COLUMBUS, Ohio — In the summer of 2003, the Penguins used a thread from arguably the greatest trade in Pittsburgh sports history to connect two Stanley Cup eras.
A franchise trying to regain relevance made a draft-day deal with the Florida Panthers to acquire the No. 1 overall pick, which the Penguins turned into Marc-Andre Fleury. The clubs swapped high draft picks to make it happen, and the Penguins also parted with Mikael Samuelsson.
The Swedish winger played just 22 games for the Penguins so only fans blessed with a great memory and a sense of hockey history probably remember his time in Pittsburgh. Samuelsson arrived in town that year as part of a package for Alexei Kovalev. That name should sound familiar. To acquire the mercurial Russian winger in 1998, the Penguins had cobbled together a deal that shipped Petr Nedved back to the Rangers.
Do you see now where the trade genealogy is taking us?
In 1995, the Rangers had jettisoned Nedved and Sergei Zubov to the Penguins for Luc Robitaille and Ulf Samuelsson. And 30 years ago, the Penguins completed one of the most memorable trades in NHL history, sending John Cullen, Zarley Zalapski and prospect Jeff Parker to the Hartford Whalers for Ron Francis, Samuelsson and Grant Jennings.
The historic March 4, 1991 blockbuster, brokered by former general manager Craig Patrick, produced a transaction trail that runs through all five Stanley Cup titles in Pittsburgh thanks to Fleury.
“Wow, that’s crazy,” Cullen said. “When you bring up all that stuff, yeah, you see why it’s so big. I just know I wasn’t there to win a ring.”
Thirty years later, Cullen’s former teammates still praise his influence for helping them win back-to-back Cups in 1991 and 1992. Thirty years later, debate still rages as to what compelled the Whalers to part with Francis, a future Hall of Fame center, and Samuelsson, one of the most rugged defensemen of his generation.
DK Pittsburgh Sports recently asked former players, coaches, general managers and media members to put into context a deal that is considered by many to be the NHL's most notable at a trade deadline. Here is the story in their own words:
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Kevin Dineen (former Whalers forward:) Right after the deal was announced, I called Ronnie and Ulfie to basically say, ‘You guys just won a Stanley Cup.’ That trade put the Penguins over the top. They already had Mario (Lemieux), (Paul) Coffey, (Mark) Recchi and Kevin Stevens. I told them, ‘You’ve got a great chance to win a title.'
Ken Campbell (The Hockey News senior writer:) I certainly can't think of a deadline deal in NHL history that turned out better for a team than this one did for the Penguins, so I would say it sits at No. 1. If the Penguins had just obtained Ron Francis in the deal, it would have been lopsided, but both Ulf Samuelsson and Grant Jennings turned out to very valuable commodities to the two Stanley Cup-winning teams and beyond. At the time, though, I don't recall anyone thinking it would be that lopsided.
Mark Madden (Pittsburgh sports talk show host, WXDX:) I think that trade did as much to win a championship as any trade made in Pittsburgh sports history, but nobody knew that at the moment it was made. The headline in the Hockey News was ‘Hartford wins the deal’ because John Cullen was top-five in scoring for most of the (1990-91) season and Zarley Zalapski was a very talented, mobile, puck-moving defenseman.
Bob Errey (Penguins TV analyst, two-time Cup champion:) We needed more strength down the middle and strength on the back end and that’s what we got. We could score goals when everyone was healthy, but the question was: Could we prevent them when we needed to?
Jeff Jacobs (former Whalers beat writer, columnist for the Hartford Courant:) It’s the stupidest f***ing trade in hockey history.
Neil Smith (former Rangers general manager:) I knew Francis and Samuelsson were good players on Hartford, but Hartford was rarely very good. So I don’t know if I realized how good those players would be when they were on a good team like Pittsburgh.
Phil Bourque (Penguins radio analyst, two-time Cup champion:) It took only a few days of witnessing Ronnie with how he carried himself and his professionalism to go along with the playmaking, penalty-killing and the ability to win faceoffs. It was like ‘giddy-up, let’s go.’ We started putting the pieces together down the middle — Mario, Ronnie, (Bryan) Trottier. We were now as solid as anybody in the league down the middle.
Campbell: One of the Penguins' glaring weaknesses prior to that deal was a center who played a sound two-way game and Francis gave them that and more. It also provided the Penguins with a buffer for Mario and gave them an incredible 1-2 punch.
