PITTSBURGH \u2014 Jim Rutherford sat inside the Commoner in downtown Pittsburgh Friday morning, picking at his poached eggs and toast.<\/p>\n
Then, one by one, the memories rushed back into his mind.<\/p>\n
Now the president of hockey operations for the Vancouver Canucks, Rutherford, three weeks shy of his 77th birthday, will be part of a celebration honoring the 2016 Stanley Cup champion Penguins before Saturday\u2019s game against the New York Rangers at PPG Paints Arena.<\/p>\n
\u201cBoy, do I love this city,\u201d Rutherford said with the hint of a smile.<\/p>\n
Just over five years ago, Rutherford stunned Pittsburgh and the hockey world with his abrupt resignation as Penguins general manager. He left only seven games into the shortened 2020-21 season.<\/p>\n
\u201cI wouldn\u2019t say I have regrets for leaving,\u201d Rutherford said.<\/p>\n
He just wishes the events leading up to his departure never happened. Namely, he wishes COVID-19 never happened.<\/p>\n
Rutherford said Friday that there was never a skirmish with ownership, former CEO David Morehouse or the coaching staff. He wasn\u2019t told to trade Evgeni Malkin or Kris Letang. All of the rumors that circulated during that time, Rutherford insists, were not true.<\/p>\n
The depression he felt from the pandemic, however, was very real.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think, if it wasn\u2019t for COVID, I probably would have been in a much different state of mind entering that season,\u201d Rutherford said.<\/p>\n
Rutherford had just turned 71 when the pandemic brought the world to a standstill.<\/p>\n
\u201cThose 11 months just really took their toll on me,\u201d he said. \u201cI never got COVID during that time, even though I\u2019ve since had it. But it took a massive toll on me. My son (James) didn\u2019t go to school for those 11 months. He didn\u2019t get to play hockey. I never left my property during that time. I\u2019d work from home, my son would play his video games. We got our groceries delivered at home. So, yeah, we survived it, but the toll it took on me really changed me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rutherford explained that his passion and focus for the job he loved had faded during those 11 months. He didn\u2019t really want to resign, but felt he owed it to the Penguins and himself.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf it wasn\u2019t for COVID, I would have been here for longer,\u201d Rutherford said. \u201cI truly do believe that.\u201d<\/p>\n
When presented with the rumors about his departure, Rutherford shook his head and dismissed all of it.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt had nothing to do with other people or anything like that,\u201d Rutherford said. \u201cIt was about my mental state of mind. That was the problem. The Penguins, Mario (Lemieux) and Ron (Burkle), everybody treated me so well and with so much respect. My whole time here, everyone was first class. That literally never changed. I just had to step away for my own personal reasons.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although his decision to leave the Penguins appeared to be impulsive, it was not. From the moment COVID-19 struck in March 2020, Rutherford considered a departure.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh yeah,\u201d he said. \u201cI was thinking about it those entire 11 months, to be honest with you. Just sitting at home all the time, those days that turned into months were so hard. It wasn\u2019t an overnight thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rutherford\u2019s affection for Mario Lemieux (\u201cthe best, and there will never be another like him\u201d), Mike Sullivan (\u201cone of my best friends\u201d) and Sidney Crosby (\u201cone of the best players who ever lived, and one of the best people who ever lived\u201d) made leaving all the more difficult. But Rutherford\u2019s heart told him he had to leave.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was so terribly hard because I was treated so well in Pittsburgh and we accomplished so very much,\u201d Rutherford said. \u201cI enjoy everything about this place.\u201d<\/p>\n
Not too long after leaving Pittsburgh, of course, Rutherford got the itch to run another team and ended up in Vancouver. Two years ago, his Canucks got within a game of the Western Conference final. Today, they sit at the very bottom of the NHL standings.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt hasn\u2019t been a fun season,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re in a whole new stage in Vancouver. A lot of important decisions. You hope the rebuild won\u2019t take longer than is necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n
How much longer does he want to keep working with the Canucks?<\/p>\n
\u201cAnother 20 more years, probably,\u201d he said with a grin before turning serious.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d he said. \u201cI think the biggest thing is my health. And how I manage stress. I\u2019m actually managing the stress better than I thought I would. This has been a very difficult year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Why did he take a job in Vancouver when he thought he was retired after leaving the Penguins?<\/p>\n
\u201cHeck, I thought I was retired after I left Carolina (in 2014),\u201d he said. \u201cI thought for sure that I was done after leaving the Penguins. But it\u2019s all I\u2019ve done my whole life.\u201d<\/p>\n
When Rutherford watches a 7 p.m. ET game before his Canucks play three hours later in Vancouver, he typically finds his attention drifting to the Penguins. He\u2019s still the godfather, five years after he left. And he can\u2019t help but notice the job Kyle Dubas has done this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust terrific,\u201d Rutherford said of the Penguins president\/GM. \u201cI had people coming to me during his first season in Pittsburgh. They kept asking me what was going on with Kyle. \u2018What about Kyle? What about Kyle?\u2019 My response to those people was to give the man some time. I have the utmost respect for him, and I always have. He\u2019s so hard-working, so smart. I\u2019m telling you, this is a great hockey man.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a tough job. I put Hexy (Ron Hextall, the GM before Dubas) in a tough spot. I had traded so many draft picks. It wasn\u2019t an ideal situation. And it was the same thing for Kyle. But Kyle\u2019s been able to figure it out. That team is good.\u201d<\/p>\n
As breakfast came to an end, Rutherford couldn\u2019t help but notice how quickly time passes and how much has changed in the five years since he last attended a Penguins game in Pittsburgh.<\/p>\n
\u201cFlying here yesterday, I thought about how many friends I have here,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd since the last time I was here, some of them are gone now. It hit me, the way things change.\u201d<\/p>\n
Time flies \u2014 unless you\u2019re Crosby or Evgeni Malkin, of course, Rutherford joked. He had a rebuild in mind when he was still the general manager in Pittsburgh.<\/p>\n
\u201cI did,\u201d he said. \u201cI knew it was coming, but I didn\u2019t know when. If I would have guessed, I\u2019d have been wrong. I didn\u2019t know they\u2019d (Crosby and Malkin) still be this great at this stage. I love those guys.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rutherford, whose schedule is packed over the next couple of days, began to head toward his hotel room when Patric Hornqvist and Carl Hagelin emerged from the adjacent elevator.<\/p>\n
The two former Penguins gave a bear hug to Rutherford, who\u00a0turned around and grinned.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe sure did have a great team,\u201d he said. \u201cNot one bad apple. Just good people winning Stanley Cups. I\u2019m so honored to be here this weekend.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PITTSBURGH \u2014 Jim Rutherford sat inside the Commoner in downtown Pittsburgh Friday morning, picking at his poached eggs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":440223,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66],"tags":[385,1790,99,1320],"class_list":["post-440222","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-nhl","tag-pittsburgh-penguins","tag-sports","tag-vancouver-canucks"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440222","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=440222"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/440222\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/440223"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=440222"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=440222"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=440222"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}