Using Fame For Good

There aren't many places in the world where one will cross paths with both the Blue Man Group and Flavor Flav in the same location, but Las Vegas seems to have that going for it. As cool as the Blue Man Group is for their brand of music, I'm here tonight to talk about Flavor Flav because this guy might be one of the coolest dudes on the planet when it comes to supporting others who need a hand-up rather than a hand-out. If there's one thing that I appreciate more than anything, it's those who have amassed more money they need and, in turn, return that money to good causes for no other reason than because they can. It isn't often that we see this, but Flavor Flav should be the example of how rich millionaires can do so much good simply by being good people.

The 65 year-old rapper, who rose to fame with Rock and Roll Hall of Fame rap group Public Enemy, isn't being absolved of anything here on HBIC. After all, Flav's got a rap sheet as long as his arm with several varying degrees of offences to his name, he starred on some of the most vapid reality TV shows ever produced, and his venture into being a restaurant owner ended up with his business being evicted. None of that is being overlooked as Flavor Flav, born William Jonathan Drayton Jr. in Roosevelt, NY, has worked to clean up his act from his days of trying to live above the law.

What's happening in Paris at the 2024 Summer Olympic Games with Flavor Flav is rather awesome, though, and I feel there about a dozen hockey men who could be doing what Flav is doing. That is, specifically, helping other athletes reach their dreams and goals.

You may not be aware of this, but water polo isn't the biggest spectator sport on the planet. While that seems obvious, sponsors often struggle to support a sport like water polo because the athletes have 90% of their bodies hidden below the water, so product placement and advertising opportunities aren't as plentiful as in other sports. The ladies may wear Speedo-branded swimsuits, but not many are going to see that branding unless the players are out of the pool.

Enter Maggie Steffens, seen to the right, who is one of Team USA's most lethal players in the pool. The 31 year-old helped the Americans win gold medals in 2012, 2016, and 2020, and she set a new Olympic record for the most goals scored by an individual player over her career in women's water polo at the Summer Olympic Games. With Team USA gunning for a fourth Olympic gold medal, Steffens would be front and center for the team as one of their top players yet again. It should also be noted that Steffens and her eldest sister and sibling, Jessica, are both part of the Team USA squad and her dad is an NCAA water polo champion and three-time Pan-American Games competitor, so water polo runs in her blood.

On May 4, 2024, Steffens wrote an Instagram post about the team's struggles, highlighting that many of her teammates "aren't just badass champions, but also teachers, business owners, coaches, physicians assistants, and more. Some may not know this, but most Olympians need a 2nd (or 3rd) job to support chasing the dream (myself included!) and most teams rely on sponsors for travel, accommodations, nutritional support, rent/lodging, and simply affording to live in this day and age." Clearly, she's passionate!

And that's where Flavor Flav comes in because he saw Maggie Steffens' post on Instagram as a call to action, responding on Maggie's post, "AYYY YOOO,,, as a girl dad and supporter of all women's sports - imma personally sponsor you my girl,,, whatever you need. And imma sponsor the whole team. My manager is in touch with your agent and imma use all my relationships and resources to help all y'all even more. That's a FLAVOR FLAV promise."

Liberal use of commas aside, that's a pretty awesome thing for Flav to do, but Flav's not known for being quiet. And that's where this story gets awesome because Flavor Flav made some noise.

On July 1, 2024, Flavor Flav signed "an unprecedented five-year sponsorship deal as the official hype man for the USA Water Polo Women's and Men's National Teams." The terms of the agreement see Flavor Flav continue to financially assist the 2024 USA Women's Water Polo Olympic Team, and will extend to seeing Flav make "multiple appearances annually at USA Water Polo events" and "extensive social media collaboration" between the parties.

"This is one of the biggest things that I feel that I could have ever done in life, outside of the other accomplishments that I've made to music," he said in an interview with NBC Olympics. "By sponsoring a water polo team and helping these girls out, this is bigger than me winning a Grammy."

Honestly, how cool is that?

Just think about what it would be like for the Canadian fencing team to have Ryan Reynolds hyping them on social media or the Australian handball team having Hugh Jackman hype them. Yes, those two men have a hugely popular movie in theatres right now, but how much attention would they draw to sports that don't get the same coverage as hockey or soccer or swimming at the Olympics if they threw their celebrity behind those athletes? I guarantee everyone would tune in to see Reynolds go bananas over a key touch in fencing or Jackman hyping an incredible goal in handball, but it would also keep the sport on the map in countries where these sports are seen as niche sports. Growth for those sports matters a lot.

