Talk:Tony Hawk vs Wayne Gretzky/Rap Meanings/@comment-72.82.174.154-20161213000419

"Keep your mittens on, Gretzky; you're too clean!"

Gretzky's play was renouned for being above-board and gentlemanly (i.e., "clean") as opposed to resorting to dirty tricks and rough play (including physical fighting) to gain an advantage; Gretzky's NHL career numbers include a relatively low 0.39 penalty minutes per game and winning the NHL's Lady Byng Memorial Trophy (given each year to the "player adjudged to have exhibited the best type of sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct combined with a high standard of playing ability") five times, second-most in league history. Hawk is telling Gretzky not to bother joining this fight by keeping his "mittens" on - "dropping the gloves" is a shorthand way to refer to hockey players removing their gloves right before an on-ice fight and using the term "mittens" implies a childish demeanor.

"So you best prepare for arrival and cross-check!"

Following on the flying theme in the previous line, Gretzky is warning Hawk to prepare for his arrival. "Prepare for arrival and cross-check" is a common announcement made by airline captains to flight attendants after a plane lands at an airport, telling them to begin arrival procedures and to make sure every procedure is checked by at least two different attendants ("cross-checking" each others' work). Gretzky combines the airline pilot line with a pun on cross-check, a minor penalty in ice hockey where the offending player checks (physically disrupts an opponent with the puck) while holding the shaft of his stick with both hands so that the stick is going across the opponent's body.

"And I'm too far ahead for you to catch up!"

Many of the records Gretzky set are at wide margins compared to the next closest player (for example, he holds the NHL career record for most regular season points at 2,857 - the next closest is Mark Messier at 1,887), making it unlikely that they will be broken by any player in the near future. Gretzky is applying these wide leads to his rap battle with Hawk, telling him that he cannot catch up with him being so far ahead this late in the rap.