Pavel Bure
| Pavel Bure | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Born |
March 31, 1971 Moscow, USSR | ||
| Height | 5 ft 11 in (180 cm) | ||
| Weight | 191 lb (87 kg; 13 st 9 lb) | ||
| Position | Right Wing | ||
| Shot | Left | ||
| Played for |
NHL Vancouver Canucks Florida Panthers New York Rangers RSL HC CSKA Moscow HC Spartak Moscow | ||
| NHL draft |
113th overall, 1989 Vancouver Canucks | ||
| Playing career | 1991–2005 | ||
Pavel Vladimirovich Bure (Russian: Павел Владимирович Буре)(born on March 31, 1971 in Moscow, USSR) is a former professional ice hockey player. He was a right winger and played in the National Hockey League (NHL), as well as for the Soviet Union and Russia internationally. He won a bronze medal in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City and a silver medal in the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano. During his career in the NHL, he played for the Vancouver Canucks, Florida Panthers and New York Rangers. Presently, Bure serves as the General Manager for Russia's Olympic team.[1]
Biography
Pavel was named after his great-grandfather, a watchmaker to Tsar Alexander III. Bure's family made precious watches for the tsars from 1815-1917. In 1996, Bure presented 3 of the 50 gold replicas of the company's last model to then-Russian President Boris Yeltsin, Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin and Moscow mayor Yuriy Luzhkov.
Bure comes from an athletic family; his father, Vladimir Bure, was an Olympic swimmer who competed for the Soviet Union in the 1968, 1972, and 1976 Olympic Games. In the '72 Games he won the bronze medal (100m), and lost the gold by half a second to swimming legend Mark Spitz. Pavel Bure's younger brother, Valeri Bure, also plays in the NHL.
Bure began his hockey career at 16, playing for the Soviet Red Army team.
Bure has had a relationship with tennis player Anna Kournikova, which ended in a broken engagement.
Bure did the first ever Sports Live Chat on the Internet in Canada in 1995 with Bob Kerstein, CIO of the Vancouver Canucks.
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Playing career
Nicknamed The Russian Rocket for his speed and skill, Bure was picked 113th overall in the 6th round of the 1989 NHL Entry Draft by the Vancouver Canucks out of the Central Red Army. He was widely recognized by NHL teams as being one of top players in the world not playing in the NHL prior to the 1989 draft. The reason he slipped to the sixth round was because Brian Burke and Pat Quinn gambled that they could win a case that Pavel was eligible for the draft a year sooner than everyone else thought. The issue hinged on whether international games counted towards his draft eligibility. In the end, the NHL acknowledged the loophole in the draft rules and the validity of Canucks' management's claims. This led to other problems though. Because Bure and his family felt he was a top player and not worthy of his sixth round drafting place, they wanted to be paid similarly to what a top five pick would have been paid, while Quinn held fast to his position. There were also issues over contract length. Eventually Bure signed a four year deal at around 600,000 per year. Due to these contract squabbles Bure started his career partway through the season.
He started playing for the Canucks in the 1991-92 NHL season, and was an instant phenomenon. In his first game versus the Winnipeg Jets he failed to score but his blinding speed help him to three breakaways in the game. Bure was awarded the Calder Memorial Trophy as rookie of the year for 1991-92. He was an integral part of the Vancouver Canucks' scoring department for many years to come, helping them all the way to the seventh game of the Stanley Cup Finals in 1994.
Considered one of the best playoff series in NHL history, Bure's blazing rushes up the ice is considered one of the highlights. In that seventh game Pavel was behind the New York Rangers' net and tried to flip the puck over the net to the front and race around to hit the puck out of the air with his stick for what would have been the tying goal. He missed. rarely has a player tried such a daring move in a game of such magnitude.
There had been a rumour that Pavel and his agent came to Pat Quinn, who was coach and general manager of the Canucks, prior to the start of the seventh game of the finals. They demanded that Quinn renogiate the terms of Pavel's contract or he would sit out the seventh game. His contract was negotiated in the off-season, but Quinn, notoriously tight-lipped about his players, would not confirm the story. At the time, Don Cherry ranted about the story on his television segment, making some infamous derisive comments about Russian players, which were (and are) nothing unusual for him.
Sometime later, Pat Quinn came to the Canadian Broadcasting Company studios where Cherry did his segments and challenged Cherry to a fight over the continued harassment that Cherry subjected Bure to on his program.