"What I’m doing right now, I think it's huge and nobody else is doing it or done it," Flavor Flav said to NBC Olympics. "Usually, I'm known to be the first to do something and everybody else follows my trends. So I'm hoping that this will be a trend that a lot of people will follow because I think it’s a really good thing. Come and step up and sponsor some of these teams."

It's here where I look at some of the fortunes made by athletes like Connor McDavid and LeBron James and Tom Brady, and I know they all give back in their own ways to various causes. But how hard would it be for any of those men to carve off $1 million from their vast fortunes to support a national team like archery, artistic swimming, or one of the many cycling teams seen at the Olympic Games? That money would change the sport for the athletes in those disciplines, and all it takes is using one's celebrity to make that difference.

I'll let Flavor Flav get his friends from the entertainment world involved in his style of philanthropy, but even if some of these athletes named above helped to build and finance sports facilities and leagues, they'd be making a huge difference in the lives of the kids who use the facilities and play the sports. Without that funding, some of those facilities may close and some of those leagues may fold, pushing kids into other sports where costs are less prohibitive when it comes to that sport surviving and thriving.

The next generation always fills the void left by an older generation in sports. Kids coming up today face greater hardships than we faced growing up, yet we're seeing incredible efforts at these Olympic Games by a pile of athletes who have take their sports to a new level like Maggie Steffens. With Flavor Flav's work on behalf of the USA Water Polo, I'd expect the Americans to remain dominant in the pool for some time as more kids see Flavor Flav's work with water polo and potentially get in the water to try the sport. Some will dislike it while others may love it, but the hope is that another young Maggie Steffens can be found.

That's the power of fame, and I commend Flavor Flav for using his fame for good. Tne only question left to be asked is who will be the next celebrity to step up and throw his or her support behind one of the less-funded national teams?

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Honouring The Best

If there's one thing that fills me with pride, it's seeing Manitobans honoured for their long careers in their chosen discipline, and it was exciting to see the Manitoba Sports Hall of Fame announce their 2024 inductees today. While there were some other notable inclusions today, two hockey stars will have their names added to the already-impressive Hall of Fames in November. Those two hockey stars are who I'm focusing on here as the hockey wing of the Manitoba Sports Hall of Fame gets a little better with these two players as part of it.

The first player being inducted likely needs no introduction if you watched women's hockey at the start of the millennium, but Jennifer Botterill will take her spot among Manitoba's most celebrated athletes in November! Botterill retired from hockey in 2011 at the age of 31, but she still holds the record for most points in an NCAA hockey career by anyone - male or female. She's a three-time Olympic gold medalist (2002, 2006 and 2010) and a silver medalist (1998), a five-time IIHF Women's World Championship gold medalist, and led the CWHL in scoring in 2007-08. She has since become a hockey analyst, most notably on Sportsnet, and she's still the only two-time winner of the Patty Kazmaier Award as top female college hockey player in the US.

The fact that she's being inducted into the Manitoba Sports Hall of Fame before she has been inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame is a serious crime. This is a woman whose college career puts to shame most players, and she went on to be one of Canada's most effective players through the first decade of the 2000s. The Hockey Hall of Fame better get its act together and put Botterill into the Hall on the next opportunity, but it's nice seeing her home province honouring her with a Hall of Fame induction.

The other inductee who had a solid hockey career before moving on to other things is former New York Rangers forward Ted Irvine! Irvine had an outstanding start to his hockey career while playing in Winnipeg with the St. Boniface Canadiens and Winnipeg Braves where he was a point-per-game player or better. Signed by Boston, he would be selected by the Los Angeles Kings in the 1967 expansion draft after four seasons in the minor leagues, and it seemed that Irvine was ready for the bright lights of the NHL after winning a pair of CPHL championships with the Oklahoma City Blazers where his scoring and his tenacious play would earn him his first professional hockey nickname!

The press in Los Angeles nicknamed him the "baby faced assassin" thanks to his thunderous checks and in-your-face play, and it served him and his teammates well as he finished fourth on the Kings in scoring in both 1967-68 and 1968-69. However, a shoulder injury slowed him down in 1969-70, and it wasn't long before one general manager had made a trade for the forward.