Francis: We got there and played three games (all wins), and Ulf and I were at dinner and we started talking about it and I said, ‘This team can win the Stanley Cup.’ There was still a long way to go, and anything could happen, but we felt we had the possibility. We had so many great players in the locker room. Three months later, we were able to do it.
The Pittsburgh Press
The trade was big news in Pittsburgh on March, 5, 1991.
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Few people alive know the inner workings of this trade better than 85-year-old Eddie Johnston. The former goaltender served as general manager for both the Penguins — he drafted Lemieux in 1984 — and the Whalers. Earlier in the 1990-91 season, Johnston had sent Scott Young to Pittsburgh for Rob Brown. That was mere appetizer.
The man known as “E.J.” had a reputation for swinging big trades. After all, he’s the one who brought Coffey to Pittsburgh from the Edmonton Oilers in 1987.
Decades later, Johnston swears he wasn’t looking to move either Francis, who was playing out his option at $370,000, or Samuelsson. Beloved in Hartford, Francis was enduring a difficult season having been stripped of his captaincy by coach Rick Ley. The Whalers had qualified for the playoffs the previous five years, but ownership was wary of rising player salaries in a league that had no salary cap at the time.
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Smith: The Wayne Gretzky trade (in 1988) from Edmonton to Los Angeles changes the economic landscape of the game. The Kings’ owner, Bruce McNall, said he was going to bring Gretzky up to the pay level of the other major sports leagues ... But the NHL didn’t have the revenue to support those contracts. We weren’t even close. But once Gretz got paid, we just started to go down the line. When you change the salary structure of a league, that starts to bring on economic problems for some teams.
Jacobs: The Whalers’ owner, Richard Gordon, was always crying poor. Years later, there was a story that quoted Ley saying the owner had told him that four (Whalers on expiring contracts) wanted too much money and they would have to be traded before the season was over. Francis and Samuelsson were at the top of the list.
Johnston: If I didn’t do it, I’d get fired. Ownership wanted Ronnie out of there. (Gordon) wanted to get Ronnie Francis some kind of operation and Ronnie went to (Whalers executive) Emile Francis and said he wasn’t going to (an outside) doctor. When he did that, Mr. Gordon got really upset. Thank God, I had the coaches and a couple of people in the room when he said, ‘If Mr. Francis is here on Monday, you people will be gone.’
Francis: I had broken my knuckle and we had an incident earlier in the year where ownership had sent players behind (the backs) of team doctors to get second opinions. Emile had addressed it and said he didn’t want that happening again. Then, I got slashed and broke a knuckle on my index finger and I was asked to go on the QT behind the team doctors’ backs to get a second opinion in Hartford. I said, ‘That’s not right. Everyone knows me in town and it’s going to get back to our team doctors.’ I just didn’t think that was right so I chose not to do it.
Johnston: We weren’t shopping him, period.
Jacobs: F***ing people want to write their own history. I’m not saying some of the stuff isn’t true, but I don’t want to let any of these guys off the hook. I call them the holy trinity for ruining a professional franchise — Gordon, Ley and E.J. I think we are doing a disservice to hockey to let any of these three out of the cage of history that should forever imprison them.
Francis: Based on how things had gone during the season, I thought there was a chance I might get traded at the deadline, but management had reached out to my agent and said they wanted to sign me, and I thought that was great. They said, ‘As soon as the deadline passes, we’ll get a contract done. We don’t plan on trading you. We’re happy with you.’ As it turned out, they traded me right before the deadline.
Johnston: When we were told what we had to do, we called a few teams. Everybody wanted Ronnie Francis. I knew John Cullen and Zalapski, and we needed guys like that. Zalapski wasn’t at Coffey’s level, but we thought he could get us 20 goals and he did (the next season).
Jacobs: I got into it with Ley one time because I called him an ‘icon basher.’ He didn’t like the Howes, either. In my mind, he was jealous of them. And he was jealous of Francis, too.
Johnston: We offered Ulfie a contract, and his agent made the comment that he was going back to Sweden. I didn’t want to trade him, but I knew Zarley would be perfect for us. It worked out good because we made the playoffs that year and the next.
Jacobs: E.J. told me the key to the trade was Zarley Zalapski. He and Ley were in my ear saying this guy almost has Bobby Orr talent and Cullen could be the equal of Francis. They found out that scoring 90 or 100 points for the Penguins was not same as scoring 90 or 100 points for the Whalers. Those guys really sold that trade at the time. They were not saying we had to get rid of these bad apples and we’re taking what we can. They thought they had won the trade.
