Sometimes Sisters Need Kissing, Too

Eddie Erdelatz was fit to be tied.

Fifty-five years ago, the head football coach at the U.S. Naval Academy had just presided over a scoreless tie with Duke. And he struggled to come up with an analogy to put his feelings about the 0-0 tie into words.

Then he came up with this gem.

“A tie is like kissing your sister!”

Even I, sister-less, know what Eddie was driving at.

It’s one of sports’ greatest ironies that Eddie Erdelatz died just nine days before what many say was one of the greatest college football games in history. Ironic because that game – the Notre Dame-Michigan State tussle of 1966 – ended in, you guessed it, a tie.

Eddie Erdelatz, also the very first coach of the Oakland Raiders, coined a phrase that’s stuck for 55 years — and counting

Eddie’s analogy from 1953 is still spewed today.

It has joined other great mantras from the second half of the 20^th century.

“It ain’t over till the fat lady sings.”

“A walk is as good as a hit.”

“On any given Sunday, any NFL team can beat another.”

They say we are a sports nation that doesn’t tolerate losing. But it appears that what we really are is a nation that doesn’t tolerate ties.

Ties simply aren’t acceptable, judging by the length we will go to ensure that one never occurs.

College football, Eddie Erdelatz’s old haunts, refuses to allow any game to end in a tie. Its overtime gives the ball to each team at the opponents’ 30-yard line and provides four downs to either make a first down, score, or fail. If the teams are still tied (field goals are allowed), the whole thing is repeated. And repeated. And repeated – until we have a winner. Some games have been known to survive five or six of these contrived overtimes. Campus football had made it perfectly clear: we’ll stay all night if we have to – but there will NOT be any game ending in a tie.

No sister kissing!

The NFL has its own kind of overtime – but one that terribly overvalues the coin flip. It’s an unfair overtime – one that doesn’t normally allow both teams to possess the football. The coin flip winner, at a shockingly high rate of success, usually kicks a game-winning field goal. Fair or unfair, at least there are hardly any ties. Mission accomplished.

Then there’s that wacky NHL.

You gotta hand it to them – they managed to create an obscene way of breaking ties, while at the same time providing a point for the team that loses this mind-boggling tiebreaker.

There can be no ties! But there CAN be a point for losing!

Those NHL people really are a bunch of hockey pucks. In the name of Don Rickles, what on Earth is going on here?

In the spring of 2004, the league crowned the Tampa Bay Lightning as Stanley Cup Champions. Then the NHL went away – vanished thanks to a labor dispute.

No hockey for one full season. It was technically called a lockout. Call it whatever you want – the NHL, incredibly, allowed its in-fighting to rob an entire season from its shrinking fan base. It was nose-cutting-off and face-spiting at its most ridiculous.

Panicked, the league was determined not to return for the 2005-06 season wearing the same clothes. They threw in a bunch of rules changes and painted a gosh darn trapezoid around the net (I still don’t really know what the trapezoid signifies; something to do with the goalies playing the puck. I’ll get back to you on this). But that wasn’t enough. There had to be an abolition of tie games.

No sister kissing in the NHL, either!

Now, a history lesson. In 1983, the NHL, already getting restless with tie games some 25 years ago, added a five-minute overtime session, sudden death style. Fine. The worst case was five extra minutes of hockey. If no winner, the game ended in a tie, with each team receiving one point in the standings. I had no problem with this. But apparently the NHL did.

In the late-1990s, the league started to go sideways with overtime. Concerned that teams were sandbagging it in the extra session to assure themselves of at least one point, the league threw in a wrinkle: the winning team in OT still gets two points. But the loser still hangs on to its one point. A point for losing! What a concept.

Ahh, but there were still tie games under this scenario. BAD tie games! Bad, bad!

Enter the – and I cringe just typing this word – shootout.

The NHL was short-cutting its way to determining a winner. If the five-minute overtime failed to produce a victor, there would be a parade of shooters swooping in on the goalies. And this would go on, ad nauseam, until somebody won by virtue of a scoring round system.

One of the most exhilarating, breathtaking plays in all of sports belonged in hockey’s den. It was the penalty shot. A man got taken down with a clear path to the goal and he was awarded the opportunity to bear down on the goalie, one-on-one – while the crowd gasped and stood. Everything here is in the past tense, because after the NHL introduced the shootout – essentially a bunch of contrived penalty shots taken post-game – the penalty shot’s thrills and chills were largely excised.

Oh why, I ask – why did the NHL feel the need to use a #$!% shootout to settle things? Do we stop extra inning baseball games and hold a home run derby? Do we whistle the play dead in the NBA and have a free throw shooting contest?

Oh and by the way, the team that loses the shootout still gets a point.

