John Garrett, beloved Vancouver Canucks broadcaster, dies at 74

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If that sounds a bit pithy given all that we know Garrett meant to his family, to his former teammates and people around the hockey world, to Vancouver Canucks fans for whom his game call was so connective, familiar and comfortable throughout his broadcast career and to his Sportsnet colleagues — John Shorthouse, Dan Murphy and Greg Shannon, their longtime producer — then bear with me. A few years ago, weeks before the pandemic shut everything down during the 2019-20 season, I spent an entire day with Garrett and Shorthouse for a feature at The Athletic. I met them in the morning at the St. Paul Hotel in Minnesota, tailed them throughout the day, went for lunch at Tom Reid’s nearby bar — Garrett loved that spot, and was proud to show off his Minnesota Fighting Saints photo on the wall — and hung out with them in the evening as they went about their business as on a Canucks game night. Etched in my mind, though, is the press box attendant who greeted Garrett as an old friend. “Oh boy!” she positively yelled the moment she saw him walking in with his roller bag. She knew she was getting donuts. The measure of a person isn’t necessarily how they treat the people it benefits them to be kind to and impress. It’s how they treat everybody else, how they behave when nobody is looking. On Tuesday, Sportsnet announced that Garrett, the inimitable, beloved longtime Canucks broadcaster, had died. He was 74. After playing 15 years in professional hockey as a goalie with time in both the WHA and NHL, Garrett embarked almost immediately on his broadcasting career. He became best known for his two decades as the color commentator on regional Canucks television broadcasts. He called his final Canucks game in 2023, but continued to be an analyst for select national games on Sportsnet. Garrett had a generosity of spirit that defined him. He loved the carnival-style mini donuts in Minnesota, made a running gag of how much he enjoyed them, and went to purchase two bags before every game that he called in that building. One bag was for him (and Shorthouse), the other was to share. Whether there was a hint of cynicism in this, best to buy two bags to preserve the maximum amount of snacks for oneself, or whether it was a generous gesture, hardly mattered. The point really was that Garrett would stride down the press box, catching up with all sorts of people he knew, and Minnesota-based arena staff as well, offering everyone a mini donut from the share bag. So, when I think about Garrett, it’s my interactions with him, his game calls imbued with that touch of silliness and deep joy that he brought to the broadcast (and to the rink) and his generosity that stand out to me. He was, simply put, the best. Until his very last days, Garrett’s color commentary was brilliant. His work with Harnarayan Singh during the first-round series he was assigned to between the Vegas Golden Knights and Utah Mammoth was exceptional. Nothing can quite match the chemistry and familiarity that Garrett and Shorthouse carved out over their decade and a half as a broadcast team, but it had that uncanny quality of two broadcasters just sitting on the couch with their audience and watching the game with them. That was the magic of Garrett, the ability to call a game so comfortably and accessibly whenever he was on the mic. Beneath that amiability, the fact that Garrett’s quality and likability as a person was so strong that it literally translated to the TV audience, there was a technical proficiency to Garrett’s color broadcast that hockey fans outside of the Vancouver market occasionally overlooked (because, admittedly, Garrett’s Canucks broadcasts had more than a tinge of home-team bias to them). He had an old goaltender’s eye for deflections, almost always seeing exactly how a goal through traffic had been scored even before he had the benefit of the replay. Back when I was first breaking into the business and counting Canucks scoring chances at Canucks Army, I remember that when Garrett used to say something like “That’s about the fourth scoring chance they’ve allowed this period,” I was shocked by his accuracy and instantaneous recall. Garrett also put in the work to stay up-to-date on the rulebook. He utilized NHL hockey operations resources scrupulously to explain weird calls or on-ice controversies during the broadcast itself. He cared deeply about the Canucks, and calling a good game for the fans. And those fans positively loved him for it. Because how could you not? Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms