Working the Red Line EP. 6

The core of what an enforcer was meant for, came down to protecting the big stars. As the 80s entered an era of high skill and high scoring, we were introduced to players like Mike Bossy, Ray Bourque, Mario Lemieux, and Dale Hawerchuck, but no greater than Wayne Gretzky. Gretzky is obviously known as the great one, where essentially every part of his game proves that case. 800 more points in the 80s decade than the Peter Stasny who sits behind him.  More Assists than the #2 guys have points, it's a conversation that does not need much attention. 

When people think of Gretzky and those great Oiler teams, names that are often brought up are Mark Messier, Jari Kurri, and Paul Coffey. Yet the one name that seemed to follow around Gretzky was Marty McSorley. McSorley played with Gretzky on 3 different occasions. He was a part of the Oiler teams from 85-88, with the Kings from 89-94 and then after a year back in Pittsburgh he returned to Gretzky and the Kings from 95-96.

Marty was your typical enforcer, in junior he played Belleville Bulls and as a 20 year old had 51 points in 70 games to go along with 183 PIMs. He went undrafted but signed with the Pittsburgh Penguins and actually appeared in 72 games as a 21 year old. It was in 85 when he began to make his name well known.

In his first full year in Edmonton he had 23 points in 59 games with 265 PIMs. McSorley was a true goon. He had multiple instances where he would hit guys from behind, deliver dangerous crosschecks or even brutal slashes, McSorley was the definition of what it meant to be a goon. He was widely known for a slash on Donald Brashear. McSorley was suspended for the remainder of the 2000 season and after was suspended indefinitely for the entire 2001 season. The play actually threw McSorely into loads of legal trouble and even a criminal charge case. 

Brashear wanted McSorely banned from the NHL and even teammates found it troubling to try and defend what McSorely did.

McSorley was very similar to the likes of Tie Domi. Making some much noise as an enforcer, McSorley was able to be a part of little side gigs including a small role in Bad Boys (1995). It helped that McSorley played the longest part of his career in Los Angeles. 

As predicted, McSorley was a great fighter. He fought 227 times throughout his 17 year career. His key rivals were guys like Wendell Clark, Donald Brashear and Stu Grimson, but possibly the best fight of his entire career came against Darren Langden in 1998 while McSorley was playing in San Jose. 

As the Rangers entered the Sharks zone McSorley had hit Langdon without the puck. The fight doesn't entirely favour either of the two but it was one of the longest fights I've watched in a long time. It truly felt like 3 or 4 fights piled into one. McSorley may have won in terms of hits but Langdon stood his ground and stood tall the whole fight. Rangers colour guy John Davidson explained it best, as he said he’d like to see Langdon make ‘a million bucks’ for having to do stuff like this - referring to fighting a guy with McSorley's stature. Give it a look below!

McSorley vs Langdon

McSorley was a cool guy to look into, he's a name who may not get talked about too often but must be in the conversation when it comes to well known enforcers. I'm not going to stray too far away from the 90s next week as i'm going to look into Kelly Chase and the late 90s blues.