Hello NHL!
Oulu’s Granlund drafted by Minnesota WildBy: By Mike Granlund, Superior Telegram
- Mike Granlund
The following is another “Have Fun or Get Out of the Way” column by Don Leighton and Mike Granlund and their alter egos, Lance Boyle and Billy Pirkola, which runs occasionally in The Superior Telegram.
It’s the dream of every youth playing sports to make the big time. Dreams of being the next Joe Mauer, Brett Favre or Wayne Gretzky dance in the heads of kids every night. Last Friday my dream came true:
It was about 9:30 p.m. The caller was from Minneapolis and the message was having a hard time sinking in.
“You’ve been drafted in the first round of the NHL by the Minnesota Wild hockey team,” said the text message. What? Impossible! I hadn’t skated for years. My credentials paled in comparison to the Derek Forbort’s and Dave Spehar’s of the world.
Yet, it seemed so real.
My countless minutes of playing with my brothers on Johnson’s Berry Patch irrigation ponds in Oulu years ago, my broadcasting of Superior Spartan hockey games, years of cheering for hockey players such as Mike Usitalo, Erik Raygor, Skeeter Moore, Jerry “Bear” Laberdie and Paige Turner, had finally paid off.
To verify this I picked up the St. Paul paper in the morning and there it was — and even on the front page of the paper: “And the Wild take … Finnish center Mikael Granlund, 1B.”
Imagine the headlines in a couple years: “Mikael Granlund scores winner against Flyer goalie Leighton!” But I couldn’t possibly be good enough for the NHL.
True enough, the article in the St. Paul Pioneer Press revealed that the Wild expected me to spend two years in the American Hockey League to get some seasoning. Darn! A google search verified that the hometown was Oulu. But then reality started to set in. The picture on the “Press” didn’t look like me. It also listed me at 180 pounds, which would have been true 40 years ago. And they listed the hometown as Oulu, FINLAND, and not Wisconsin.
Something had gone drastically wrong. I called my recently hired agent to have him check it out.
He quickly called back and verified the bad news: “There must be another Mikael Granlund from Oulu.”
He is the one with the bright future and huge multi-million dollar contract possibility. I, meanwhile, am the one who must toil in anonymity, satisfied with a life far from the bright spotlights of the Excel Energy Center.
Oh, well, for a few fleeting moments it was fun. Maybe the real Mikael Granlund can get me tickets to a Wild hockey game? He must be a third cousin or something.
Boyling in the Pirkolater
* Northwestern’s Ryan Miesbauer has been named All-State in track in 2010. The Wisconsin Track Coaches Association took the top six performers in each event regardless of division. Others of note to make all-state include Ashland shot putter Caitlin Zepczyk, Bloomer 800 runner Malcom Wankel, and Rice Lake high jumper Wally Ellenson. Miesbauer, the Telegram’s 2009 Football Player of the Year, also qualified for the WIAA State wrestling tournament the past two seasons, and won a national weightlifting title. He broke Tom Burke’s school shot put record with a put of 58-6 ½. He will attend UMD in the fall and be a member of the Bulldog football team.
* Kellen McCoshen of Superior and Donnie Hissa of Northwestern played in the Wisconsin baseball Coaches Association All-Star series last weekend in Oshkosh. Hissa, a pitcher headed to Notre Dame, pitched three innings on Friday, giving up one run and making the defensive play of the series. McCoshen, a shortstop, had a key double in the West team’s victory on Saturday.
* Other area members of the West team included C.J. Smith of Ashland, Conner Sabin of Hayward and Josh Theide of Hurley. Gatorade player of the Year and Minnesota Gopher recruit, Bobby Juan of LaCrosse Central, also played for the West, finishing with three hits, including a double and two-run single.
Opinions and/or story ideas can be e-mailed to wgranlund@centurytel.net
Tags: have fun or get out of the way, collections, sports, hockey, superior, oulu
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