On January 17, 1999, he was traded to the Florida Panthers with Bret Hedican, Brad Ference, and Vancouver's 3rd round choice in the 2000 NHL Entry Draft for Ed Jovanovski, Dave Gagner, Mike Brown, Kevin Weekes, and Florida's first round draft choice in the 2000 draft. On March 18, 2002, Bure was acquired by the New York Rangers along with Florida's 2nd round pick in the 2002 draft for Igor Ulanov, Filip Novak and the Rangers' 1st and 2nd round choices in the draft and a 4th round choice in the 2003 draft. Plagued by injuries throughout his career, he did not play in the 2003-04 NHL season due to a lingering knee injury even after two operations. On November 1, 2005, Bure announced his retirement from professional hockey due to complications with his injured knee (injury sustained in 2003).[1] At the same time, it was announced that Bure would be the general manager of Russia's ice hockey team at the 2006 Winter Olympics.
Libel Lawsuits
In 2001 a Moscow based newspaper called the eXile published an article claiming Bure broke-up with Anna Kournikova after discovering she had two vaginas. Bure successfully sued the eXile under Russian libel law for 500,000 rubles (about US$10,000) in damages.[2]. The eXile claimed that the original article was a parody and suggested Pavel Bure's influential status may have compromised the judgement.[3]
In 2005, Bure again launched another Kournikova related lawsuit, this time against perfume chain Arbat Prestige for defamation. Bure seeks 300,000,000 rubles in damages.[4] [5]
Awards
- Calder Memorial Trophy - 1992
- Maurice 'Rocket' Richard Trophy - 2000, 2001
- Played in 6 NHL All-Star Games - 1993, 1994, 1997, 1998, 2000, 2001.
Career Statistics
| Regular Season | Playoffs | |||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Season | Team | League | GP | G | A | Pts | PIM | GP | G | A | Pts | PIM | ||
| 1987-88 | HC CSKA Moscow | RSL | 5 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 0 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1988-89 | HC CSKA Moscow | RSL | 32 | 17 | 9 | 26 | 8 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1989-90 | HC CSKA Moscow | Russia | 46 | 14 | 11 | 25 | 22 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1990-91 | HC CSKA Moscow | RSL | 44 | 35 | 11 | 46 | 24 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1991-92 | Vancouver Canucks | NHL | 65 | 34 | 26 | 60 | 30 | 13 | 6 | 4 | 10 | 14 | ||
| 1992-93 | Vancouver Canucks | NHL | 83 | 60 | 50 | 110 | 69 | 12 | 5 | 7 | 12 | 8 | ||
| 1993-94 | Vancouver Canucks | NHL | 76 | 60 | 47 | 107 | 86 | 24 | 16 | 15 | 31 | 40 | ||
| 1994-95 | HC Spartak Moscow | RSL | 1 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 2 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1994-95 | EV Landshut | DEL | 1 | 3 | 0 | 3 | 2 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1994-95 | Vancouver Canucks | NHL | 44 | 20 | 23 | 43 | 47 | 11 | 7 | 6 | 13 | 10 | ||
| 1995-96 | Vancouver Canucks | NHL | 15 | 6 | 7 | 13 | 8 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1996-97 | Vancouver Canucks | NHL | 63 | 23 | 32 | 55 | 40 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1997-98 | Vancouver Canucks | NHL | 82 | 51 | 39 | 90 | 48 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1998-99 | Florida Panthers | NHL | 11 | 13 | 3 | 16 | 4 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 1999-00 | Florida Panthers | NHL | 74 | 58 | 36 | 94 | 16 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 2 | ||
| 2000-01 | Florida Panthers | NHL | 82 | 59 | 33 | 92 | 58 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 2001-02 | Florida Panthers | NHL | 56 | 22 | 27 | 49 | 56 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 2001-02 | New York Rangers | NHL | 12 | 12 | 8 | 20 | 6 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| 2002-03 | New York Rangers | NHL | 39 | 19 | 11 | 30 | 16 | -- | -- | -- | -- | -- | ||
| NHL Totals | 702 | 437 | 342 | 779 | 484 | 64 | 35 | 35 | 70 | 74 | ||||
International play
- Played for Russia in the 1998 Winter Olympic Games and 2002 Winter Olympics. He was to represent Russia in the 1996 World Cup of Hockey, but was unable to play due to injury.
- GM for Russia during the 2006 Olympics
See also
External links
- Hockey statistics for Pavel Bure
- New York Rangers player profile
- Biographical sketch
- More Career Stats
References
- ^ "Bure retires, takes Russian GM job". Canadian Press. 2005-11-01. Retrieved 2007-02-02.
- 1971 births
- Calder Trophy winners
- Deutsche Eishockey-Liga players
- Florida Panthers players
- Living people
- People from Moscow
- New York Rangers players
- National Hockey League 50-goal seasons
- National Hockey League 100-point seasons
- Rocket Richard Trophy winners
- Russian ice hockey players
- Vancouver Canucks players
- Winter Olympics medalists