“Niinimaa loved, or so it seemed, every minute and every one of the 399 regular season games he played with the Oilers over the parts of six seasons he spent here. He loved the city, and he showed it by playing the best hockey of his NHL career here after arriving from the Philadelphia Flyers in March of 1998. And the city loved him, despite a style of play that earned the noted metal head the nickname Spaz.

“For reporters, he was a go-to quote. When things went off the rails for the Oilers, fairly often at the hands of Niinimaa himself, he was as brutally honest a player as you’d find. “That was unacceptable. That was just bullshit,” he’d declare while spitting tobacco juice into a cup. Gold. More important than all that, Niinimaa was a helluva player during his time in Edmonton, playing tough minutes, running the power play and, occasionally, making the highlight reels with plays that seemed like absolute genius and blunders that made you laugh out loud.”