Roy Roedger (born October 11, 1958) is a retired

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an Ice rink, ice skating rink with Ice hockey rink, lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two o ...

player born and raised in Canada. Roedger, of German descent, left Canada for Germany in 1978 and played eleven seasons there. He also fielded for the

German national team German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

at two

Olympic games The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a multi ...

and six

World Championships A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

. After the end of his career he returned to Canada. He is a member of the

German Ice Hockey Hall of Fame The German Ice Hockey Hall of Fame, also called Eishockeymuseum in German, was founded in 1988 and is located in Augsburg. The hall honors individuals who have contributed to ice hockey in Germany, and displays memorabilia depicting contributions of ...

Biography

Roedger, born in

Weston Weston may refer to: Places Australia * Weston, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb of Canberra * Weston, New South Wales * Weston Creek, a residential district of Canberra * Weston Park, Canberra, a park Canada * Weston, Nova Scotia * ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...

of German descent, started his playing career with the

Prince Albert Raiders The Prince Albert Raiders are a major junior ice hockey team in the Western Hockey League. The Raiders play in the East Division of the Eastern Conference. They are based in the city of Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, Canada. The team plays its hom ...

in the

Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League The Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League is a Junior 'A' ice hockey league operating in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan and one of nine member leagues of the Canadian Junior Hockey League. Open to North American-born players 20 years ...

.Roy Roedger
ww.hockeydb.com, accessed: 20 December 2011 Roedger was discovered in 1978 by Heinz Weisenbach, coach of the Mannheimer ERC in the German

Ice hockey Bundesliga The Eishockey-Bundesliga ("Federal Ice Hockey League") was formed in 1958 as the elite hockey competition in the Federal Republic of Germany, replacing the '' Oberliga'' in this position.Klein, p. 12 From the 1994-95 season, it was in turn repl ...

. Weisenbach went to Canada to discover whether he could find Canadian ice hockey players of German descent who were eligible to obtain a German passport and therefore would not take up one of the limited permissible spots for foreigners. Additionally, they would also be eligible for the German national team. Weisenbach flew to

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, most pop ...

and contacted German clubs in Canada to make contacts. He watched a number of junior games and eventually discovered a number of young players, among them Roedger, his brother

Peter Peter may refer to: People * List of people named Peter, a list of people and fictional characters with the given name * Peter (given name) ** Saint Peter (died 60s), apostle of Jesus, leader of the early Christian Church * Peter (surname), a su ...

Harold Kreis Harold Kreis (born January 19, 1959) is a German-Canadian ice hockey coach and a former professional player. He is a member of the German ice hockey hall of fame. Playing career Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, Kreis played junior ice hocke ...

Manfred Wolf Manfred Wolf (born 11 January 1948 in Steinbach-Hallenberg) is an East German former ski jumper who competed from 1971 to 1973. Career On 23 March 1969, he set the ski jumping world record at 165 metres (541 ft) at the opening of Velikanka br ...

Ralph Krueger Ralph Krueger (born 31 August 1959) is a Canadian-born German professional ice hockey coach and former player. He is the former head coach of the Edmonton Oilers and Buffalo Sabres of the National Hockey League (NHL), and former chairman of South ...

, George Fritz,

Mike Schmidt Michael Jack Schmidt (born September 27, 1949) is an American former professional baseball third baseman who played his entire 18-season career in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the Philadelphia Phillies. Schmidt was a 12-time All-Star and a ...

, and

Karl Friesen Karl Heinz Friesen (born June 30, 1958) is a Canadian-born German former professional ice hockey goaltender. Friesen spent most of his career in Germany, playing in the Eishockey-Bundesliga and Deutsche Eishockey Liga, but he also played four game ...

. Weisenbach managed to convince some of them to join his club, Mannheimer ERC while others, like Friesen, later appeared in the Bundesliga and for Germany for other clubs. It marked the beginning of an influx of ethnic German Canadians, the ''Deutschkanadier'', in German ice hockey and on the national team.Klein, p. 152 Roedger joined Mannheim, freshly promoted to the Bundesliga, and by 1980, the club won the national championship, giving credit to Weisenbach's initially belittled recruitment effort. Roedgers played for six seasons at Mannheim and, from 1982, also for the German national team. While at Mannheim he played in three World Championships and the

1984 Winter Olympics The 1984 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XIV Olympic Winter Games ( Serbo-Croatian and Slovene: ''XIV. Zimske olimpijske igre''; Cyrillic: XIV Зимске олимпијске игре; mk, XIV Зимски олимписки иг� ...