Smith: When we won the Cup with the Rangers in 1994, we didn’t have a single free agent. But that was about to change with the lockout. It became prevalent in the 1990s, and it put a financial strain on some teams that tried to compete with the big boys.
GETTY
John Cullen in 1988.
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When the deal was struck late in the evening on March 4, 1991, it sent tremors through the league. The Penguins’ players were excited over the additions of Francis, Samuelsson and Jennings, but they were initially stunned by the losses of Zalapski and Cullen. Especially Cullen.
With Lemieux having appeared in just 26 regular-season games because of back surgery, Cullen carried the offensive load and kept the Penguins in the playoff race, contributing 31 goals and 63 assists and finishing the season second in team scoring behind Recchi despite playing his final 13 games in Hartford.
Cullen had a strong playoff performance for the Whalers and led the club in scoring during the 1991-92 season. But mourning the loss of Francis, the Whalers’ fans had a difficult time warming to the new arrivals.
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Cullen: It was a shock to me and the whole team. I had no indication I was getting traded. I found out late that night after going to the movies with friends from Boston and Scott Young.
Errey: We weren’t clicking on all cylinders at the time. (The Penguins went 3-8-1 prior to the trade). Johnny Cullen was an asset because of his play. If he’s not playing that well, we don’t have any chance of making a deal remotely close to that.
Campbell: John Cullen was a good, young player with some real offensive upside.
Cullen: I went down to the rink the next morning to get my stuff. I was pretty emotional and pretty upset. I get there and Ronnie, Ulfie and Grant were already there in the room. I’m like, ‘Where am I going? These guys wanted to get out of Hartford so fast they are already here?’ I was like, ‘Oh, God.’
Bourque: It broke our hearts to trade Johnny.
Errey: The first thing we thought when the trade was announced was, ‘Boy, we’re losing Johnny Cullen.’ He was just a great guy, fun guy, a real competitor. I remember him fighting Mike Keane in the Montreal Forum. Those guys went toe-to-toe. He had so much character. ... And let’s not forget Grant Jennings. His name always gets left out and that’s one thing that irks me. He was a solid player for us.
Cullen: Going to Hartford was tough, and one reason is that Ronnie had been there forever and he’s an icon there, a legend. . . . Any time people had a chance to say something bad about the trade, they did. My poor wife couldn’t even sit in the stands where she was supposed to sit — she had to get her seats moved — because guys were yelling at me. It was a rough couple of years.
Dineen: What happened was not an indictment on Cully or Zalapski. Those were tough circumstances, and those guys came in there and played well. It's just that Ronnie and Ulf were so much a part of the city and knew what it meant to be Whalers. There was a connection.
Cullen: I went back to Pittsburgh after they won the first Cup and hung out with the guys. It was so cool. I’d run into fans who thought I was still on the team, so I did get to celebrate that title for a little while. I have so many great memories there.
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Ulf Samuelsson and the Bruins’ Cam Neely spar in the Wales Conference final, May 9, 1991, in Boston.
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The Penguins’ fans had a decent idea of what they were getting in Francis, who already had played in three All-Star Games. Samuelsson was more of a mystery. He had a reputation for nastiness and nobody -- and nothing -- was safe when he went after his target.
Several months before the trade, Samuelsson made national news for grabbing a long squeegee and smashing it into the grille of a Zamboni at Maple Leaf Gardens after being ejected for instigating a fight.
“He was a tough player, and we had heard reports about him before he got to Hartford,” Jacobs said. “I had heard he was in a brawl in a minor-league game where they had to bring cops on the ice. A German Shepherd might also have been involved.”
Samuelsson’s tenacious play, particularly in the postseason and especially against the Bruins and Cam Neely, made him an instant hero in Pittsburgh.
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Dineen: Ulfie added a totally different dimension to the Penguins. He played the game hard and he played it sincere. He was a fierce defender.
Madden: On a borderline playoff team or non-playoff team, he’s known as a dirty defenseman. On Pittsburgh, where he could make an impact and drive Cam Neely crazy in a playoff series, he was a difference-maker. When he got here, you had to see him in that context to see how valuable he could be in big games against good teams.
Bourque: He was a Swede and, at that time, Swedes weren’t known for that style. If you had told me he was from Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, it would have made a lot more sense.
