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J U N I O R     S U R V E I L L A N C E - January 4, 2007 World Class Canadian hockey fans in particular get very excited about the annual World Junior Hockey tournament. When the tournament is held in Canada every game is a sell out. Television ratings are huge. And the media coverage is extensive. Meanwhile hockey fans in other countries hardly know the event is underway. It is not uncommon for a World Junior game in Europe or the USA to have more empty seats than occupied seats. The common held belief amongst Canadians is that every one of these lucky team Canada members is a sure fire NHL superstar in the making. You can’t blame the kids for thinking that way. For them its so close they can taste it. The sad reality is that very few of these current heroes will ever have anything close to a hall of fame career. And many of them won’t have any career at all. All one has to do is look at the many, many past rosters of World Junior teams to realize that. There are more strangers on those lists, than familiar figures. More telling was a recent list of World Junior Tournament all star team members that was published on the internet. For the most part, if you’re a member of Team Canada you don’t want to make the tournament all star team. With the exception of Wayne Gretzky and Scott Niedermayer there may not be a single Canadian hall of famer on the all star list going all the way back to 1982. Other than those two key all stars the rest of the list is made up of mediocrity. Oh sure Jerome Iginla and Eric Lindros are big names. Hall of Fame is not a certainty for either. After that we have Gord Kluzak, Mike Moller, Mike Moffatt, Bob Dollas, Sylvain Cote, Theoren Fleury, Greg Hawgood, Dave Chyzowski, Stephane Fiset, Paul Kariya, Brent Tully, Marty Murray, Jason Allison, Brian McCabe, Eric Daze, Jose Theodore, Nolan Baumgartner, Christian Dube, Marc Andre Fleury, Mathieu Biron, Pascal Leclaire, Mike Cammalleri, Jay Boumeester, Chris Phillips, Scott Upshall, Carlo Coliaiacovo, Jason Spezza and others. So as the 2007 tournament comes to a close, Team Canada members may be secretly hoping their name is never called. Unless a career of mediocrity is their goal. Send your story to hockspy@hotmail.com and we will pass them on to our readers in a future installment of Junior Hockey Surveillance.

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