Don Cherry isn't going to get the Order of Canada

In politics, there’s kicking a hornet’s nest, and there’s tripping over one.

Typing up a column about Don Cherry’s suitability for the Order of Canada without being asked to? That’s kicking a hornet’s nest.

But here goes.

Everyone has an opinion about the former hockey broadcaster. Mine is this: he made hockey games entertaining. He did. Cherry was like Donald Trump, in that you never knew what he was going to say next. But, unlike Trump, Cherry didn’t seem to revel in being cruel. He didn’t make a career of punching down.

He did like punching, however. Don Cherry knew that hockey was fast and physical, and fights were inevitable. And - let’s face it - hockey fights are sometimes entertaining.

So, most of the time, Cherry was entertaining. He was funny, with the garbled syntax and the byzantine sartorial choices. But, sometimes, Cherry would pop off about things that had nothing to do with hockey. And then he’d get in trouble.

You can debate whether he should’ve been kicked off the Hockey Night in Canada broadcast, and - seven years later - people still do. Here’s what got him in trouble. Here’s what he said.

“You people” Cherry said, indisputably referring to immigrants, “you love our way of life, you love our milk and honey, at least you can pay a couple bucks for a poppy or something like that.”

Before that, Cherry used to make fun of Europeans and “French guys.” He’d say female reporters shouldn’t be allowed in NHL dressing rooms. Stuff like that. All unforced errors. But what ended his career was the “you people” thing. Sportsnet fired him.

In the intervening years, his fans haven’t abandoned him. Premier Doug Ford gave him the Order of Ontario. My colleague Joe Warmington celebrated Cherry’s every utterance, just about. Life went on. Don Cherry continued to be Don Cherry - loving Canada, loving hockey.

And then, Conservative MP Andrew Lawton - who previously distinguished himself by saying that gays were “the real enemy” because of HIV/AIDS, and that abortion “robs” men of being Dads - decided to start a petition. To bestow the Order of Canada on Don Cherry.

Uh-oh.

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