Nelson Skalbania

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Former Edmonton Oilers owner Nelson Skalbania was a complete opposite to his predecessor, Dr. Charles Allard.

Dr. Allard enjoyed neither the public spotlight nor the losses that came with the World Hockey Association (WHA) team.

With pressures mounting, Dr. Allard sold the Oilers for $300,000 to Skalbania, a real estate magnate from British Columbia. Through the Allard family’s North West Trust Company, Dr. Allard knew Skalbania through their dealings in multimillion-dollar property deals.

After another disappointing season in 1975-76 that saw the Oilers finish fourth in the WHA’s five-team Canadian Division, Skalbania became concerned about his team’s debt, which was in the range of $1.6 million.

Buying what was then a second-rate sports franchise was not Skalbania’s style, and the Oilers were not as attractive an investment as he initially thought. So in the fall of 1976, he decided to recruit a partner with whom he had done millions of dollars worth of real estate deals.

The partner was Peter Pocklington, whose business background also included auto sales. Skalbania and Pocklington would balance each other with their different approaches.

"Pocklington would pride himself on gut-instinct deal-making decisions, on not getting lost in details, on not losing the long-term view through short-term greed," wrote Douglas Hunter in The Glory Barons. "While Nelson Skalbania, his newfound business associate out West, often looked for quick profits with rapid rollovers of properties, Pocklington began to build a diversified empire."

From the Great Gatsby to the Great Gretzky

Skalbania and Pocklington became co-owners of the Oilers in front of an audience. Pocklington was dining with his wife, Eva, at the Steak Loft in Edmonton in October 1976, when Skalbania and a group of reporters made their way into the restaurant. The two bartered their way to an agreement.

Pocklington gave Skalbania a vintage Rolls Royce Phaeton used in the film The Great Gatsby, a painting by Maurice Utrillo and a diamond ring worth about $150,000 that happened to be on Eva’s finger. The swap was worth about $700,000, according to Pocklington, who also agreed to take on half of the team’s $1.6 million debt.

Several months before splitting the franchise with Pocklington, Skalbania had gone to New York to hold talks with the National Hockey League (NHL) about a possible merger with the WHA. After it became clear that no merger would happen by 1977, Skalbania had decided to sell his half of the Oilers to Pocklington.

Skalbania, however, would return to the WHA as the owner of the Indianapolis Racers, setting the stage for one of hockey’s historic transactions.

"The WHA had become a rival of the NHL," wrote Rick Carpiniello in Messier. "For seven seasons, it had signed as many of the NHL’s players as possible, often by luring them with huge contracts. But there was a more subtle form of raiding going on. The NHL did not allow players under the age of 18 to be drafted. The WHA had no age limits."

Wayne Gretzky was just 17 when he made his professional debut in the fall of 1978 for Skalbania’s Racers. Indianapolis had finished last the previous season and during the summer that followed, Skalbania had a chance meeting with Gus Badali, Gretzky’s agent.

Soon after, Skalbania handed Badali $1,000 in plane fare that was used to fly Badali and Gretzky’s parents to Vancouver, where Skalbania hosted his guests in a 17,000-square foot mansion.

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