Selon nos sources dans le milieu de l’internet, Marc Bergevin est un malcommode, comme en faisait foi cet article de Hockey News il y a quelques années :
Laugh-man standing – By Mark Brender
Hockey can be a funny game. With Marc Bergevin around, it’s really, really funny.
So yo want to know what’s on their mind as they sit on the bench? First promise not to blame Tampa Bay forward Andre Roy for laughing. Don’t think he doesn’t care just because he couldn’t keep the grin off his face. Maybe you saw him smile, just a little?
It was overtime of Game 2 between Tampa Bay and New Jersey. Nothing to laugh about, really, not unless you’d just walked where Roy and his teammates had walked, under the stands toward the Zamboni entrance, and seen what they had seen. A Ryder van was parked in the hallway. Big guy with a goofy-looking face in the driver’s seat. He was wearing a jumpsuit, cigar hanging out of his mouth, and now he’s leaning on the horn like it’s rush hour yelling « Let’s Go, Lightning! » honk honk honk, right in the bowels of the Meadowlands. That’s what Roy was thinking about as he as on the bench moments later, deeper into the playoffs than he’d ever been.
This kind of thing happens a lot on Marc Bergevin’s teams. You know know him as the journeyman blueliner who threw the puck in his own net in a playoff game. If you thought that was funny, wait until you see what he’s like when he’s trying.
« It’s not like he’s playing pranks on everybody, it’s that he’s not afraid to make an ass of himself » – ex-teammate Ian Moran.
May 4, 1999. The Blues are in Phoenix to take on the Coyotes in Game 7 of their opening round series. The boys are tense. Breger is on the trip even though he’s injured and out for the season. He wakes up from his nap and bolts from his hotel room around 4 o’clock. The team bus is outside, ready to go, idling in the sweltering heat. As the bus rounds the first corner, the players hear a noise from the sidewalk.
« GO BLUUUESS! GO BLUUUESS! SEE YOU IN DALLAAASSS! » Berge is jumping up and down wearing a ‘Fuhr’ sweater and a huge black afro wig. The bus was 10 minutes late. Berge is roasting up in there. « SEE YOU IN DALLLAAASS, BLUUUESSS! »
Intermission entertainment this night includes a parade of fans dressed up head-to-toe in plastic Sumo suits. Berge gets his hands on one of them. In a celebratory Blues dressing room after the 1-0 OT win, with « Kung Fu Fighting » blasting on the stereo, he waddles into the room for his post-game victory dance, Sumo-style.
« I remember falling down and I couldn’t get up and the guys, they were all laughing so hard nobody could help me up. Finally the trainers helped me up, » Berge says.
The bus gig was pretty good too. « I found out after the game that the guys laughed all the way from the hotel to the rink. »
In Boston, he once put a Scott Young sweater over a medical skeleton, stuck a beer and a cigar on the thing and wheeled it into the St. Louis dressing room. He has been known to ring doorbells and run. He has opened garages and left lawn mowers on sidewalks. If you invite him to a party, check the thermostat when he leaves. If you’re in the stall enjoying quiet time with the paper, beware of falling shaving cream.
Of course he has too many skeletons in his own closet not to be a frequent target himself. He has found his equipment in the jacuzzi, vaseling in his shoes, his shirt sleeves and pant legs sewn tight. With the entire team watching, he has put on his glove, felt something furry in one of the fingers and pulled out a dead mouse. A freaked-out, hopped-up Berge vowed holy revenge on the usual suspects: Chase, Courtnall, MacInnis – while Grant Fuhr was doubled over nearly in tears, having laughed so hard he could barely breath.
At 30,000 feet, TampaBay’s Dan Boye is white-knuckled and dripping buckets. The boys are getting thrown around like chopped egg in a tossed salad. Berge is on the Monster of the Midway, dipping and dancing, hands in the air.
Berge: « Whweeeeee! »
Boyle: « Will you please sit down? »
Berge: « Whweeeee! Whweeeee! »
Another plane, another team, similar story. The bird is way too small and the skies are way too angry. The supper formerly belonging to Penguin goalie Johan Hedberg has made a second appearance. Berge chats with a flight attendant and is the las one off after touchdown.
« Man, » he says as he greets his teammates in the terminal building, lip-stick smeared across his face, « that was one rough flight. »
Flight attendants are also useful for fine yellow jackets. Berge puts them on and walks down the aisle: « Can I sell you a house today? Buying a house? Need a house? I have a nice four-bedroom… »
Berge likes takeoffs, too. As the plane lifts into the air he puts on his hat with ear flaps and goggles, stands up and leans forward like a ski jumper ready to fly. It’s amazing how close you can get to the ground if you try.
When a player gets traded, his equipment ends up with the new team’s equipment manager. Usually the equipment manager opens the bag, takes out the equipment, hangs it up and goes on with his day. But when Pittsburgh’s Steve Latin opened Berge’s bag, he found another bag inside.
« And I opened it up » Latin recalls, « and I said ‘What the hell is this?’ « He says ‘These are my props.’ »
There are among other things, five or six wigs, a pair of leopard-skin flip flops; an old-school, J.C. Tremblay-style helmet from the 1960s; some Kazoo-style horns; leather pants with the butt cheecks cut out. Just one question: Which bag do the leopard skin skate guards call home – equipment or props?
Les succès retentissants de Jean Charest dans le monde de l’humour auront sans doute inspiré Geoff Molson et Serge Savard à eux aussi porter un clown au pouvoir. Oui, malgré les prédictions bétonnées de Ron Fournier qui nous assurait que Julien BriseBois a.k.a. «le diamant» serait nommé directeur général le 10 avril, c’est plutôt Marc Bergevin qui a obtenu le poste tant convoité. Marc Bergevin qui est renommé, oui, pour avoir déjà compté dans son propre but avec sa main, mais surtout pour être tout un boute-en-train au chapitre des farces et attrapes.