Do we like Wayne Gretzky?
Our score: 7 out of 10. No harmful words of his own turned up and the record is mostly clean, but one contested political friendship and one unresolved lawsuit keep him short of the top.
Wayne Gretzky was born in Brantford, Ontario, in 1961 and was skating at two. By six he was playing against much older boys. He joined the Edmonton Oilers in 1979, won MVP as a rookie, and led them to four Stanley Cups in the 1980s.
He retired in 1999 as the NHL's all-time leading scorer with 894 goals and was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame the same year. He also ran Canada's men's Olympic team, which won gold in 2002. So when he says he's a Canadian icon, nobody argues about the hockey.
The stoush is about Trump. After the 2024 election Gretzky attended Trump's victory party wearing a MAGA hat and later went to the inauguration, just as Trump was talking up Canada becoming the 51st state. Then he was named Canada's honorary captain for the 4 Nations final against the US, and the backlash hit hard.
Fans booed him at that final after he gave a thumbs-up to the American players, and Edmonton's Wayne Gretzky Drive got a rename petition. In a November 2025 podcast he said he never became a US citizen, can't vote in either country, and is “just a hockey player”. Where you land depends on whether you read the Trump friendship as a mate being a mate or as cosying up to a bloke who has threatened his homeland.
On the harm test, we found no words from Gretzky about LGBTQ+ or trans people, women, vaccines or the climate, which is honestly a thin file. Bobby Orr defended him, writing that “Wayne respects your right to such beliefs.” Note he is also not a politician, so there's no voting record to check.
The one real stain is commercial. A 2022 California lawsuit by a former manager and investor in a gum company alleged Gretzky fraudulently claimed he lost 35 pounds chewing its weight-loss gum. It's an allegation only, we found no ruling, and the excerpt we read carried no response from him.