Canucks social media trolls are pathetic and fun at the same time. It’s laughable, but somewhat entertaining when people who know nothing about me and who I’ll never meet, rip me personally on a topic. The ones who keep it going after eight or nine attacks either have serious mental health issues or are local beat writers typing under an alias.
Regardless, I noticed a handful of them this week getting on Director of Communications for Canucks Sports and Entertainment Victoria Ullrich. She apparently wrote the press release announcing the revocation of Daily Hive writer Trevor Beggs’s press credential.
Relax peeps. That would have been a collaborative effort, and I guarantee you she wasn’t the one who insisted on tossing Beggs out of the building after one period of hockey on Thursday night.
In what is an utterly toxic environment at times, Ullrich actually remains a dedicated and obedient employee. Before my Rogers Arena banishment four years ago, and on the road since, she’s always been cordial and professional.
Most of all, she’s honest. During the 2022 meeting when her PR cohort Craig MacEwen was lying through his teeth about why I was being banished, and how he had nothing to do with trying to block me from covering the team on the road, she stepped up and admitted what had really taken place.
It was an awkward ah-ha moment, one that changed the entire mood of the proceedings, while remarkably refreshing at the same time. With a third person on-hand watching, at that time the always amiable and helpful PR assistant Marcus Anderson, I reckon she decided enough was enough.
MacEwen told me there were nine reasons why I wasn’t allowed to cover the team, but wouldn’t name one. That’s because it was bullshit and he couldn’t come up with one. It was like listening to Donald Trump, and it established a pattern of remarkably unnecessary bullying.
Last season in Seattle the Canucks came in twice and both times I attended the morning skates. While Vancouver was coming off the ice on January 2nd, Ullrich spotted me coming down the corridor and called MacEwen. She was instructed to tell the team’s travelling security guy Trevor, not to let me in the dressing room because of an “incident”.
It just so happens that frequently during the 2021-’22 season and pretty much every day in Whistler, BC during the 2022 Canucks training camp, just before I was banned on October 1st, I spoke to Trevor and got to know him. We talked families, travel, you name it. An absolutely delightful gentleman.
Trevor said, “do you want me to call Craig and ask what the incident is?” I said “no, that’s OK”, but he did it anyway. I think he tried twice. MacEwen was suddenly unavailable.
I guess it would have been embarrassing to lie to your own security guy.
So Trevor and I chatted like it was any other day. I didn’t go in the dressing room, didn’t need to anyway, and I waited to talk to head coach Rick Tocchet out in the hall with everyone else.
I chatted again with Trevor before I left and he expressed regret for not knowing what was going on.
On March 1st, MacEwen was there in person, the first time I recall him making the trip to Seattle in three or four seasons. He limped over along the glass to tell me I wouldn’t be allowed in the room. I said, “yeah, that’s what I heard.”
Not only did I not go in the room, but MacEwen held “Toc’s” interview inside the locker room as well, away from the standard sponsor backdrop in the hallway, presumably so I couldn’t participate.
I waited in the hallway, sitting against the wall on my laptop. Toc eventually came around the corner, recognized me and asked me what I was doing.
We walked and talked for the next ten minutes before MacEwen came by and interrupted us just outside the bus area. Part of the conversation was about my ban and I confirmed whether he still had the same cell phone number.
For Ullrich’s small part in any of this, again, she was just following orders.
She’s a young woman who’s proven she has the integrity to be running an NHL PR department of her own, supervising others. Given her dedication to the cause regardless of how bizarre the task might be, her honestly, and her friendly demeanour, she should be considered for an upgrade or a head job in another market if she’s interested.
In the meantime, leave her be, basement-dwellers. Stick to ripping me and other people you know nothing about.
Earlier Canucks:
— Canucks: Before Hughes, The Greatest Ever Was Edler
There’s always more to the story. Thanks for not jumping to conclusions and sticking up for her when she needs it most. Where was Molly Ray’s name in all of this? Or Doyle?