Francis: Right after I got the (trade) call from E.J., I got a call from Craig Patrick and I said to him, ‘I don’t know how well you know Ulf Samuelsson, but you are getting a top-five defensive defenseman.
Madden: The battle between Ulf Samuelsson and Cam Neely in that (1991 playoff) series was akin to two big-horn rams butting heads on a mountainside. There was only going to be one winner. People like to make Ulfie the villain for that hit on Neely (that knocked him out of the series). Cam Neely was playing just as dirty and just as aggressively. Ulfie was just better at it.
Bourque: (Bruins coach Mike) Milbury melted down and I know in our locker room we were composed with ‘Badger’ Bob Johnson. Remember, in that series Milbury called him the ‘Professor of Goonism.’ We stayed composed. We hadn’t really won anything before that, but we had guys in our room like Trottier and Coffey, Jiri Hrdina and Joey Mullen. Guys who had won before, especially Trottier, and then there was our leader Badger Bob. It was fuel to our fire to see their leader melt down, while our leader was so composed.
Madden: Ulfie got tagged pretty quickly: ‘Jack Lambert on skates.’ It was a great description and it served Ulf very well. Jack Lambert in ballerina slippers would be a hero in Pittsburgh, but Jack Lambert on skates with a championship Penguins team, that really blew up Ulfie’s profile.
Francis: There was one night I couldn’t sleep, and I went out into the living room and I turned on this Pittsburgh cable channel. They start flashing this ‘U,’ then they flash an ‘L,’ then they flash an ‘F.’ They loved him there. I was actually a big fan of the Steelers as a kid growing up in Sault Ste. Marie. A lot of fans in Pittsburgh kind of saw Ulf as someone who could have fit in with the Steel Curtain.
Bourque: If I put together a list of the top-10 players I had the upmost respect for, he’d be on that list. I saw what he went through off the ice to patch his body together. I don’t think people realized how much of a beating he took. He wasn’t that big of a guy. He looked big on the ice because he wore those big shoulder pads that made him look menacing, but he wasn’t the biggest guy. I saw him battle through a lot of injuries.
Errey: Ulf would stir it up in the dressing room, too. It would be like a beehive in there. He had a way of getting under people’s skin. He provided a lot of great play and chuckles.
GETTY
Ron Francis
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Francis played an integral role in helping deliver the Penguins’ first title in 1991. He was an invaluable player during all seven-plus seasons in Pittsburgh.
But his greatest contribution came in the 1992 Cup run after Lemieux was sidelined in Game 1 of the Patrick Division finals courtesy of an Adam Graves slash to the wrist. Francis responded with seven goals and five assists, registering a hat trick in Game 4 with the Penguins down two goals and trailing, 2-1, in the series against the Rangers.
Pittsburgh rallied to win that game in overtime on a Francis goal and never lost again on the way to claiming the franchise’s second Cup.
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Bourque: That was Ronnie’s series. He just went to another level. He never talked about it, he just quietly went about his business. He just had this sixth sense of when it was time to step up and that was it. We rode his back in that series. The connection he and Kevin Stevens had was incredible.
Smith: I remember that Game 4 like it was yesterday. We would have won the Stanley Cup in 1992 if Ron Francis doesn’t score from center ice in that game. And he just kept scoring.
Madden: Once that overtime goal went in, once the puck hit the back of the net, I knew the series was over. The series was 2-2 and the Penguins had injury problems, but I knew the series was over.
Errey: In Ronnie Francis, you knew what you were getting — a quality two-way hockey player, one of the best in the game. A guy who could really do anything. A guy who if Mario went down for a short time, he could occupy that role.
Francis: We lost Mario and we lost Joey Mullen in the first game. We lost Game 2 and we lost Game 3 in overtime and, to this day, I think that was the best hockey game I’ve ever played, (scoring two goals and adding an assist.) I remember telling my dad and he said, ‘Well, you’re going to have to do it again.’ You never wanted to see anything happen to a teammate, especially Mario, but someone on that team always stepped up and filled a role and did the job.
Madden: The Rangers were just losers then. They overcame that in 1994, but when the Penguins came back in that series it was the height of the ‘1940’ chant — not just in Pittsburgh, but everywhere. I’ll never forget, the clinching (Game 6) at home, ‘19-40!’ ringing out as loud as it possibly could for almost the whole third period and how demoralized the Rangers’ bench looked.
