Kings Ransom
August 9th, 1988. The day Canada froze over
On August 9, 1988, the NHL was forever changed with the single stroke of a pen. The Edmonton Oilers, fresh off their fourth Stanley Cup victory in five years, signed a deal that sent Wayne Gretzky, a Canadian national treasure and the greatest hockey player ever to play the game, to the Los Angeles Kings in a multi-player, multi-million dollar deal. As bewildered Oiler fans struggled to make sense of the unthinkable, fans in Los Angeles were rushing to purchase season tickets at a rate so fast it overwhelmed the Kings box office. Overnight, a franchise largely overlooked in its 21-year existence was suddenly playing to sellout crowds and standing ovations, and a league often relegated to “little brother” status exploded from 21 teams to 30 in less than a decade.
- Year: 2009
- Country: United States of America
- Genre: Documentary
- Studio: Asylum Entertainment, ESPN Films
- Keyword: sports, biography, ice hockey, los angeles, california, sports documentary, nhl, edmonton
- Director: Peter Berg
- Cast: Wayne Gretzky, Janet Jones, Luc Robitaille, Glen Sather, Peter Berg, Bruce McNall
