Craig Button wants to assure everyone he’s fine now, although Monday afternoon, the TSN hockey analyst sounded, in a word, terrible.
Button was in Ottawa doing a preview of the Slovakia vs. Switzerland game in the 2025 IIHF World Junior Championship. After TSN host Laura Diakun did an intro, she pitched it to Button.
At that exact moment, Button began coughing. He could not stop.
“Oh, bless you,” Diakun said. Meanwhile a highlight video played, accompanied by silence instead of Button’s commentary. Button tried to talk a couple of times, but was clearly suppressing the urge to cough.
“All right, we’re going to wrap this up,” Diakun said. “This is the beauty of live television here.”
Later, Button joined play-by-play announcer Bryan Mudryk in the booth for the game. The coughing fit evidently was not anything serious, because Mudryk cracked a couple of jokes.
“Great news, we’ve resuscitated Craig Button, he is back and he’s ready to go,” Mudryk said.
“A little bit of a coughing attack, I am much better now,” Button said. “Never something you want to have happen. Timing wasn’t very good.”
“Craig, we’ve worked together a long time, and that might be the first time ever I’ve heard you speechless,” Mudryk joked.
Button, a former NHL executive and scout, is TSN’s director of scouting. He serves as an analyst on TSN’s That’s Hockey as well as the network’s regional NHL broadcasts. He’s also known for his “Craig’s List” ranking of NHL Draft prospects each year. He is not, as Mudryk noted, known for ever being rendered speechless by a coughing fit.
About Arthur Weinstein
Arthur spends his free time traveling around the U.S. to sporting events, state and national parks, and in search of great restaurants off the beaten path.