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Samuelsson scored the Cup-winning goal in 1991. Francis scored the Cup-winning goal in 1992. Such details only added to the misery in Hartford, where the franchise would never qualify for the postseason again before moving to North Carolina in 1997.
Meanwhile, Johnston returned to Pittsburgh to coach the Penguins in 1993 after being fired as the Whalers’ general manager. Cullen was traded to Toronto after two seasons in Hartford and, on Aug. 3, 1994, he signed as a free agent with the Penguins to play alongside Francis, Samuelsson and Jennings.
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Dineen: It’s always easy to look back, but Eddie Johnston gets relieved of his duties and goes right back to Pittsburgh in a different role and it’s like, ‘Wow, did that just happen?’
Jacobs: There’s no proof of that, but it’s a hilarious theory. I want it to be true, but I have no proof of it.
Dineen: You wondered if the league was going to put in an inquiry or something to check on the logistics of how that worked out in such a time frame. ... I understand it’s the nature of our business and that’s a pretty harsh indictment to say that, but you do take it personally. You wear that jersey with a lot of pride, and you want to make it work. That’s just the nature of athletes.
Smith: I worked for Craig and E.J. for a while as a consultant, and I used to tease them. I would say, ‘I know what that deal was. Whoever got the best of the trade had to hire the other guy.’
Cullen: It was great. I loved Pittsburgh. I loved the city and the fans. One of my best friends, Kevin Stevens, was still there and, ironically, I end up playing with Ronnie, Ulfie and Grant. Grant had been renting my house, and I had to kick him out. I was like, ‘Hey, I’m coming back so you have to get the hell out.’
Francis: I’m not going to lie, there were some hard feelings when I got the phone call in Hartford from E.J. But we sat down Day 1 in Pittsburgh and cleared the air. We moved on and had no issues. Over the years, we’ve run into each other and it's all smiles and laughs so it’s all good.
Johnston: I explained it to Ronnie because he didn’t know all the details. He didn’t know because we couldn’t say anything at the time. I loved coaching him. He was great with the players, and he led by example.
Cullen: I told E.J. ‘I’m sorry I let you down.’ He had made a big deal, and it didn’t work out for him. ... I love Craig Patrick, and we are friends to this day. It had nothing to do with Craig. He did what he had to do and it worked out for him. I have the upmost respect for him.
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Patrick, 74, and Johnston remain part of the Penguins’ organization. Francis, 58, returned to the franchise that birthed him and became Carolina’s general manager in 2014. Two years ago, he was named to the same role with the expansion Seattle Kraken.
Samuelsson, 56, is serving as an assistant coach with the Panthers. Cullen, 56, is a car dealer with his brother in Atlanta, while Jennings, 55, works as an airline mechanic in Alaska. Zalapski died three years ago at age 49 of complications from a viral infection.
The seven men, who each enjoyed stretches of NHL fame, always will be linked to one of the sport’s most memorable trades 30 years ago. And for the Penguins, it was a gift that kept giving right up to moment Fleury lifted the Cup for a third time in 2017.
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Madden: It’s the most impactful trade in Pittsburgh history, I can say that. The only ones that rank up there is the Rick Tocchet deal in ’92 that was needed to shake up a sluggish defending championship team and, if I could have a group entry, the five trades Jim Rutherford made in 2016. That was the most amazing string of trades that any Pittsburgh sports executive has ever made.
Dineen: Ronnie and Ulf were the perfect pieces that helped them win two Cups and they nearly got a third the next year.
Francis: I have been fortunate. I’ve always liked the cities where I played. When we got to Pittsburgh, it wasn’t a steel town anymore, but I grew up in a steel town and my dad was a steelworker, and I just felt a connection with the people of Pittsburgh.
Bourque: After the we won it (in 1991), I told (ESPN’s) Bill Clement in the locker room, 'We don’t win this Stanley Cup without John Cullen.' He was like, ‘John Cullen?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, because John Cullen was playing so well at the time — he was one of the best players in the league. If he’s not playing that good, I don’t know if we have the pieces to send to Hartford.'
Cullen: Who wouldn’t want to be on that team at that time and win Cups? But it didn’t happen, and that’s the cruel thing about the sports business. I was still happy for them, but obviously disappointed not to be part of it. When Bourque brought it up in the locker room, I was watching. He wanted to make a point. That was like putting a ring on my finger.
