ANALYSIS : Pressure Is Back With Captain Gretzky

The C is merely another letter, right? It’s the third letter of the alphabet, one of 26.

No one ever notices it until it disappears from a hockey sweater. Or appears on another.

It was big news when King Coach Barry Melrose selected his captain for the season. At the time, Wayne Gretzky was sidelined because of a back injury that jeopardized his athletic career. Left wing Luc Robitaille was Melrose’s choice for captain.

It was a move laden with symbolism: a rookie head coach seeking to stamp the Kings with his own identity by selecting his own team captain.

Thirty-nine games later, Gretzky has returned and the C is back on No. 99’s jersey. Melrose made that announcement Monday, the date of the Kings’ carefully orchestrated “Gretzky’s Back” news conference.

For Melrose, it was a difficult choice. Certainly Robitaille had done nothing to lose the honor. With 30 goals and 56 points, he is having his finest NHL season and will be playing in his sixth consecutive All-Star game. He is the kind of leader Melrose likes.

But if Melrose had maintained the status quo, there would have been shrieks of horror from Canada. Robbie Ftorek’s eight-minute benching of Gretzky in 1988 would have paled in comparison. Maybe it would have been comparable to hanging the Canadian flag upside-down.

“He’s the most important person to Canada,” Melrose said. “No one is close to him up there. He’s bigger to Canada than anyone is to the United States.”

Melrose said, though, that neither possible international repercussions nor internal pressure from his bosses influenced his decision.

He added that he didn’t even consider what Canadians might think, and that there was no in-house pressure.

“I never could live my life by coaching by what people thought,” Melrose said. “A lot of the success I’ve had, I went against what people thought. . . . For me, it has to be what I believe in.”

Then, why the change?

With one glaring exception, Melrose has raved about Robitaille’s ability on and off the ice. He wasn’t thrilled when his captain drew three minor penalties in a five-minute span against Montreal, but in Robitaille, Melrose said, he had a fiery leader.

Robitaille responded and helped transform the team from a collection of small cliques into a unified group. Even as late as last week, those close to the Kings believed Melrose would retain Robitaille as captain. Before the December wave of injuries, the formula was working well and the Kings had even briefly challenged for first place overall.

Some even suggested that the Kings were a better team without Gretzky, although they might have meant that the Kings were playing more as a team . That talk fizzled when the Kings won only one of the last 11 games.

There is support for Melrose’s decision.

First, it’s almost an unwritten rule that a player doesn’t lose a starting position, or captaincy, because of an injury.

Perhaps more important, Gretzky’s leadership credentials are impeccable. He has been on teams that won four Stanley Cups and is known for his ability to work the officials during games with measured diplomacy. If anyone is going to find a way to get an edge, it’s Gretzky.

What made things easier for Melrose was his chance to get to know Gretzky when he started practicing and traveling with the team.

And before that, Melrose got favorable reports from assistant coach Cap Raeder, who was working closely with Gretzky. Whenever Raeder increased his demands on the ice, Gretzky met them. Some days, he skated as many as three times.

“Cap’s a better judge because he’s known him longer,” Melrose said. “Cap said (Gretzky) is as committed and as excited as he’s ever seen. We’ve done a lot of talking in getting to know each other.

“There were a lot of things that went into it. I didn’t want Wayne taking it just because he had it before. I wanted Wayne to know how important my captain is to me. Wayne thought about it and decided it meant a lot to him.

“He’s not playing for money. He could have retired. It’s like he’s on a mission.

“If Wayne had said it was no big deal--’I like it, but it’s not very important’--I would have kept Luc because being a captain meant a lot to him. (Gretzky) took a day to think about it and he came back to me and said, ‘Barry, this really means a lot to me. I want to be captain.’ ”

Then there was Robitaille. Melrose said that his former captain took the news well, even coming to the news conference in a show of support.

Melrose was asked if Robitaille wasn’t merely being politically correct.

“No, Luc’s not a good liar,” he said. “Luc wears his heart on his sleeve. It won’t have any effect on Luc. He said Wayne should be the captain.”

For Melrose, this is the second critical juncture of his rookie year as an NHL coach. The first occurred at the start of the season, when almost everyone wondered how the Kings could survive without Gretzky.

But there was less pressure then because of the lowered expectations. The “win now” factor disappeared when Gretzky entered the hospital. Melrose could use his young players, install his own system and tinker with line adjustments.

Now that Gretzky is back, the pressure will return, especially now that the Kings are slumping.

And adding to it is the league-wide scrutiny on the commingling of strong-willed personalities and egos.

Are the Kings now Gretzky’s team? Or Melrose’s? Or will they be able to meld their leadership qualities?

All we know at this point is that the listing in the Kings’ program is no longer accurate. From now on, it will be Luc Robitaille, without the C.