The shootout is evil. It’s all wrong. It smacks of minor league. It’s taken one of the game’s crown jewels and cheapened it. Thanks to the shootout, the penalty shot is no longer diamond – it’s cubic zirconia. It’s phony drama – contrived and shoved down the throats of a loyal fan base because they’ve been told it’s good for them. Like castor oil.

Why can’t we have tie games anymore? Is there something inherently wrong with a contest that doesn’t produce a clear cut winner? Must we nullify sixty minutes of hard-fought football or hockey with a gimmicky ending?

Even Eddie Erdelatz wouldn’t have gone for it. No way, sister.

Lidstrom The Best Ever? Prove To Me Otherwise

I never saw Doug Harvey play, but I felt like I have.

Harvey, the seven-time winner of the Norris Trophy as the NHL’s best defenseman, played in the neanderthal days of the league, when the number of franchises was six and a “western swing” meant games in Chicago and Detroit.

I feel like I know of Harvey’s skill set because of my late father, who would go on and on to me about the chubby blue liner who played mainly for Montreal.

“He’d get maybe one, two goals a year,” my dad would say, always giving me the same litany about Harvey. I’d heard the case over and over — but all was good. “He could block shots, defend in front of his net. He was just a good defenseman,” he would go on, emphasizing the word as if to besmirch those who “claim” to play the position nowadays. There was nothing fancy or flashy about Doug Harvey, my dad would drill into me. He was just a good defenseman.

Today, Harvey is one of only two defensemen who have won more Norrises than the Red Wings’ Nicklas Lidstrom, who picked up Norris No. 6 last night in Toronto. Harvey has seven; the all-time leader, someone named Robert Orr, has eight.

I’ve written in this space that Lidstrom is modern day sports’ answer to the Tigers’ Mechanical Man, all-world second baseman Charlie Gehringer, who owned the position in the 1930s. Plenty has been written about how Lidstrom is never out of position, and rarely gets burned, and always seems to make the right play, etc.

He’s just a good defenseman. Of course, he can produce points, too — something defensemen didn’t start doing until the late-1960s. Thanks to one man, that all changed.

Orr thrilled us — and yes, I DID see him play in his prime — with his revolutionary method of defending, which was based on the theory that you can’t score if I have the puck, and you can’t beat us if we overpower you with our offense. No defenseman had come up with the end-to-end rush until Orr came along. And no defenseman had come close to leading the league in scoring, until Orr did that, too. But his knees betrayed him, or else Orr would have won maybe 10, 11 Norrises.

It’s plenty likely that Lidstrom will catch and surpass Harvey, thus tying Orr. And it’s not bad money if you’d like to wager it on Lidstrom, when all is said and done, surpassing both of them and standing alone as the most-winning Norris defenseman of all time.

Doug Harvey

Which begs the question — and you probably saw this one coming paragraphs ago.

Is Nick Lidstrom the best defenseman ever?

Actually, you’re too late; I’ve already asked this, and answered it. In that same rant about Lidstrom being mechanical, I came to my own conclusion: Yes, Nick Lidstrom will go down as the best defenseman to ever lace up an NHL skate.

But you haven’t seen Doug Harvey!!

No, but even dear old dad might agree with me here. He died in 1996, in the middle of Lidstrom’s sixth NHL season. Not long enough to fully appreciate how good No. 5 is now. I mean, we all knew Lidstrom was good back in ’96, but you can’t tell me that he hasn’t gotten better in the 12 years hence. Lidstrom does the things that had my dad mesmerized by Harvey. The only thing Harvey might have on Lidstrom is the propensity to block shots with his body, but some of that is because the difference in eras. Besides, I haven’t seen where Lidstrom’s infrequency in this area has cost the Red Wings anything to speak of.

I’m not normally one to declare today’s star athlete better than those of yore. I can be curmudgeonly that way, I admit. But I’m just not seeing where Lidstrom — who I’ve seen from the get-go — could possibly not be doing something that someone else did — which would, in turn, make that someone else better than he is. Forget the shot-blocking thing. That’s nitpicking, and you know it. Who else has played this game, night in and night out, with the same monotonous level of excellence as Nick Lidstrom has? I’m talking every night.

Don Cherry’s favorite: Bobby Orr

Sometimes these post-season awards can be handed out based on reputation. Multiple winners, regardless of sport, aren’t always worthy. That’s something else you already know.

But being a six-time Norris winner isn’t the same as being a six-time Pro Bowler. Not even close. Lidstrom wins the Norris every year, because every year he’s the best defenseman the league has to offer. Simple as that. What’s more, he wins it every year because no one else is even close to him; no one to even challenge him and maybe break his streak, if even to keep things mildly interesting. He’s not only the best, he’s far and away the best.

Orr dominated his position for a time, but mainly because he was a pioneer of sorts. No one else did, or could do, what Orr did when he sprang his offensive skills on an unsuspecting league. And Orr would occasionally leave his position vulnerable, being caught up ice more than once. Of course, before his knees went bad, he had the speed to compensate at times.

