Steen is rebuilding his life in Sweden
His name and number still hang on the ceiling at Canada Life Center, but Thomas Steen says he has never felt more distant from the Winnipeg Jets – both figuratively and now literally – because their long-standing relationship took an unexpected turn shortly after he was elected to the club’s Hall of Fame.
“I have many questions about many things, but no answers,” the 61-year-old told me last Friday in a phone chat from Sweden.
Here is what is known. Steen, who played his entire NHL career in 950 games with the Jets between 1981 and 1995 and holds a number of records from the 1.0 era, ended up on the verge of unemployment in the summer of 2020, just months after an emotional ceremony on the rink in the center in which he and former teammate Randy Carlyle was honored. His contract with True North, where he was involved in part-time amateur scouting and alumni relationships, had expired. And it would not be renewed.
Sources within the organization say that covid-19 was the main culprit. Of course, the league had stopped in March 2020 when the global pandemic struck, and it was not clear where things were going. Steen’s position was one of the victims, his workload dried up in principle. Nothing personal. Just an unfortunate affair.
“I spent 40 years in Winnipeg. I had my kids there and everything. I planned to stay there,” said Steen, who served for a period (2010 to 2014) as councilor for Elmwood-East Kildonan.
He was far from the only one who got a curve. You will recall that the chairman and co-owner of the team, Mark Chipman, told reporters “they work when we work” regarding hundreds of part-time positions in the arena / playing days that were suddenly eliminated. The organization quickly reversed the course and decided that employees would at least be paid for shifts that had already been planned.
Steen says he never personally heard from anyone at True North about the end of his term, which also included working with their youth hockey academy and Camp Manitou. It made him feel a bit of an outsider.
“It just feels like they do not even know me now,” he said.
Shortly after receiving the message, Steen packed his things and went to California, where his girlfriend, Brenda, is a firefighter in the town of Hollister. For the first time in ages, he refined his resume – which included previous scouting gigs for Minnesota, Anaheim and Phoenix – and began contacting other NHL teams.
The result was quite humble.
“I asked everyone. No one hired,” Steen said. The pandemic-paused NHL season finally resumed later that summer in the hubs of Toronto and Edmonton, but teams were looking for ways to reduce in the wake of massive financial losses and an uncertain future. It was about the same story for the truncated campaign 2021, which was played in mostly empty buildings.
Steen believes that an arrest in 2014 for an accusation of assault in the home that eventually stopped the crown may also have played a factor in getting the cold shoulder from potential employers. He always denied any wrongdoing for the alleged incident, which was reported to have been refilled with alcohol at a Winnipeg restaurant.
Steen realized that he would probably need to broaden his horizons if he wanted to stay in the hockey game. And a series of life events, including some bad investments on his part, meant that he could not just put his feet up and live on his savings.
“I had to work. So I went to work,” he said.
Which brings us to the present, and the city of Sundsvall back in my home country Sweden where I caught up with Steen last Friday. He had just come off the ice after his last session of the day with a group of high school kids. They are the future of IF Sundsvall Hockey, a men’s team that plays in Hockeyettan, which is considered the third class of hockey in the country. Steen is the supervisor of youth hockey, while his son Alex is the director of the program.
“He’s my boss,” Steen says with a laugh about his Winnipeg-born boy, who retired after the 2020 season after playing 1,018 regular-season games with Toronto and St. Louis. Louis.
Although it had been a number of years since he hit the ice in a meaningful way – Steen had become quite comfortable wearing a suit instead of skates – it did not take long before he felt familiar.
“It came back pretty quickly. When I first came here I saw the players and knew it was a lot of work. I came here on July 31 last year, started working on August 1 and have had about four days off since then,” says Steen . “It’s not the elite series. It’s something else. I’ve never been at this level, so I’m learning things. It’s a lot of growing pains, but we’re enjoying it.”
Unfortunately, all this distance means that he has not seen his two youngest children in the last eight months, as they are still in Winnipeg with his mother. His girlfriend is also thousands of miles away and is fighting forest fires in California.
“One day at a time”, Steen describes his current situation and philosophy.
To be clear, Steen is not angry at True North. Just disappointed with how it ended. He applauds them for the steps they have taken to honor former teammate Dale Hawerchuk, who died of cancer in 2020. A statue in True North Square, to be erected this summer, is among a number of projects underway.
“Dale was a really good Jet. He deserves it, that’s for sure. He was a great teammate. Good for everyone,” Steen said.
The Jets are now out of sight, and mostly out of the mind of Steen, who from time to time will watch a game on TV or read about the latest developments. He admits that he is surprised both by the departure of long-term coach Paul Maurice and how much they have struggled this season.
“I’m not really thinking about it now. I’m just trying to survive every day,” he said. “I do not really have a feeling for what is happening. I would just guess like everyone else. I have no insight into it.”
Not anymore, he does not.
Twitter: @mikemcintyrewpg