Former 1st-round draft pick recounts career, offers advice to Dylan Cozens

Greg Vaydik jokes his status as an NHL first-round draft pick and four dollars is enough to get him a beer at a Dallas bar.

The former Yellowknifer, who now lives in Texas, was picked seventh overall in the 1975 NHL draft by the Chicago Blackhawks. Fellow northerner Dylan Cozens tied this achievement last weekend when he was drafted by the Buffalo Sabres.

Vaydik caught up The Trailbreaker host Loren McGinnis this week to take a walk down memory lane and discuss what it meant to be drafted back then versus now.

"I'm going to tell you," he said.

"I was sitting in the local pub ... and somebody, I forget who, tapped me on the shoulder and told me I got drafted. I said, 'Well that's pretty neat. Let's celebrate.' I looked in my wallet and I didn't have any cash."

In the end, Vaydik was able to tear it up a bit with a bit of help from his friends.

Cozens, of course, learned he was drafted to the Sabres in Vancouver, surrounded by family, on live television.

"The whole thing is a production now and rightfully so," he said. "These guys work hard to get where they're at not that we didn't."

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Vaydik said not everything has changed he definitely did dream of becoming a professional hockey player when he was a youngster, just as Cozens undoubtedly did.

He said if he has any advice for the 18-year-old, it would be to not be afraid to ask questions and to stay in shape year-round.

"That wasn't one of my strong suits," he said.

Vaydik's NHL career

Vaydik described himself as a "finesse" player on the ice, rather than a fighter.

"I thought I was a good two-way hockey player and a pretty good face-off guy," he said.

His favourite memories from his professional hockey career were his first two games because his father was able to attend.

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He actually got called up right as his father was flying down to Dallas to visit him. Because he had no way to tell his father to re-route to Vanvouver where he had to be the next day his roommate picked him up, kept him overnight, and sent him back to the airport.

"He got to see me play my first game and then two days later I'm playing on Hockey Night in Canada in Montreal," said Vaydik.

"So he got to see my first couple games. That was kind of a thrill."

But the moment he'll always carry with him? Losing a face-off.

"In the Montreal game I thought I was a hotshot face-off guy," he said, describing when he went head-to-head against Doug Jarvis and Bob Gainey.

"I take the face-off just on the left side, outside of our blue line, and I'm bearin' down and I'm bearin' down to win it. And Jarvis just pushes it ahead. He goes with me to pull it back and he flips it ahead, but then it bounces off the board between the winger and the defensemen and Gainey just goes around both of them, picks up the puck and scores.

"And I'm minus one."

All told, Vaydik played five hockey games in the National Hockey League and scored zero goals. He retired from his hockey career in 1982 with the Blackhawks farm team in Dallas.

Vaydik was recently back in Chicago to see his daughter graduate from DePaul University.

"I told her that maybe one of us could make it big in Chicago," he joked.