you. He didn't hit him or nothing. You just come and took it.

SPEAKER_01 29:35

He didn't touch it in the middle of the room. No, he didn't, no, it's gone.

SPEAKER_00 29:37

Or he knocked it out of the air or something. And you didn't even go near him. Yeah. And all of a sudden he's got it and he's going the other direction.

SPEAKER_01 29:44

Game was easy for that guy.

SPEAKER_00 29:45

Yeah, you know, like he was the guys that are that good. Oh because I say that in Toronto, but Willie, when he gets flacked for not trying, I said, no, no, he skates so good. It looks like he doesn't drive. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:56

Matt's kind of took that knock for a while too, right? Like sometimes it because it's so big it looked like a big thing.

SPEAKER_00 30:01

But he didn't skate like Willie. Yeah. Like Matt's was just a big power guy. Like he was skilled. Like Matt's best two years stats-wise ever. I think you'd have to check it. But he played wing for Sakik and Wing for Dougie his first year. Oh think if he'd have played wing his whole time.

SPEAKER_02 30:18

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 30:19

Now he didn't have to battle for in his own end down low.

SPEAKER_02 30:22

Play 200 feet.

SPEAKER_00 30:23

Now you're now you're like Wayne. That was Curry going down the low. Wayne didn't go back down in his own end.

SPEAKER_02 30:28

No. Something else.

SPEAKER_00 30:29

But imagine if Matt's, now they want to be the center to be the big horse, but imagine if he just played wing and you had a Gilmore or a Sakick as your centerman and you're that big, six foot five, two thirty-five. Yeah. Yeah. Like if he got a half step on you, you weren't stopping Matt's. No. Like he was he was strong and good.

SPEAKER_04 30:49

Last one uh here, but you know, you look obviously you were defined as a Toronto Maple Leaf, a few other stops along the way, but when there's a picture of you in another jersey, what's the one jersey that looks weird when we look at a picture of Wendell Clark?

SPEAKER_00 31:03

Uh Islanders, Captain Highline. It doesn't even have to be the jersey. That was the first year that Captain Highliner. Were you thinking what the hell is going on here? I think after that, uh the Bettman was even mad, and he said, Okay, the league has to put a ruling on logos because that crest was too big for the jersey. Because you had to break in the crest. It was huge, yeah. The crest with the crest was uh because it I I always say that all the new jerseys never own up to the old crests or the old. I always think the old, even the new old, the Islander logo is better than the highly like yes.

SPEAKER_01 31:41

I just saw a picture of you that like I think it was yesterday. It popped up on my feed in the Islanders. I'm like, that looks weird.

SPEAKER_00 31:46

Yeah, yeah, that looks weird. That was uh out of all the jerseys. Yeah. And Tampa was new, Detroit, Detroit. You can't beat the red wing.

SPEAKER_04 31:54

Thank you so much for doing this. That was awesome. Very good. Thank you, guys. I know you don't do a lot of these. Yeah, yeah. Thanks for taking this. I will just say this. Um, my grandfather passed away in 1993. Um, year after the long time.

SPEAKER_00 32:07

We're not getting blamed for that, too.

SPEAKER_03 32:11

I mean, if you'd still be alive.

SPEAKER_04 32:14

But the reason I just want to share this quick story, if you don't mind. But my grandmother obviously loses her life partner of 50 years, and she was a huge Maple East fan. During the lockout, uh, that year 94-95, um, I was working at a college radio station. I had booked, uh, arranged for some interviews for this card convention you were coming to town for. Um, I had done an interview with you. You were, you know, the lockouts going on. I brought my grandmother with me because she was hoping to get a Wendell Clark autograph. And uh she had lined up, she paid and she lined up in this line with hundreds and hundreds of people. But, you know, she was also like close to 80 at that time, and I thought, man, it's a lot to ask for an elderly woman to stand in line.

SPEAKER_02 32:56

Sure.

SPEAKER_04 32:57

Well, I asked the organizer, and I mentioned it to you, hey, do you think you would mind signing you know, an autograph for my grandmother before we leave? And you said, no problem. And you're walking out, and like, you know, there's a lot of fans at these at events and expos and conventions. People are coming this way and that. You didn't, you know, you were very respectful, you came, but you you found my grandmother, you took a moment, you made like you made her feel so awesome that day. And as a kid who was like 18, to make to do something cool for your grandmother for the first time, where they normally spoil you. Thank you, man. I appreciate that so much. So thank you. That's 30 plus years later, but I always appreciated that about you, Wendell. Oh, thank you. Uh, Mr. Leaf, I mean, that's all enough said right there. Wendell Clark joining us on the Clearing the Crease podcast, powered by Ozune.net. See ya.

SPEAKER_01 33:44

Well played.