The Stars are running out of options with the Mouth That Roared but maybe a little time off will teach Sean Avery to think twice before he speaks.
EDMONTON - What few things there are to like about Sean Avery are confined to his play between the whistles, and vastly outnumbered by all the other attention-deficit baggage that defines hockey's reigning Mouth That Roared.
Avery doesn't talk as much as Brett "The game sucks" Hull - who suggested on Hockeycentral @ Noon Tuesday "there might be some sort of medical help that he can get to help him out," - and he is nowhere near the player Hull was.
So the cameras and microphones show up at Avery's stall in hopes of catching the arsonist in the act, not because he's done anything to warrant the media attention. And while Avery talks seldom there is an economy of bombast when he does, as he attempts now to stuff maximum shock value into minimal camera time.
His quote on Monday in Calgary - "I just want to comment on how it's becoming like a common thing in the NHL for guys to fall in love with my sloppy seconds," - was not delivered during a long discussion on the state of the game or some other weighty issue, the way Hull's usually came out.
He orchestrated the whole scene, lying to his coach about his intent to speak to the media, waiting for the media scrum to form in front of his stall, then throwing out a rehearsed quote out there and cowardly walking away without explaining himself.
So he doesn't have the natural timing of Hull, who waited until the game was at its nadir before telling us how awful it really was. Nor does he have the pedigree or history of another former hockey bad boy, Jeremy Roenick, who was a far, far better player.
"I didn't start yapping until after I'd accomplished some major things in my career," Roenick said over the phone from San Jose Tuesday. "And I don't think I ever degraded or demeaned someone personally. It crossed the line, it really did.
"I know Sean," continued Roenick, who played with Avery in Los Angeles. "I've had this conversation with him, to watch what he says, what he does. So has Brett. I think he's more into being a celebrity, being a newspaper tabloid figure, than being a hockey player."
Though Avery the player is a consensus valuable third-line player, over the long run that average level of talent will not support Avery the personality.
He does not have Terrell Owens' level of production, and even if he did Avery he is likely in the wrong sport. The National Football League is a place where production is the currency that buys a player the right to act or speak any way he chooses.
The National Hockey League is still a team-first, get-stitched-up-and-play kind of league.
His own teammates can not stand the man, perhaps the worst commentary any NHL player could ever have written or said about them, and his coach said Wednesday night that he doesn't want him back in his dressing room. Now, the rest of the hockey establishment is reaching the end of its tether with this guy.
"It's disgusting," Flames GM Darryl Sutter said of the entire spectacle. "It's been pretty disgusting for three days actually, I mean Dallas Stars come to town, probably the two best spokesmen in the league … in Mike Modano and Marty Turco. I didn't see their picture or even hear a story about them."
Sutter is old-time hockey. In his day, in his dressing room, the veterans would have straightened this Avery kid out before training camp was over.
It doesn't work that way anymore, however, and as such, a guy like Avery just moves from team to team, and commits act after act until we reach this point - where the implosion point can not be far off.
At Thursday morning's hearing, an incident that occurred after a Nov. 1 game in Boston will be re-introduced among Avery's lengthy list of priors. The language used in that incident - between Avery, and a man and woman in the stands near the Stars bench - made Tuesday's "sloppy seconds" sound like something from an episode of Barney and Friends, we've been told.
And after NHL commissioner Gary Bettman's decision comes down, there is the issue of Stars owner Tom Hicks, and his own teammates in Dallas. There is a very strong feeling that they all feel the same way about Avery as coach Tippett.
"When someone is in it just for his own image," Roenick said. "I mean, he has own publicist who gets him into these parties, the Hollywood scene. He meets all these people. That, to me, is someone who is more interested in being a celebrity than a hockey player."
It is coming to an end now however. Or, if not an end - he has three years and US $12 million left on his contract with the Stars -- surely a hiatus is at hand.
Perhaps a little time on the old couch. Maybe a closer look at a few ink splotches.
"That team that just gave him the contract should … get tough. Throw him on waivers, and you know no one is going to pick him up," Roenick said. "Send him down, let him learn his lessons, and maybe he'll come back smarter."
At this point, what do the Stars have to lose?
