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Getty ImagesMark Messier was standing next to the glass, watching New York Rangers prospects show off their skills during the recent prospects tournament in Traverse City, Mich. Somewhere at the rink, Joe Nieuwendyk was doing the same for the Dallas Stars.
Later in the tournament, Steve Yzerman arrived, and spent much of his time in the Detroit Red Wings team balcony, looking down at the players below.
Ron Francis was the last guy off the ice during a Carolina Hurricanes practice at the tournament where both he and Glen Wesley worked the future 'Canes.
Scott Mellanby, scouting for the Vancouver Canucks in the stands, joked that he kept bumping into so many former teammates and opponents that it was hard to get his work done.
It quickly became clear this wasn't just a tournament for future NHL players — it was also for future NHL general managers. Or head coaches. Most likely, both.
Many of these former stars of the 1990s, most of whom retired around the lockout, are moving closer to positions of power during their second life in hockey.
Nieuwendyk was one of the first of that era to get his own team to run after he was hired to be the Stars general manager this summer when Les Jackson and Brett Hull were re-assigned.
"It's happening," Nieuwendyk said of the wave of players from his era re-emerging as team execs. "The last few years I've talked with Ron Francis a lot, Al MacInnis in St. Louis, Steve Yzerman and I talked about it.
"The common denominator is the game has been great to us for so many years. I think we're all still passionate about it."
Former players moving into management is nothing new, but this group of players competed at a time when salaries in hockey paid enough to set a player for life.
So it's clearly not about the money, not when guys like Yzerman and Messier earned in excess of $60 million during their careers.
"It's two things," Yzerman said. "First of all, the guys that stay involved and work at it and stay in it enjoy the game. I like being around the game, I like the people in the game and being involved. The second part is the challenge. I've learned a lot, for me it would be a great challenge to be in (that) type of role."
Yzerman is the general manager of Team Canada, one of the favorites to win the gold medal at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. He's also a vice president with the Red Wings. Current Wings GM Ken Holland said Yzerman is ready to run his own NHL organization.
A gold medal in the Olympics, to go with the Stanley Cup he earned as an exec in 2007, would make him more than qualified for the next GM opening.
He did it the right way, and so is Messier, who was hired by the Rangers in August to be a special assistant to Glen Sather. Running a team is not as simple as being able to evaluate talent or having the respect of the players. Taking time to learn from experienced executives like Holland and Sather is priceless.
In fact, the skills needed for playing isn't close to those needed for aspiring general managers who want to run an organization. The stuff these guys let their agents handle during their playing days is knowledge they need to know now.
That's one of the reasons former agents like Mike Gillis, Peter Chiarelli and Brian Burke have been so successful running teams. They have a great grasp of the business side.
But the business side can be learned; it just takes time. Loads of it. John Davidson played more than 300 games as an NHL goalie and now, as president of the St. Louis Blues, has built his young team into a future powerhouse.
He has seen all angles of a hockey organization, from playing to broadcasting to running it.
"It's very difficult just to step in and think you can be the general manager or whatever it is," Davidson said. "You have to live it and have an understanding of how much work it is. It's not just evaluating a guy, if he's a good skater or shooter. It's everything from A to Z. There's paperwork, there are rules, there's the CBA, there's agents, there's contracts, there's parents. You get curveballs all the time."
But when it's going well, and the pieces you've assembled are on the ice, the rush starts to come back again, even if just for a moment.
Nieuwendyk got a taste at the prospects tournament and it will only get more intense when the season starts.
"When you're in the chair I'm in, the juices flow again," he said. "You feel like a player again."
Ryan Callahan scored for the fifth time in four days and defenseman Ryan McDonagh snapped a second-period tie to lift the New York Rangers to a 3-2 victory over the Washington Capitals on Sunday.
Check out highlights from the Rangers 3-2 win over the Capitals.
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Zambia has won the African Cup of Nations, beating pre-tournament favorite Ivory Coast 8-7 on penalties in a dramatic final at Stade de l'Amitie.
Wesseling: Each NFL team enters the offseason with a series of pressing needs. Sometimes a team can address them all, sometimes they ignore them all. But if a team's smart, they'll listen to us. These are the most crucial aspects for AFC teams.
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