for Germany.Roy Roedger (GER)
www.eurohockey.net, accessed: 20 December 2011 In 1985, in a friendly against Switzerland, he was part of the Canadian bloc of the German team when, for the first time, all skaters on the ice were born in Canada, a novelty in German ice hockey. The players were Roedger, Krueger and Wolf as forwards while Kreis and Schmidt played defense, all discovered for Germany by Weisenbach. In the 1984–85 season, Roedger was involved in an incident in which he hit Kölner EC player Steve McNeil in the right eye with his stick. In the scene, which was repeated on German television many times, McNeil is shown to lose a lot of blood. McNeil lost up to 50 percent of his vision in the right eye and Roedger was forced to pay him compensation after an out-of-court settlement but intent was never proven and it was generally considered to be an accidental foul. At the end of the 1984–85 season, Roedger left Mannheim for the Düsseldorfer EG. With Düsseldorf, he won one more German championship in his last season, 1989–90, and also took part in three more World Championships and the

1988 Winter Olympics ) , nations = 57 , athletes = 1,423 (1,122 men, 301 women) , events = 46 in 6 sports (10 disciplines) , opening = February 13, 1988 , closing = February 28, 1988 , opened_by = Governor General Jeanne Sauvé , cauldron ...

. In 1990, aged 31, he retired from Bundesliga ice hockey.

After his playing career

Roedger returned to Canada after his career ended. He acquired a degree in sports and event marketing and formed SDI Marketing, a sports marketing agency of which he is the CEO. Roedger's younger brother Peter (born 1960) also played in Germany, starting his career with

Berliner SC Berliner Sport-Club, commonly known as Berliner SC, is a German association football club based in Berlin. The team is part of a sports club which also has departments for badminton, hockey, and rugby. History ''Berliner SC'' was created ou ...

in 1981, playing for a season with his brother in Mannheim in 1982–83 before dropping down to the 2nd Ice hockey Bundesliga. He played, until 1992, for

Eintracht Frankfurt Eintracht Frankfurt e.V. () is a professional sports club based in Frankfurt, Hesse, Germany. It is best known for its football club, which was founded on 8 March 1899. The team is currently playing in the Bundesliga, the top tier of the Germa ...

, Duisburger SC and

EC Kassel The EC Kassel Huskies are a professional ice hockey club based in Kassel, Hessen, Germany. The club currently competes in DEL2, the second level of ice hockey in Germany. The Huskies were founded in 1977 and have competed in the top five leve ...

.Peter Roedger
at www.hockeydb.com, accessed: 21 December 2011

Honours

** Champions: (2) 1979–80, 1989–90 ** Runners-up: (4) 1981–82, 1982–83, 1984–85, 1988–89 *

Ice Hockey World Championships The Ice Hockey World Championships are an annual international men's ice hockey tournament organized by the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF). First officially held at the 1920 Summer Olympics, it is the sport's highest profile annu ...

** Participant: (6)

1982 Events January * January 1 – In Malaysia and Singapore, clocks are adjusted to the same time zone, UTC+8 (GMT+8.00). * January 13 – Air Florida Flight 90 crashes shortly after takeoff into the 14th Street Bridge in Washington, D.C., Un ...

1983 The year 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning ...

1985 The year 1985 was designated as the International Youth Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 ** The Internet's Domain Name System is created. ** Greenland withdraws from the European Economic Community as a result of a ...

1986 The year 1986 was designated as the International Year of Peace by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 **Aruba gains increased autonomy from the Netherlands by separating from the Netherlands Antilles. **Spain and Portugal enter ...

1987 File:1987 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The MS Herald of Free Enterprise capsizes after leaving the Port of Zeebrugge in Belgium, killing 193; Northwest Airlines Flight 255 crashes after takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airpor ...

1989 File:1989 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Cypress structure collapses as a result of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, killing motorists below; The proposal document for the World Wide Web is submitted; The Exxon Valdez oil tanker ru ...

* Olympic ice hockey tournament ** Participant: (2)

1984 Events January * January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888. * January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeast As ...

, 1988

References

Sources

* Günter Klein: ''30 Jahre Eishockey-Bundesliga'' Copress Verlag, published: 1988,

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Roedger, Roy 1958 births Living people Adler Mannheim players Canadian ice hockey right wingers Canadian people of German descent Düsseldorfer EG players German ice hockey players Olympic ice hockey players of West Germany Sportspeople from Toronto Ice hockey players at the 1984 Winter Olympics Ice hockey players at the 1988 Winter Olympics Prince Albert Raiders (SJHL) players Ice hockey people from Ontario Canadian expatriate ice hockey players in Germany