Mr. Norris — I mean, Lidstrom

Lidstrom dominates now in a league that is filled with offensive-minded blue liners, and tough stay-at-home ones, too. No disrespect to Harvey, but when he played, there were perhaps 24-to-30 defensemen who played every night in the NHL. Lidstrom plays in a league where 180-to-200 defensemen play regularly. So is it more impressive to be first among 30, or first among 200?

Harvey dominated in his own way. Orr dominated in his own, revolutionary way. And now Lidstrom dominates, in his mechanical, robotic, perfect way.

The only thing Harvey and Orr have on Lidstrom, in my opinion, is more Norris Trophies to their credit. Soon, they won’t even have that.

Of The Four Recent Red Wings Victims, Pens Most Likely To Be Heard From Again

Sidney Crosby is gone for the summer. School’s out. His final exam performance wasn’t good enough to win the Stanley Cup. And all his young Pittsburgh Penguins schoolmates – those early-20-somethings who did their best to make the Red Wings’ lives spooky during this year’s Cup Finals – are gone with him, perhaps to gather together and raise a cold…soda (Sid’s only 20, don’t forget) and figure out a way to return to the championship round next spring.

The Penguins have the goods to do it, you know.

The Red Wings have sent four teams from the inferior Eastern Conference home for the summer since 1997.

There were the heavily-favored Philadelphia Flyers of ’97 – a big, supposedly fearsome team with a line called the Legion of Doom: wingers John LeClair and Mikael Renberg, and center Eric Lindros. How would the less physical (again, supposedly) Red Wings handle such beasts coming at them in droves throughout the Finals?

Easy. Coach Scotty Bowman just made sure defenseman Nick Lidstrom was on the ice, along with Larry Murphy, whenever the frightening Legion of Doom climbed over the boards. Bowman chose the finesse of Lidstrom and Murphy over the brawn of Vladimir Konstantinov, surprising those experts who had the Flyers winning the series rather handily. And finesse totally shut down the Legion. In fact, that line was so ineffective, the Flyers could have been considered to have Legionnaire’s Disease. The Red Wings swept. The Flyers haven’t been back to the Finals since.

The next year, the surprising Washington Capitals, who seemed to need a couple of games to simply explain their presence in the Finals, were flicked away in four straight games, though it took a classic comeback in Game 2 to assure that. But those Caps were a collection of has-beens and not-quites and fluked their way into the Finals. That team was never heard from again.

In 2002, the Carolina Hurricanes showed up in the final round, and while everyone was still asking, “Who ARE these guys?” the ‘Canes had stolen Game 1 in Detroit in overtime. The Red Wings needed a late goal to force OT and three extra sessions to win Game 3 in Carolina. But the Cup was won in five games, just one over the minimum, and it took the Hurricanes four more years to return to the Finals (they won it in 2006), and today they cannot be considered a good bet to do it again anytime soon.

But these Penguins, these young, high-scoring, physical Penguins, are sure to break the string of vanquished Red Wings opponents in the Finals who are never heard from again. In fact, don’t be surprised if by next Memorial Day we’re around our grills talking about a Red Wings-Penguins rematch. And continue to not be surprised if the other team wins it in 2009.

There’s Crosby, for one. His initials match the Stanley Cup’s, and it will be oh-so-appropriate by the time Sid the Kid’s career is over with – sometime in the year 2025 or so. Crosby, though crammed down an unsuspecting public’s throats by the league and its minions and propaganda machine (which includes the National Broadcasting Company), is indeed the real deal. He’s as close to the next Wayne Gretzky as the NHL is ever going to get – both in terms of sheer talent and potential to win multiple championships.

Crosby is the face of the NHL — the closest thing to Gretzky since, well, Gretzky

There’s goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury, who didn’t have the best game of his career in Game 6 but who was the reason there was a sixth game to begin with, thanks to his 55-save performance in Game 5’s epic battle. He’s young, as all the Penguins seem to be, and there’s no reason why he can’t keep it up. There’s Evgeni Malkin, who was terribly disappointing in the Finals but who was terrific leading up to it, and actually showed some signs late in the series against Detroit that he was just a player in a slump at the worst possible time, and was about to break out of it. It gives me the creeps to think of what he may have done in a Game 7.

No need for me to rattle off other names from the roster. The ages are the first thing you should look at if you happen upon a listing on the Internet. Lots of 20s under the age column.

These Penguins more closely remind me of the Edmonton Oilers of 1983 than any other Cup-losing team since then, if you want to know. The ’83 Oilers lost in the Finals to the New York Islanders, who by beating Edmonton had just won their fourth straight Cup. And those Oilers were basically the same core who went on to win five Cups in the next seven seasons. The same Oilers led by Gretzky. The Oilers of Paul Coffey, Mark Messier, Kevin Lowe, and the rest. The 2008 Penguins may have lost a Cup, but something tells me they gained a future.

