Once upon a time in Toronto, fans hoped that Carlo Colaiacovo would be the future of the Maple Leafs’ blue line.
He was drafted 17th overall in the 2001 NHL Entry Draft, and he showed his potential in the 2003 World Junior Championships.
Colaiacovo completely dominated the tournament, and everyone thought he was destined for greatness.
But injuries would completely overshadow his career.
Colaiacovo played in the NHL for 13 seasons, but not once did he play more than 67 games in a season.
Among other injuries, Colaiacovo battled concussions, and one of those head injuries would wound up costing him a brand new car — but to be fair, Tie Domi was to blame for it.
When Colaiacovo guested the First Up podcast, he revealed that while he was rehabbing a season-ending concussion at the start of the 2006-07 season, everyone on the Toronto Maple Leafs got a brand new BMW.
But as Colaiacova was away from the team, doing rehab by himself, the one and only Tie Domi completely forgot about him.
”I remember one year, I think it was Tie Domi who negotiated a BMW deal,” Colaiacova said.
”Every player on the roster got a BMW X5 … except me! I started the season still recovering from a concussion, so I was doing a lot of my individual rehab elsewhere. It would be early morning at the pool, hours spent at the practice facility. I would just stay away from the team.”
And the fact that he stayed away from the team led to Tie Domi’s gaffe.
”I guess when Tie negotiated this deal, he negotiated with the players that were at the rink every day, which I wasn’t. And when I showed up, six weeks later, everyone had their cars. I just looked around like, ’Is somebody come to me and tell me where my car is? Because it would be nice to get a BMW X5.’ The younger guys drove them, but I also think the older guys only drove them to game rinks, because that’s where you want to show your loyalty to the sponsorship. If you walked through the first row of the parking lot, you would see the exact same car in every spot, which was pretty cool.”
All the same cars except for one, that is.
Tie Domi was often praised for how much he took care of rookies and teammates that not had the same superstar status he had, but this one time, he really messed it up. Thankfully, Colaiacova can laugh about it today.
