Doc helps Daigle see more than the negative

Former top pick finds peace after career as a 'bust'

- DAVE FESCHUK

Alex Daigle says wearing a nurse's uniform in a promo shoot put an early target on his back.

There’s a moment near the end of “Chosen One,” the new Prime Video documentary on the hockey life of Alexandre Daigle, when Daigle appears to breathe a sigh of relief.

The production, out this week, is framed around scenes of Daigle, the No. 1 pick in the 1993 NHL draft, sitting in a screening room watching a video summation of his career. Given how Daigle is widely considered one of the ugliest draft busts in hockey history, the reel is filled with more lowlights than highlights, more grim memories than great ones.

But as it wraps up, Daigle offers the camera a telling assessment. To paraphrase, he says watching his younger self fall flat on his face wasn’t as painful as he expected it to be.

As a younger man, he explained in a recent interview, he was inclined to believe that everything about his hockey career was a disaster. Certainly, he was convinced that almost nobody saw any other side to the story.

“For me, it seemed like everything was negative,” said Daigle, now 48. “But looking back, it was not the case.”