You wish that you could come into my neighbourhood
Meaning my mental state
Still I’m 5 foot 8
— GURU, “DWYCK“
Waking up the morning after a home-ice hat trick, white-hot Tampa Bay Lightning forward Martin St. Louis has a chance to become the NHL’s oldest winner of the Art Ross Trophy. With 58 points, St. Louis holds a two-point advantage over teammate Steven Stamkos and the injured Sidney Crosby, whose broken jaw has him stuck at 56 points and 36 games played. If St. Louis can hold his lead for two more games, he’ll snap a 50-year-old mark held by Gordie Howe, who was an infantile 34 in 1962-63, when he elbowed his way to the last of his six scoring titles.
But in a season in which 42-year-old marvel Teemu Selanne and 41-year-old “freak” Jaromir Jagr are set to influence the playoffs, it’s not St. Louis’ age (37) but another number that most impresses.
Five feet, eight inches.
It’s more than five inches shorter than the average height of an NHL player in 2013, and more than an inch shy of the average North American male’s stature.
It’s also the vertical measurement of both St. Louis and retired 60-goal scorer Dennis Maruk.
“Did you watch last night?” Maruk says, lighting up at the mention of St. Louis. “Did you see how fast he skates and how good he is with the puck? That’s the key.”
Despite (or perhaps because of) his below-average size, the retired Maruk enjoyed a long NHL career, amassing 878 points in 888 games. The 57-year-old is a Washington Capitals fan first, but speaking with him at a shinny game to promote the Scotiabank Pro-Am, it’s apparent the forward is in St. Louis’s corner.
“You don’t have to be a giant out there. If you have pretty good hands, good movement and you’re a fast skater. There’s not a lot of hitting in the NHL right now, the way the rule changes are, so a smaller-statured player that has good offensive ability and can skate and is strong and can compete, he can make it. That’s St. Louis,” Maruk says. “He’s got an opportunity at 37 years old to win a Hart. He’s leading the league now. He probably wouldn’t be if Crosby was still playing — but that happens in the game of hockey, and he’s taken over.”
Before St. Louis’ time, the diminutive Maruk and his trademark Fu Manchu took over a Capitals squad in the early-’80s. Yet even though the Etobicoke, Ont., native scored a pre-Ovechkin 60 goals for the club and racked up a mind-boggling 136 points in 1981-82 (a franchise record Ovie hasn’t touched), Maruk never did experience the thrill of a final-weekend Art Ross race. (Alas, 1981-82 was the season Wayne Gretzky put up a mellow 212.)
Still, St. Louis’ 2012-13 Bolts and Maruk’s 1981-82 Caps have something in common: pinball-like numbers individually but no postseason berth.
“They got a pretty good situation there, but they’re not in the playoffs. That’s gotta be frustrating for him,” Maruk says of St. Louis. “He’ll probably go over and play for Team Canada in the world championships.”
Regardless if St. Louis becomes the shortest NHLer to capture the scoring title since St. Louis (in 2003-04, he had a league-best 94 points),* his drive to excellence is something only a short guy can fully understand.
In high-level hockey, height discrimination is real. Despite leading his midget league in scoring, St. Louis was denied a spot on the Quebec provincial team. He was a leading scorer in the NCAA, an all-star at the Division I men’s tournament and twice a finalist for America’s prestigious Hobey Baker Award. Yet St. Louis was never drafted by an NHL club. After proving himself with the International Hockey League’s Cleveland Lumberjacks, the Calgary Flames finally took notice and, after an AHL stint, earned his way in the bigs through an impressive training camp in 1998-89 — the final year of Maruk’s professional career.
Maruk, too, believes his draft stock was stunted due to his growth, or lack thereof.
“I was told when I was drafted that I was too small. That’s why I didn’t get drafted first-round,” explains Maruk, who was selected in Round 2 by the California Seals. “I thought I was going to be drafted when I was 18, but they said I was too small. It made me push harder. I had to prove to everybody right until my last game that I could play.
“I was called a rat a lot. Midget. All those names. But I played in the National Hockey League; I made it there, and nothing was going to take that away from me. Whatever they said, I just played harder.”
*The only other 5’8″ winners in the award’s 65-year history: Ted Lindsay in 1949-50 and Marcel Dionne, who weighed 195 pounds to St. Louis’ 180 and needed a tie-breaker to defeat some 6’1″ rookie named Wayne Gretzky in 1979-80 (Gretzky also had 139 points but scored two fewer goals than Dionne)