Sportsnet’s decision to fire Don Cherry was long overdue
I remember the first time I ever watched Coach’s Corner with Don Cherry. I was about four or five years old. I didn’t really understand why my family was crowding around the TV, and I had no idea what was actually coming out of the mouths of those two guys in front of me, but I could tell that the older guy with the colourful jacket was pretty animated.
“Why are we watching him?” I would turn and ask.
“It’s Don Cherry. We have to watch; he’s always got something to say,” my family would echo.
At this point, I was really just getting introduced to hockey, so I went along with it. I wanted to know more about the game.
Hockey Night in Canada has become an institution within our country, almost akin to a religion and for nearly 40 years, Cherry has been its preacher. Even to this day, many Canadians treat what the man has to say as gospel, repeating his familiar expressions to one another in arenas and bars from St. John’s to Vancouver Island.
And those close to me told me Don Cherry was the guy I should listen to every Saturday night, in part because he’s usually got a message for the kids in each segment.
Hockey has been in my life forever, and basically everywhere I went, Cherry was one of the faces people used to promote the game when I was young.
My cousins and I would have his classic Don Cherry Rock’Em Sock’Em Videos running in the background as we played hockey in the basement. He lives in Mississauga, where I grew up, and played a major part in bringing an OHL team to my hometown, the Mississauga IceDogs.
I even met Cherry once, when I was nine years old. It was a weird experience, I almost felt like I was in the presence of a mythical figure like Santa Claus.
But ‘Grapes’ was anything but sour and was more than willing to take the time to talk to me and give me an autograph. He even me called a “good Irish lad” when I told him my name was Nolan.
And then as I got older, more and more I started to notice some things about ‘Grapes’.
Cherry has always been known to admire the tough, gritty, under-appreciated players who wore their hearts on their sleeves—the guys who did the little things to help your team win like blocking a 100 mph slap shot or playing through injury. But whenever he complimented a player, the player was ALWAYS Canadian. More specifically, he was always an English Canadian; never a francophone.
Whenever he criticized someone, it was almost always a Russian or European player — usually for being “too soft” or a “pansy”. It was never a “good Ontario boy.”
Cherry also kept stressing the importance of fighting in hockey, that you needed someone to “send a message”. He doubled down on his statement, even when multiple former players who regularly fought in the NHL began suffering from CTE and committed suicide.
Gradually, I agreed with him less and less. By the time I finished high school, I didn’t agree with him at all.
As he got older, he started making less sense, his xenophobia became less subtle, and his rants became more outlandish.
He said women have no place in locker rooms. He denied climate change and said only “idiots” believed such a thing.
Then right before Remembrance Day, disgusted by what would be Cherry’s final rant on Hockey Night in Canada, I sat there with likely millions of other Canadians, asking myself the same question I did to my family when I was four years old, “Why are we watching him?”
Obviously, Sportsnet felt the same way, and I was stunned. Cherry had become so institutionalized and never faced significant consequences for any of the countless harmful comments he had made before. I never thought the day would come. With the amount of people who adored him, as well as the amount of advertising revenue his segment brought in alone, I really thought, “He’ll die before anyone takes him off the air.”
Some may try and excuse him by saying, “Well he’s an 85-year-old man. Sometimes your thoughts don’t come out the way you intend.”
In a way, I do agree with what Don Cherry was trying to say. More people should be wearing poppies as a way of showing support for those that have served and continue to serve our country.
But the way he delivered that message, the way he used the term “you people”, the way he made a sweeping generalization of who was at fault by pointing out “Mississauga” and “Downtown Toronto”, two of the most diverse and multicultural cities in Canada, showed that his statement was never really about poppies at all.
Don Cherry did a lot to grow hockey in Canada. The problem is that, given how long he was allowed to be on air without being kept in check, he did just as much, if not more, to tear it down and prevent anyone who he didn’t see as a “real Canadian” from participating. ‘Grapes’ was one of the faces of the sport when I was growing up, but he and his beliefs are the last thing I want representing the game I love today.