If I was Pittsburgh coach Michel Therrien – who must dump some of the whining and crying if he’s to raise his game to another level, by the way – I’d be sure to remind my players of how they turned what was looking to be a snoozer of a Finals series into one that won’t be forgotten for a long time, if ever. I’d affix it into their skulls that after being shutout in Games 1 and 2 in Detroit, hardly anyone thought the series would last to even a fifth game. But the Pens, who had breezed through the first three rounds without any adversity or angst, picked themselves off the mat, won two of three, and suddenly a series had broken out. The TV ratings confirm how much interest there was, despite those first two games that were all Detroit.

Yes, I’d say these Pittsburgh Penguins did more than just scare the bejeebers out of the Red Wings and their fans during the past couple of weeks. They arrived. And they’re not just passing through, like so many of the pretenders who’ve fluked their way to the Finals and lost, never to be heard from again. Uh-uh.

Nashville’s Trotz A Rarity Among Coaches

When the NFL granted the city of Dallas a franchise in 1960, it was the Big D’s second chance at pro football. The first try, the woeful Texans, lasted just one season — 1952. They were the typical expansion football team — a motley crew of other team’s rejects who were prone to stumbling and bumbling and with a fetish for being beaten handily every Sunday. By the midway point of the season, the Texans became wards of the league and didn’t even play any home games. Players’ paychecks bounced like rubber balls with regularity. Yet strangely, several players from that Texans team made up the core of the great Baltimore Colts (the Texans moved to Baltimore in ’53) teams from later in the decade.

So it’s doubtful that the new Dallas team — the Cowboys, they’d be called — made any splash in ’60 with the news that their first head coach would be a young secondary coach from the New York Giants named Tom Landry.

Yet Landry and his fedora would remain on the Cowboys sideline for 29 seasons.

Quick, now — name me the original coach of the Nashville Predators, now in their 9th NHL season. (cue the “Jeopardy” theme)

It’s a trick question, of sorts. Sorry about that.

The man who stands behind the Preds bench today is the same one who did so when the puck was first dropped back in October 1998. None other than Barry Trotz.

Trotz, like Landry before him, is among the most rare of coaches: the leader of an expansion team who survives longer than a couple of wretched seasons.

Of course, I still think Landry’s achievement is more impressive. The Cowboys went 0-11-1 in 1960, and didn’t put together a decent season until 1966, their seventh campaign. The odds against expansion teams in the ’60s and ’70s, in all sports, were terribly skewed. Only in the last 10-20 years have new teams been given more of a fighting chance, with more equitable rules for filling their rosters, and more money to work with to attract free agents.

Still, the fact that Barry Trotz remains the Predators’ only coach in Year Nine is pretty impressive. Certainly more impatient ownership would have found reason to can him sometime in the early 21st century. It’s not like the Predators came out of the womb with 90-point seasons.

Trotz: rarely precedented job security for an expansion coach

But the playoffs are becoming less of a novelty in Nashville lately. This appearance against the Red Wings in Round 1 is the Preds’ fourth straight post-season. Still, they’ve never won a playoff series.

Landry’s Cowboys, by their ninth year, had already won three divisional titles and had played in two championship games. They put it all together and won Super Bowl VI in their 12th season.

Barry Trotz has had highly unusual job security as the coach of an expansion team. But he’d better start winning some playoff series soon. There’s no telling how much more time he’ll buy if his team upsets the Red Wings this month. Heaven forbid.

Red Wings’ Closing Schedule Nauseating

As if you need any more proof that the NHL’s schedule is cockeyed and in desperate need of repair, take a look at the Red Wings’ menu (home games in CAPS):

Yesterday – at Columbus
Wednesday – COLUMBUS
Thursday – at Nashville
Saturday – at Columbus
Mar. 25 – at. St. Louis
Mar. 28 – ST. LOUIS
Mar. 30 – NASHVILLE
Apr. 2- at Chicago
Apr. 3- COLUMBUS
Apr. 6 – CHICAGO

Doesn’t that just get your juices flowing?

Good grief.

I know what the league is trying to do here. They mean to augment what they hope will be stirring divisional races with nothing but divisional games down the stretch. Not a totally bad concept, but here’s the deal: divisional races mean very little, in a playoff system where the top eight teams in each conference qualify, regardless of division. It would come into play when a division is so poor that if you don’t win it, you don’t qualify for the playoffs at all. But that’s highly unlikely. Otherwise, all that’s at stake are post-season seedings — and we know how much that matters in the zany world of NHL playoff hockey.

I must admit, though, that I wouldn’t be nearly as cranky if all these divisional games were happening in the East, and the Red Wings were playing endless games against Boston, New York, or Toronto. Or Montreal. But the Blue Jackets, Predators, and Blues just don’t do it for me. And I only tolerate the Blackhawks because they’re an Original Six team, and they’re on the way back to respectability.

If you’ve happened upon this blog with any degree of consistency (and if you have, I thank you), you know that this is a frequent beef of mine. Guilty as charged. Nothing really new here, but it’s like any other pet peeve: you can only suppress your disdain for so long. Then you need to vent, and then you’re fine again until the next implosion.

Playing the same teams over and over again was fine pre-expansion, because that’s all there were. Besides, it was compelling when those clubs faced each other 14 times a year; made for some great rivalries and personal grudges. But playing the same clubs ad nauseam when there are 30 teams in the league isn’t cute anymore.

At least next season, there’s some relief on the horizon.

The NHL will cut back from eight games with divisional opponents to six, opening things up for more inter-conference matches. It’s a step in the right direction.

Meanwhile, three games with the Blue Jackets in seven days. Lovely.

Phantom Calls Threaten NHL Experience

Mickey Redmond’s incredulous comments aside, I’m able to formulate my own opinions — and they don’t stray very far from the Red Wings’ TV analyst.

“Holy smoke!”

“He barely touched him!”

“(derisive chuckling)”

Officiating in the NHL is at an all-time low in terms of quality, consistency, and accuracy. I’m talking in terms of penalties, though there have also been some curious judgments when it comes to rather obvious things — like pucks bouncing off the protective netting above the glass. I’m sure you know of which I refer.

Watching the Red Wings and the Predators play last night, it occurred to me that the NHL fan gets two games for the price of one: the regular contest between the two teams, and a bonus game, pitting each club’s specialty teams against one another. The latter is ridiculously influenced by the zebras.

It’s a case of being careful what you wish for. As early as the mid-1980s, I had longed for a second referee — someone to stay behind the action, policing the nonsense that was happening 30-40 feet from the main action. It was a time when I thought that would be, you know, a GOOD thing.

So the NHL added that second ref, alright, but all it got us was an influx of power plays — and 5-on-3s.

A year and a half ago, I was talking to Ted Lindsay, the still-irascible Red Wing of the 1950s.

“When I played, if you saw two 5-on-3s the whole YEAR, that was a lot,” Terrible Ted told me. “And the player who was responsible for the second penalty would find himself in Edmonton the next day.” (Edmonton was the Red Wings’ minor league affiliate in those days).

“But now, you see 5-on-3s all the time,” Lindsay said, shaking his head.

But it’s not JUST that there’s a lot of penalties — and, of course, 5-on-3s. It’s what’s being called.

Last night, Niklas Kronwall was moving, stride-for-stride, with a Predator player along the boards. It was nothing more than two determined players going for the puck. But up went the referee’s right arm. Holding.

“I think the refs are trying to balance things out a bit,” Larry Murphy said from his new position, between the benches, as the third man on the FSN team. “They called a lot of penalties on Nashville earlier in the game. They like to have a more even scoresheet.”

Now, the notion of refs and umps making “makeup calls” has been going on forever. I can even tolerate that, to a degree. But the NHL officials are bastardizing the game with their ticky-tack, almost basketball-like way they’re calling games. In other words, I agree that if the sport was hoops, then you’ve got yourself some fouls. But the game’s hockey, and you can’t touch a guy anymore.

The league, several years ago, wanted to come down hard on obstruction. Their reasoning — and it wasn’t bad — was that the game’s more talented players were being held up by some of the lesser ones. No one was paying, they said, to see the star players being put into wrestling holds through the neutral zone. Again, hard to argue.

But the trouble is, nobody seemed to hold any sort of leadership meeting to actually try to define what should be called and what shouldn’t. The result was that each referee formulated his own opinion, and more and more of them erred on the side of blowing the whistle. As bad as it was in the beginning, it’s horrific now.

It’s hard to watch the NHL now as a result. Games have little flow, and nearly half of the 60 minutes, often, are spent in power play situations, or 4-on-4s. It’d be like if the NFL switched to Canadian football rules and punted on third down. Way too much special teams emphasis.

I really hope the league mucky-mucks congregate this summer and try to better define what is a penalty and what should be, frankly, ignored.

Or, to quote Redmond again: “It’s hockey, for goodness sakes!”

The Secret’s Out: O’Ree Broke Color Barrier Half Blind

The first black hockey player in NHL history was crushing my hand. He didn’t know his own strength.

Now THAT’S a hockey player’s grip, I thought. Strong. Firm. Bone-crunching, if you didn’t get your hand in there just right.

Willie O’Ree is 72, fit as a fiddle, and prancing around the country, playing pied piper for North America’s disadvantaged youth, hoping they’ll follow him into the world of ice hockey.

And he’s doing it all with one good eye. In fact, he did EVERYTHING in his hockey career with one good eye.

“I had an accident in my late teens, when a slap shot hit me in the right eye. I ended up losing about 95% of the vision in that eye,” O’Ree tells me. We’re sitting in a hotel in Detroit, he and I, in between one of O’Ree’s many appearances in town a few weeks back. It’s another leg of his pied piper tour. And there, in the quiet before the hotel lounge’s evening storm, he regales me with a story that he kept secret from his teammates, his coaches, everyone.

“I was a left winger and a left-handed shot, so because I couldn’t see out of my right eye, I had to completely turn my head to the right. But I decided to concentrate on what I COULD see instead of what I couldn’t see, and I only told two people about my eye: my youngest sister, and my best friend. I swore them to secrecy, because I was afraid if anyone found out they wouldn’t let me play again… the truth was that I was blind in my right eye.”

So there you have it. The “Jackie Robinson of Hockey” played with one good eye. And no one ever knew about it – except his sister and best friend. How could he have kept such a thing hidden?

“I never took an eye exam for any of the eleven professional teams I played for.”

Oh.

Willie O’Ree might be the Jackie Robinson of Hockey – he says the media dubbed him that – but his NHL debut was about as heralded as that of a little-known rookie called up from the Quebec Aces playing in just another regular season game in January. Which is what O’Ree was, and that’s exactly how it went down.

O’Ree, as a Bruin

“On January 18, 1958, the (Boston) Bruins contacted the Aces and said they wanted me to join the team in Montreal for their next game against the Canadiens,” O’Ree recalls. “Prior to that, to the Montreal fans I was just Willie O’Ree of the Quebec Aces. The big write up was that we beat the Canadiens, 3-0 – not that I broke any sort of color barrier or anything. I traveled with the team to Boston and Montreal beat us, 6-2. Then I was returned to Quebec to finish the season.”

O’Ree came back up during the 1960-61 season, when he played 43 games. It was his only NHL season. After that, he played minor league hockey – until 1979, at age 43.

The notion that O’Ree’s entry into the NHL was treated so subtly fascinates me. And he was the only black player until 1974, when Mike Marson suited up for the expansion Washington Capitals. Just because the other NHL teams were slow on the uptake shouldn’t be held against O’Ree, of course. He’s still a trailblazer, even if that trail was overgrown with weeds when Marson joined the fray.

Yet O’Ree didn’t see himself that way – as a trailblazer. Still doesn’t.

“Well, that was my goal, to be a professional hockey player and hopefully one day play in the National Hockey League,” he says with not so much as a tiny shrug.

Surely, I asked him, beyond the racial remarks, there must have been those “Jackie Robinson moments” that come with being a minority of one.

There were. But one stands out in O’Ree’s mind, and I can see why.

“There was a big right winger for the Blackhawks – about 6-foot-4, 230 pounds – named Eric Nesterenko. We got into an altercation (in Chicago); I was behind the net, and was coming out front, and Nesterenko came from my blind side and butt-ended me in the mouth (with his stick). Split my lip, split my nose, knocked my two front teeth out. He made a couple of racial remarks, but what really got me mad was that he was kind of laughing at me, waiting to see what I would do.

“So I hit him over the head with my stick, and we got into a fight. Both benches emptied. I had to remain in the locker room, for my own safety. That was probably the worst fight.

“But I told myself, if I’m going to leave the league, it’s because I don’t have the skill – not because someone’s trying to run me out.”

That, and concentrating on what he COULD see, instead of what he couldn’t, through that blind eye.

It’s easy to understand, when you spend some time with O’Ree, why NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman, in a rare fit of foresight, tabbed O’Ree to be the director of the league’s Diversity Program. That was ten years ago.

“We have approximately 39 programs throughout North America,” O’Ree says. “What I do are on and off-ice clinics with these programs, personal appearances, autograph sessions, fundraisers. I speak to about 40 schools a year. I go into the inner cities and try to encourage boys and girls to play hockey. Basically, I’ve had good success trying to let these kids know that there’s another sport out there that they can play. The tough part is getting them on the ice. But once we get them on the ice and they start maneuvering the puck with the stick, we find out that a lot of these boys and girls have a lot of natural talent.”

O’Ree today, instructing

O’Ree was in Detroit last month as part of the NHL’s “Hockey in the Hood” tour. The city was hosting a tournament, featuring youth teams from all over North America. All teams were made up of kids of color and who would never have had the opportunity to lace up a pair of skates if it wasn’t for the Diversity Program’s equipment bank – donated gear that gets recycled.

O’Ree is still wacking away those weeds, 50 years later.

(note: you can read the entire Q&A I had with O’Ree — a five-part series that will continue throughout the month, at SET-Magazine.com)

Shame On Red Wings If The Future Blinded Them

I’m loathe to agree with Free Press columnist and sometimes radio blowhard Drew Sharp, but I fear that I fall on his side of the fence when it comes to the Red Wings and the much-ballyhooed NHL trading deadline, which came and went yesterday like the month of March: in like a lion and out like a lamb. Sharp argued, rather competently, in this morning’s Freep that GM Kenny Holland — assuming we know all the facts, which we never do, so bear that in mind — played things a might too conservatively, completing only one deal: acquiring D Brad Stuart from Los Angeles for a couple of draft picks.

As the clock ticked closer and closer to 3 p.m. yesterday, and as I refreshed the NHL.com trades page once every 2-3 minutes, failing to see the Red Wings logo, I kept muttering to myself, over and over: “I can’t believe the Wings aren’t going to make a move. I can’t believe they’re going to stand pat.” It was almost 3:30 when even the late deals were being posted and announced, and I was beside myself. No deals? For a team depleted by injuries and 1-7-1 in their last nine games?

Well, then the Stuart deal came down the pike, and that soothed my nerves a little bit. Stuart’s name had been mentioned a while back — actually, when the Kings were in town on February 7. Incidentally, that game, a 5-3 come-from-ahead loss, started the Red Wings’ current slide. Oh, and the man who scored the game-winning goal that night? None other than Brad Stuart.

But after the relief from the Stuart deal wore off — which was about ten minutes, tops — I went back to gnashing my teeth. I merely changed my whine to “ONE deal? For a team depleted by injuries and 1-7-1 in their last nine games?”

Now, as I eluded to in the first paragraph, we don’t know what went on behind the scenes at Red Wings HQ. No doubt Holland and his crew were racking up the cell phone minutes, and no doubt that the club could have gotten into the Marian Hossa bidding, but the asking price was likely a bit steep. Certainly Holland was TRYING to look for something that made sense, without giving up too many draft picks and/or young players.

But here’s my thing: when you have 90 points and lead the league, but things are dicey because of the injuries and the improvement of your main competitors, you kind of have to forget about the future a little bit. Let’s face it: pro sports is about NOW. My feeling is that the fans who worry so much about giving up prospects are being a little disingenuous. Those same people want it both ways; they want to win now, AND have something under the mattress for a rainy day. That’s not always possible, folks.

The Red Wings have been Cup contenders for 16 years straight. They’re likely to be Cup contenders for several more years to come. How badly could they truly deplete their stockpile of youth? And isn’t it worth a shot at some more championships?

I’m not saying the mythical “window” is closing on the Red Wings. Far from it. But whenever you’re coming off a conference finals loss and following it up with a big year that has the general hockey community buzzing about your chances, then I say err on the side of recklessness.

I guess what it boils down to is this: I just hope the Red Wings didn’t keep their guns in their holsters because they were afraid of dipping too much into future assets. I think pro sports teams’ futures are bad bets anyway, if you want to know. The percentage of “prospects” who actually make a splash isn’t as high as you think. And even if they do, and you’re adding to your trophy case, who cares?

The fascination over “can’t miss” guys who are “untouchable” as trade bait amuses me. If the Red Wings fretted too much over the future to the extent that they missed out on some deadline-available talent, then I’m in disagreement with that philosophy. Because, all things considered, the average fan doesn’t give a hoot about the future. Everyone wants to win NOW.

Trade Deadline Rescued Murphy From Toronto In 1997

They booed him, unmercifully, every time he touched the puck. They made signs deriding him. Games at Maple Leaf Gardens became nasty. The fans were bidding him good riddance.

And he was one of theirs.

Larry Murphy, at the trade deadline in 1997, was held up as the punching bag for Toronto Maple Leafs fans frustrated with the team’s Stanley Cup drought — which continues today and is now 41 years old. It was obvious that he had to go; the differences between Murphy and the fans were irreconcilable.

To the rescue came the Red Wings.

Murphy came to the Red Wings at the deadline in ’97 and added two Cups to his resume


They traded for Larry Murphy at the deadline in 1997, and free from the slings and arrows in Toronto, he helped the Red Wings win Stanley Cups the next two springs.

I bumped into Murphy the night Steve Yzerman’s jersey went up to the rafters. We spent some time together in the alumni suite, watching the game below. I asked him about the final days in Toronto. He shrugged it off. Didn’t seem to bother him all that much.

“It’s all about winning,” he said. “When you don’t win, people get frustrated.”

Mats Sundin, it was reported, has told Leafs management that he doesn’t care to waive his no-trade clause. He would like, in other words, to stay in Toronto.

“To me, it means more to be part of the journey from October to June,” Sundin said to the press, explaining his decision. “I’ve never cared for the idea of the rental player.”

Tell that to Raymond Bourque, who finally won a Cup in 2001 with Colorado, after over 20 years with the Bruins and some failed Finals appearances. He didn’t seem to mind the idea. But I can certainly understand Sundin’s sentiment, and find it rather refreshing.

Of course, Sundin isn’t being hung in virtual effigy in Toronto, the way Larry Murphy was. And it’s perhaps easier for Murphy to shrug off that poor treatment, since he was a four-time Cup winner (two in Pittsburgh, two in Detroit). Plus, Murphy ended up being revered in Detroit, and stays close to the team as a TV analyst. Those miserable Toronto days are long gone.

By the way, if you’re lucky enough to get the NHL Network (I do, with DirecTV), you might want to take a sick day. The network is providing non-stop coverage of Deadline Day tomorrow, from 8 A.M. to 6 P.M. They’ll be all over it. I work from home, so I can bask in it; Deadline Day in the NHL is one of my favorite days of the year.

In 1997, I’m sure it was Larry Murphy’s favorite day as well — even if he could shrug it off some 10 years later.

16 Years Of Cup-Worthiness Makes Us Take Red Wings For Granted

It’s going to be asked around the water cooler at work, over the airwaves on sports talk radio, and in some of the area’s finer establishments — and even the not-so-finer. And it will go something like this:

“Do the Red Wings have a shot at the Stanley Cup this spring?”

Brief pause.

“You know, I think so. They look tough enough, and deep enough.”

OR

“The regular season doesn’t mean squat. And Dan Cleary’s hurt, and so too Dominik Hasek. Chris Osgood is showing signs of fading. The Anaheim Ducks got Teemu Selanne and Scott Niedermayer back.”

Well? DO they have a shot?

“I don’t know … I’m cautiously optimistic.”

It’ll go like this, off-and-on, the closer we get to the end of the regular season. Perhaps some doubting Thomases were won over by the team’s advancing to the conference finals last May. Who knows.

But one thing is certain, and it simply cannot be overstated — though I’m going to give it a shot here, you can rest assured — the fact that we’ve been able to ask that question of the Red Wings, with complete legitimacy, for 16 springs in a row now, is stunning in its amazement. And I really hope you appreciate that.

Think about it for a moment. Is there any team, in any of the four major pro sports, that can honestly say that it has been a serious contender for its sport’s championship for 16 years running?

Let’s take a look around, shall we?

In football, have the New England Patriots been football gods for 16 years in a row? Uh-uh. In fact, 16 years ago, the Pats were trying the ill-fated Dick MacPherson coaching experiment (he came from Syracuse), and were bottoming out before Bill Parcells rescued them. The Packers have been very good, but not Super Bowl-like during the past 16 years, which perfectly coincides with Brett Favre’s time there. They’ve certainly had their ups and downs. The Cowboys have been downright wretched in between Super Bowl-contending years. Don’t ask about the 49ers, Bills, or Redskins, either.

Not even in baseball, where the Yankees have had outstanding years under Joe Torre, is there a team that’s been October-worthy for 16 years straight.

Basketball’s cupboard is dry in this department, too.

That leaves the Red Wings, who ever since the 1991-92 season have been not only playoff qualifiers, but a good bet to go all the way. The Wings have never, since ’92, simply snuck into the playoffs as a fraudulent team. They have endured some rotten playoff losses and disappointments, for sure. There’ve been some strange first round encounters. But that doesn’t alter the fact that even in those years where the end has come too soon, the Wings went into the post-season as a team many talked about as hoisting the Stanley Cup when all was said and done.

I’m sorry, but I find that fascinating — that we’ve been talking about the Red Wings winning the Cup ever since the end of the FIRST Bush Administration.

Not sure why I bring this up now, except that I had been thinking about it for awhile but never splashed it on this blog. And I guess it became a little more topical this season, with all the whining about how Joe Louis Arena’s red seat cushions have been showing in their upright positions with alarming frequency for the TV cameras.

It could be that Hockeytown’s denizens are taking their team for granted.

But I also want to serve as a reminder this point: as gut-wrenching as 1996, 1999, 2000, 2003, 2004, and 2006 were in terms of how the Red Wings bowed out of the playoffs, know two things. Number one, on several of those occasions the team that drummed the Wings out of the playoffs went on to the Cup Finals themselves. Second, at least the team was good enough to even BE disappointed with their playoff exodus. How many teams in sports are lauded for simply playing beyond the regular season?

You can’t win the ring every gosh darn year, you know. Though some have tried, like the 1960s Celtics and the 1950s Yankees. But even they failed here and there.

The Wings have lost four in a row, in an NHL sort of way. They’re actually 0-3-1, but it’s still considered 0-4. Go figure. Those silly overtime/shootout rules! Anyhow, despite that little lull, the team is running away with things in their division, and all of hockey for that matter. They’ll go into the playoffs as — guess what? — prime-time Cup contenders.

Yawn.

Shame on us — and that includes you and me — for not talking about this streak more, and with the appropriate awe.