Don Cherry's rant regarding the dearth of Ontario-born players on the Toronto Maple Leafs' roster had some impeccable timing. The following morning, Patrick Burke would unveil his wonderful, new 'You Can Play' campaign , and its simple but progressive central message: "If you can play, you can play." To my mind, it just wasn't the right time for Cherry to be instigating a controversy surrounding how an inconsequential, unnchangeable aspect of a player's identity makes him more or less deserving of a spot on a hockey team. Of course, there is no right time. But that's what Cherry did: Railing on Brian Burke's seeming penchant for American-born players and comparing it to the makeup of some of the league's best teams, suggesting that Ontarian-lessness was standing between them and the playoffs. Now I'd just like to tell ya … there's more people that come from Ontario hockey, players come from Ontario than any other place in the world … Vancouver has four. Pittsburgh has six. St. Louis. Beautiful team. Surprise team. Nine! Last year, Boston had seven from Ontario, this year they have nine. Chicago won it in 2010 and they had seven. "Every team in the National Hockey League has a guy from Ontario except one. GUESS WHO IT IS?! IT'S ONTARIO'S TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS. Now, if you want American college guys. If you want Americans, you got the team. It's the only organization in the world, in Canada, that cheers when Canada loses. It's an absolute shame. There's 40,000 kids in the GTHL. … This guy has none! This is worse than nonsense -- it's subtly prejudiced nonsense. Where a player is from should have no bearing on whether or not he (or she, dammit) should be playing for the Toronto Maple Leafs. Only skill should.
