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NHL History: Toronto Maple Leafs hire Gord Stellick as GM today in 1988

Photo credit: JOHN MAHLER / TORONTO STAR FILE PHOTO

By Zach Laing

Apr 28, 2020, 16:23 EDTUpdated: Apr 28, 2020, 17:08 EDT

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The Toronto Maple Leafs made Gord Stellick the youngest GM in league history today in 1988.

Stellick, 30, first started working for the Leafs as a 17-year-old high school student distributing scoring summaries in the team’s press boxes.

He put in the work to get to his role as GM spending time in the club’s public relations department and worked as an assistant GM under Gerry McNamara, who was fired two months prior.

“(Leafs owner Harold) Ballard said Stellick would have “top authority. The only guy he’s responsible to is me and I don’t know what I’m doing so he can do what he wants to. He can hire or fire the coach or he can hire and fire me if he’s got enough money to buy the place.”

Ballard’s comments are semi-ironic, as Stellik only lasted 16 months in the job before resigning. Why, you may ask?

Well, Stellick cited interference from Ballard as to why he stepped away. Suffice to say Ballard didn’t give as much authority as he said.

Nonetheless, in Stellick’s first draft in 1988, he ended up selecting Scott Pearson in the first round and Tie Domi in the second. No other pick of his that year played over 100 NHL games.

In the 1989 draft, Stellick accumulated three first round picks. The third overall selection was used on Scott Thorton, who had a 941 game career, while other picks Rob Pearson and Steve Bancroft played 269 and six games, respectively.

Here’s a look at the trades Stellick made: