O'Marra dug himself out of rock bottom and is now getting his shot.
EDMONTON — Scott Thornton has never even met Ryan O’Marra but he might know him better right now, than O’Marra knows himself.
The retired, former Toronto Maple Leafs first-rounder — No. 3 overall in 1989 — clicked out of his bindings Friday at Blue Mountain ski resort near his home in Ontario, picked up his cell phone and took us back to exactly where O’Marra found himself Friday night in Edmonton.
It is a place O’Marra was supposed to be by now. Then it was somewhere he wasn’t supposed to get to at all.
But here he is — with a chip and a chance in his first real shot with the Edmonton Oilers, NHL organization No. 2 for the former Islanders first-rounder (15th overall, 2005).
"I wasn’t a point per game player or anything in junior," Thornton recalled. "But you get drafted in the first round and you’re expected to score 80 points, which was far from reality."
Thornton spent 30-some games in the press box as a rookie and then went to the minors. He was quickly dealt to Edmonton, in an eight-player deal that brought Grant Fuhr and Glenn Anderson to Toronto.
O’Marra’s spotlight wasn’t nearly as bright out on the Island, but he had more points in junior than Thornton and was coming off a 2006 World Junior tournament that spread his brand from coast to coast.
But the Isles cashed him in for Ryan Smyth, just as O’Marra’s junior career was coming to a close. He came to Edmonton acting like a high first-rounder and was rewarded with a plane ticket to Springfield.
"I don’t think I really responded well to my (initial) demotion. It was immaturity, overconfidence. It carried over to my second (pro) season," he said.
"It wasn’t easy to swallow," Thornton said of his first demotion. "There were a lot of times when you thought you deserved more ice, but you weren’t sure how to get it."
It is one of the oldest and unflinching storylines in pro hockey: Junior star assumes that the role that got him drafted will be the role that he’ll play in the NHL, the problem is there are fighters in the NHL who scored 25 goals in junior.
A guy like John Madden was better than a point-per-game player in college and the minors, but he’ll play 1,000 NHL games as a solid, dependable fourth-line centre and post just two 40-point seasons along the way.
O’Marra looked like a future star for those memorable two weeks in Vancouver, during the 2006 World Junior. Then again, so did Canadian goaltender Justin Pogge.
"The big wakeup call was when I wasn’t given a role at all in the American League," O’Marra said Friday. "I was in and out of the lineup on the fourth line. When you’re playing a few minutes a game you don’t have an identity on the team. You start to soul search, and realize what you have to do to find a role."
"I wouldn’t even say the demotion to the East Coast League was rock bottom. It was the entire next season (2008-09) where I only had one goal. I didn’t even play a full weekend until March, and we were in last place. I had one goal. I’d say that was rock bottom for me."
There, he ran into a coach named Rob Daum, on the Oilers farm team.
"I gave him a defined role. A responsibility," Daum said Friday.
"You need someone in your corner. Someone who believes in you," Thornton said. "That way, your confidence starts to soar. You feel you’re part of it. You stop gripping your stick so tight. Your chest sticks out a little bit more."
O’Marra, 23, arrives in Edmonton after grabbing on to Daum’s roadmap, a smart kid who could see his career was cratering as long he as he kept his ears closed.
"I just realized, I had one year left in my contract. I dug deep in the summer. Was ready to do whatever they wanted of me."
What is he now?
"I’m a big centreman who plays physical down low. I’m good on the penalty kill and I win faceoffs," said O'Marra, who will centre fellow call-up Linus Omark and Ryan Jones. "You have to find a niche, in all walks of life, in order to succeed and to excel. I just had to figure that out."
Tonight, this third-line centreman who by all reports can win a draw, joins Edmonton — a club that is coincidentally way too small down the middle, 29th in the league in the faceoff dot, and without the injured Shawn Horcoff, their best draw man.
Preparation has, it seems, run head long into opportunity for O’Marra.
He smiles.
"Life? This sport?" he said. "It’s all about timing."
