Gretzky Weighs in on the Maple Leafs: What's He Thinking?

Some hockey opinions make you stop for a minute. Wayne Gretzky talking about the Toronto Maple Leafs is one of them. The Great One was on The Pat McAfee Show this week, and naturally the conversation eventually turned to Gavin McKenna. The 18-year-old has played two NHL games, and if you judge him strictly by the numbers, there isn't much to get excited about yet. He had one shot and a minus-2 in his debut against Montreal, followed by one shot and a zero against the Islanders.

But Gretzky wasn't particularly interested in piling pressure on the kid. Quite the opposite. He seemed impressed by the way McKenna has handled everything that comes with being the first overall pick and, more specifically, doing it in Toronto.

Gretzky Understands What McKenna Is Walking Into.

Gretzky pointed out something easy to forget when everybody is talking about hockey prospects. McKenna isn't just an 18-year-old starting his NHL career. He's an 18-year-old Canadian who the Maple Leafs selected first overall. That's a pretty big hockey fishbowl.

“There’s a lot of pressure when you get the first pick overall,” Gretzky said, adding that the pressure is even greater when a Canadian player goes first overall to Toronto. That's coming from somebody who knows a little something about pressure.

What caught Gretzky's attention was McKenna's maturity. He said he had listened to the young forward's comments and liked how he has handled the media, the game, and everything surrounding his arrival.

“He seems like he’s very mature for 18 years old,” Gretzky said. “He’s a young kid. He’s not very big, but he’s going to grow and get stronger.” And then came the part every Toronto fan probably wanted to hear. “He’s going to be fine.”

Gretzky Also Likes What He's Seeing From the Maple Leafs.

Gretzky wasn't just talking about McKenna. He also had something positive to say about the Maple Leafs themselves. He described Toronto as a team putting together “a nice little hockey club” and said he thinks the Leafs will be better this season than people anticipate.

That's interesting because this team has already generated plenty of questions after losing its opener to Montreal and then squeaking past the Islanders. Two games isn't enough to tell us much about anybody. But maybe that's the real point.

Gretzky isn't making some grand prediction about McKenna or the Maple Leafs. He's simply saying that he likes what he sees from the young player, understands the pressure he's facing and thinks the kid is going to be fine.

Coming from The Great One, that's probably worth listening to.