It’s All About Helping Kids!

May 21, 2008

I live in Edmonton. Here Wayne Gretzky is a folk hero. For helping to lead up to 4 NHL championships in 5 years, there is a lot of love here for him. A while back, there was a newspaper contest for kids to write 5 questions that would be asked of Wayne when he was in town for a coming event. As a fan, I had to enter…I needed to fib a bit about my age, but a little fraud never hurt anyone, did it?

Here are my questions.

1. Back in the early 1990’s, You, Michael Jordan and Bo Jackson were on a cartoon called Prostars. It was primarily created to sell breakfast cereal while giving face time for athletes representing the four majors sports in America, Basketball (Jordan), Football and Baseball (two-sport superstar Jackson) and Hockey (yourself). If Bo or Mike called you saying wanted to do a reunion to fight some crime, one last time, would you do it?

2. In one episode of Prostars, I remember that some dudes stole the Stanley cup and you went on a mission to recover it. What were they planning on doing with it anyways? It’ not like they could sell it at a pawn shop or anything.

3. During the theme song for Prostars, the singer has a line where he says “Wayne’s hot, slap shot!”, however at the time, it shows you scoring on the Winnipeg Jets with a backhand shot, not a slapper. Why is this? Shouldn’t it have been something like “Wayne’s grand back hand”? Also, did you guys live in those lockers? Where did you put your stuff?

4. Speaking of the “Wayne’s hot, slap shot!” line…when people think of you, would you rather have them fondly remember the 61 league records you broke, or your storied hotness?

5. With the Prostars, everyone on the team had a specialty. Bo was the brawn, Michael was the brains and you were always hungry. However now you are retired, things seem to have changed. Whether you are endorsing a product, conducting an interview or coaching the Phoenix Coyotes, I barely ever see you chowing down on a mountain of burgers. Do you just not need as many carbs when you are not fighting crime, or are you on a diet or something?

Thank you, Mr. Gretzky

Brent Thompson
Age 8
prostars