Glen Sather—Page 2

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Let’s Make a Deal

Early in Sather’s general manager career, some of his players dubbed him "Monty." The nickname was inspired by Monty Hall, host of the T.V. game show Let’s Make a Deal.

"The Oilers would win five Stanley Cups in seven seasons, and they would do it with 49 different players," wrote Douglas Hunter in The Glory Barons. "In a league that permitted a team to dress 18 skaters and two goaltenders for a game, this represented a player turnover of 150 percent."

Company Man

Sather also was known for his tactical strategies during contract negotiations.

"He had a large desire to have control, because control got him better results," said player agent Rich Winter in The Glory Barons. "He worked hard on the relationship with the players so they were as likely to believe him as their agent…He’d become a bit of a businessman. He saw that Pocklington needed a return on his money, and felt he was doing the right thing."

Winter negotiated Esa Tikkanen’s generous contract in 1988. Disturbed by the public backlash after he traded Gretzky to the Los Angeles Kings on August 9, 1988, Pocklington bypassed Sather on Tikkanen’s contract and dealt directly with Winter, who negotiated a six-season, $7 million deal.

A contract dispute had led to Paul Coffey’s sour departure a year earlier. Gretzky had signed a new contract in the summer of 1987, and both Coffey and Messier were looking for new contracts as well. While Messier would come to a new six-year deal with Sather, Coffey felt grossly underpaid when he learned Washington’s Rod Langway was making about $500,000 USD compared to Coffey’s $320,000 CDN.

Sather would trade Coffey to Pittsburgh in November 1987 in a seven-player deal that saw Edmonton acquire Craig Simpson, who would eventually become the team’s assistant coach in August 2003.

Death of a Dynasty

Pocklington’s inability to afford his star-studded roster eventually led to the dismantling of the Oilers’ dynasty.

"By the mid-1990s, Mark Messier and Wayne Gretzky made more than $12 million a year combined," writes Rick Carpiniello in Messier. "In 1995, the Edmonton Oilers’ entire payroll was about $9.6 million. That, more than anything else, explains why the Oilers’ dynasty of the 1980s– arguably the greatest hockey team ever assembled–was no longer together."

Sather dealt Lowe to the New York Rangers in December 1992, but brought him back to steady the Oilers’ defence corps in 1996/97. More importantly, Sather was grooming Lowe for a coaching position.

Serving his country

Sather served as the general manager of Canada’s gold-medal winning team in the 1994 World Championships and was both general manager and coach of Team Canada in the 1996 World Cup of Hockey.

After a 24-year career with the Oilers, Sather became the 12th president and 10th general manager of the New York Rangers on June 1, 2000. He became the team’s head coach after firing Bryan Trottier in the 2002-03 season.

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