OHL Alumni Central

John Slaney as an OHLer and as a Frankfurt Lion.

Frankfurt Lions logo.

In the past week or so, we’ve posted about Ontario Hockey League alumni that have weathered the storm in the world of hockey and put in many, many years at the pro level. We’ve also recently posted on players that hold minor league records. Just the other day, we featured Sean Blanchard, a Max Kaminsky Trophy winner.

In John Slaney, you have all that. John began his Ontario Hockey League career in 1988-89 with the Cornwall Royals. He played four seasons with the Royals and in his second season with the club won the Max Kaminsky Trophy as the OHL’s top defenseman. That season, he had 38 goals and 97 points in 64 games.

Slaney was drafted by the Washington Capitals in the first round of the 1990 NHL draft, 9th overall. Just finishing his 18th season in professional hockey, John played a total of 268 NHL games with the Capitals, Colorado Avalanche, Los Angeles Kings, Phoenix Coyotes, Pittsburgh Penguins and Philadelphia Flyers.

However, a good part of John Slaney’s career in North America was spent in the AHL. He played for five different teams in the league: Baltimore Skipjacks, Portland Pirates, Cornwall Aces, Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins and Philadelphia Phantoms. From 2000-01 to 2006-07, his time was mostly spent with the Phantoms. In his first two seasons with the Phantoms, he was awarded the Eddie Shore Award as the AHL’s best defenseman.

John currently has his name in the American Hockey League’s record book in three different spots. He holds the record for most goals by a defenseman in a single season with 30. Also his is the record for most goals by a defenseman in a career with 166. Naturally, Slaney also holds the record for most points by a defenseman in a career with 519.

John has spent the past three seasons in Germany in the Deutsche Eishockey Liga (DEL). His first season was played with the Cologne Sharks and the past two were spent in Frankfurt with the Lions. This past season, the Lions finished in second place in the 15 team league over the 56 game schedule. John contributed 24 points in 44 games.

Check out John Slaney’s profile page on the DEL’s official website.

John is a teammate of another Max Kaminsky Trophy winner, Sean Blanchard. We featured Sean in a recent post.

The first ever OHL Alumni Central Free Giveaway Contest has arrived. As mentioned, a Wayne Gretzky rookie card, it is not. We’re giving away two hockey cards of John Slaney. You won’t find these in a Beckett’s guide and a dealer won’t give you the time of day for them. But, any OHL fan would appreciate the rarity of these cards.

First is a 7th Inning Stretch OHL card from 1991 featuring John as an OHL all-star with the Cornwall Royals. Second is a card featuring him on his newest team, Germany’s Frankfurt Lions.

Future OHL Alumni Central free giveaways will increase in monetary value, but hey – it’s free, right? All you have to do is go to our contest page and fill out the online form or you can e-mail giveaway@ohlalumnicentral.com with ‘John Slaney’ as the subject line and you may be the one luck winner.

For those who don’t know who John Slaney is for some reason, John played in the OHL from 1988-89 to 1991-92 with the Cornwall Royals. His best season was 1989-90 when he scored 38 goals and added 59 assists for 97 points and won the Max Kaminsky Trophy as the league’s top defenseman.

In 1991, he scored the game winning goal in the gold medal came for Canada at the World Juniors. In 2004-05, he was an important part of the AHL’s Philadelphia Phantoms Calder Cup winning team. To this day, he is he AHL’s all-time top scoring defenseman. John also had a 268 game NHL career with Washington Capitals, Colorado Avalanche, Los Angeles Kings, Phoenix Coyotes, Nashville Predators, Pittsburgh Penguins and the Philadelphia Flyers. He began play in Germany in 2007-08.

Here’s the prize: