Monday, November 26, 2007
Number 19 to the rafters-Canadiens honour Larry Robinson as he joins other greats
The late Ted Blackman once said that there are two organizations in the world that continually get it right in terms of being able to supply the proper pomp and pageantry required for a showing of any magnitude, the House of Windsor and the Montreal Canadiens. Heady company for a sports franchise but the Montreal Canadiens is not your average sports franchise.
As the early plans began to roll out a few years ago for the Habs 100th year anniversary in 2009-2010 one of the defining themes was it was high time to begin retiring sweaters again. There had been a bit of a lull for Montreal fans, enough so that the Boston Bruins actually surpassed Montreal in terms of overall sweaters retired and frankly for anybody who is worth their weight in hockey pucks this was a bit of an affront because you can argue your New York Yankees and maybe your Manchester United or the Harlem Globetrotters but there is certainly no hockey franchise anywhere near close to Montreal in terms of success combined with notoriety and as such their list of Hall-of-Fame players is more lengthy than anybodies and more richly deserving of the continuation of the sweaters being raised to the rafters.
Point of clarification that has been missed by a number of main stream media, the sweater numbers did not hang up high in the Montreal Forum. This is a new thing for the Bell Centre. The only thing that hung in the Forum was the Cup banners, no Prince of Wales Banners, no finalist banners, nothing else at all other than the actual Cup banners. Having said that Larry’s went up to join a growing list that at this rate could soon see the sweaters retired come close to the actual number of Cups, ( 24) although even with Montreal’s storied history that’s quite a leap. As it is, Robinson’s number 19 joins Jacques Plante 1, Doug Harvey 2, Jean Beliveau 4, Bernie Geoffrion 5, Howie Morenz 7, Rocket Richard 9, Guy Lafleur 10, Dickie Moore and Yvan Cournoyer 12, Henri Richard 16, Serge Savard 18 and Ken Dryden 29. Bob Gainey’s number 23 will be next giving the Habs a total of thirteen sweaters retired for a total of fourteen players. Recently I had a chance to talk to Dick Irvin about this and we both questioned as to what happened with previous documentation indicating that Montreal had in fact retired number 4 for Jean Beliveau and Aurel Joliat and number 16 for Henri Richard and Elmer Lach. There are media guides and NHL guides a few years back that indicate those numbers were retired for all four players yet there is no indication of that now. In my next column I’ll attempt to have found out what’s transpired there. Frankly I was disappointed that number five was not also honoured for Guy Lapointe. Lapointe won six Cups and was a huge factor in the ‘big three’ on defense for Montreal. To think that Savard’s number 18 and Robinson’s number 19 are retired and not Lapointe’s I think is an over site. But that’s what you get when you are as loaded as the Habs are with Hall-of-Fame players.
Cheap shots continue-in fact they will never end
Are you a fan of the NHL? My guess is if you’re reading this you are. Are you a fan of cheap shots, the gutless play, hitting from behind, increased stick work and the overall lack of respect that permeates the league now? My guess is you are not. So far in his newly appointed role with the NHLPA Eric Lindros has visited with four NHL teams. In fact there’s been probably more now because this bit was aired on CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada two weeks ago. In his initial conversations with these teams Lindros was told unequivocally by these players, these are the guys who play the game folks, get rid of the instigator rule!! Get it the hell out of our game. What’s amazing to me is why anybody would be opposed to this. Are there none of you who are old enough to remember the NHL prior to the inception of this piece of crap rule that has done more to harm the league and its players than anything ever in the history of the sport? The Broad Street Bullies in Philadelphia ruled the day in the mid-1970’s. That’s more than 30 years ago. Since then and prior to this inane rule, the Habs dominated, the Islanders dominated, the Oilers dominated, the Penguins dominated all teams with superstars, all teams who had a makeup of players who could play it tough, who could or would fight if need be but in the end almost all of their roster players could play the game. As a result in that time period, you rarely, ever saw a hit from behind. You rarely ever saw the type of slash Mattias Ohlund put on Miko Koivu. You rarely ever saw a Steve Downie type of hit. These types of plays almost never happened. You did see a fair amount of fighting but by 1988 bench clearing brawls went the way of the Do-Do bird and you were left with a league that policed it self, that had a huge measure of respect and produced some of the greatest hockey you’ll ever see. Is that what you think we have now? No, it’s not. Unfortunately we have to continue to get back up on our soap box to preach this but now a new man in the NHLPA is getting the same information and maybe for once somebody will listen to the damn players rather than seemingly a collection of suits most of who can’t skate. Keep your stick on the ice, talk to you in a few days, gidday.
Liam Maguire
As the early plans began to roll out a few years ago for the Habs 100th year anniversary in 2009-2010 one of the defining themes was it was high time to begin retiring sweaters again. There had been a bit of a lull for Montreal fans, enough so that the Boston Bruins actually surpassed Montreal in terms of overall sweaters retired and frankly for anybody who is worth their weight in hockey pucks this was a bit of an affront because you can argue your New York Yankees and maybe your Manchester United or the Harlem Globetrotters but there is certainly no hockey franchise anywhere near close to Montreal in terms of success combined with notoriety and as such their list of Hall-of-Fame players is more lengthy than anybodies and more richly deserving of the continuation of the sweaters being raised to the rafters.
Point of clarification that has been missed by a number of main stream media, the sweater numbers did not hang up high in the Montreal Forum. This is a new thing for the Bell Centre. The only thing that hung in the Forum was the Cup banners, no Prince of Wales Banners, no finalist banners, nothing else at all other than the actual Cup banners. Having said that Larry’s went up to join a growing list that at this rate could soon see the sweaters retired come close to the actual number of Cups, ( 24) although even with Montreal’s storied history that’s quite a leap. As it is, Robinson’s number 19 joins Jacques Plante 1, Doug Harvey 2, Jean Beliveau 4, Bernie Geoffrion 5, Howie Morenz 7, Rocket Richard 9, Guy Lafleur 10, Dickie Moore and Yvan Cournoyer 12, Henri Richard 16, Serge Savard 18 and Ken Dryden 29. Bob Gainey’s number 23 will be next giving the Habs a total of thirteen sweaters retired for a total of fourteen players. Recently I had a chance to talk to Dick Irvin about this and we both questioned as to what happened with previous documentation indicating that Montreal had in fact retired number 4 for Jean Beliveau and Aurel Joliat and number 16 for Henri Richard and Elmer Lach. There are media guides and NHL guides a few years back that indicate those numbers were retired for all four players yet there is no indication of that now. In my next column I’ll attempt to have found out what’s transpired there. Frankly I was disappointed that number five was not also honoured for Guy Lapointe. Lapointe won six Cups and was a huge factor in the ‘big three’ on defense for Montreal. To think that Savard’s number 18 and Robinson’s number 19 are retired and not Lapointe’s I think is an over site. But that’s what you get when you are as loaded as the Habs are with Hall-of-Fame players.
Cheap shots continue-in fact they will never end
Are you a fan of the NHL? My guess is if you’re reading this you are. Are you a fan of cheap shots, the gutless play, hitting from behind, increased stick work and the overall lack of respect that permeates the league now? My guess is you are not. So far in his newly appointed role with the NHLPA Eric Lindros has visited with four NHL teams. In fact there’s been probably more now because this bit was aired on CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada two weeks ago. In his initial conversations with these teams Lindros was told unequivocally by these players, these are the guys who play the game folks, get rid of the instigator rule!! Get it the hell out of our game. What’s amazing to me is why anybody would be opposed to this. Are there none of you who are old enough to remember the NHL prior to the inception of this piece of crap rule that has done more to harm the league and its players than anything ever in the history of the sport? The Broad Street Bullies in Philadelphia ruled the day in the mid-1970’s. That’s more than 30 years ago. Since then and prior to this inane rule, the Habs dominated, the Islanders dominated, the Oilers dominated, the Penguins dominated all teams with superstars, all teams who had a makeup of players who could play it tough, who could or would fight if need be but in the end almost all of their roster players could play the game. As a result in that time period, you rarely, ever saw a hit from behind. You rarely ever saw the type of slash Mattias Ohlund put on Miko Koivu. You rarely ever saw a Steve Downie type of hit. These types of plays almost never happened. You did see a fair amount of fighting but by 1988 bench clearing brawls went the way of the Do-Do bird and you were left with a league that policed it self, that had a huge measure of respect and produced some of the greatest hockey you’ll ever see. Is that what you think we have now? No, it’s not. Unfortunately we have to continue to get back up on our soap box to preach this but now a new man in the NHLPA is getting the same information and maybe for once somebody will listen to the damn players rather than seemingly a collection of suits most of who can’t skate. Keep your stick on the ice, talk to you in a few days, gidday.
Liam Maguire
# posted by Liam Maguire @ 11:57 AM