"I've been trying to get Irvine for two years," Emile Francis, the general manager‐coach of the Rangers, told the New York Times, "and we were finally able to swing it. I'm sorry we had to give up Lemieux and Widing, but that was the deal."

His run with the Rangers lasted six seasons where he was a fan favorite for his work on and off the ice. He won the "Conacher Award" for his work with handicapped children in 1975, something that he'd bring back with him to Manitoba where he was was instrumental in bringing the Special Olympics to Manitoba. When all was said and done on his NHL career, Irvine had scored 154 goals, 177 assists, and 657 PIMs in 724 games, but his work off the ice certainly helped his cause when it came to landing in the Manitoba Sports Hall of Fame.

The other inductees include Brita Hall who has six gold and eight silver Special Olympics Games medals in cross-country skiing and track and field; Russ Horbal who founded the Sport Physiotherapy Centre and its predecessor, the Institute for Sports Medicine; Dr. Sandra Kirby who is a founder and coach of the University of Winnipeg Rowing Team; the 1999-2003 University of Manitoba Bisons men's volleyball team who captured three national championships and placing third in four years; and, Randy Turner who spent 26 years writing about Manitoba sports for the Winnipeg Free Press before passing away in 2019.

The Manitoba Sports Hall of Fame annual induction ceremony will take place on Thursday, November 7, 2024, at 7:30pm CT at the Victoria Inn in Winnipeg. Seats always fill up fast, so here's hoping you can get yours if you plan on going. It should be a great night of honouring some of Manitoba's best athletes and teams, and we should be proud of producing these incredible atheletes here in our province!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Scouts' Honours

I'll be very honest when I say that a lot of good general managers in hockey likely have incredible scouts who know more about the game than they do. The scouts rarely receive recognition when a diamond is found in the NHL Entry Draft in the later rounds, but those organizations often sing praises about the efforts of the scouting staff as a whole. In saying that, I had no idea that there was a Western Canada Professional Hockey Scouts Foundation in Okotoks, Alberta that will be honouring a pile of men whose scouting work changed teams and found superstars in the WHA and NHL. That ceremony happens Tuesday night, and some of the names who are being inducted at the Inaugural Wall of Honour ceremony are well-known throughout the hockey world!

I'll give credit to T. Kent Morgan who writes a Memories of Sport column every second week in the Free Press Community Review for bringing attention to this event because, as stated above, I had no idea it was happening nor did I even know the Foundation was a thing. Morgan's article deals specifically with the Manitobans and players with Manitoba connections being inducted into the Wall of Honour at the WCPHSF, but there are some other names that should be mentioned as well.

A committee featuring veteran scouts Scott Bradley, Ron Delorme, Erin Ginnell, Ross Mahoney, Garth Malarchuk, and Mike Penny, and longtime hockey observers Gregg Drinnan and Shane Malloy decided that the inaugural Wall of Honour inductions would be capped at 45 individuals despite there likely being a pile more scouts that could be included. The head of the committee, Glen Dirk, unfortunately passed away on April 17 from complications with cancer, but he was one of the 45 individuals inducted in the Class of 2024 who will be honoured on Tuesday night.

Of the five men inducted in the Pioneer section of the Wall of Honour, perhaps the biggest name is Cecil "Tiny" Thompson. The ten-year NHL veteran spent eight seasons with Boston and two with Detroit, and he would win four Vezina Trophies and a Stanley Cup in his rookie season with the Bruins. He was also the first NHL goaltender to be credited with an assist in a game, but he gets his name into the WCPHSF thanks to his 32-year career as chief western scout for the Chicago Black Hawks from 1945-77.

In the Early Era section, names like former Winnipeg Jets forward Bill Lesuk who worked with the Jets, Coyotes, Blackhawks, and Bruins; former New York Islanders head coach Earl Ingarfeld Sr. who worked as a scout with the New York Islanders; former Montreal Canadiens scout Del Wilson who spent 47 years with the Canadiens and saw 18 Stanley Cups won in that time; and, former Philadelphia Flyers forward Gerry Melnyk who spent 29 years as a scout with the Flyers and saw two Stanley Cups won.

The men inducted into the Modern Era section of the Wall of Honour should be fairly recognizable, and they include TSN analyst Craig Button, Vegas Golden Knights assistant GM Vaughn Karpan, Florida Panthers senior scouting advisor Les Jackson, and longtime Hockey Canada and NHL scout Barry Trapp. A lot of the men in this section are still working for NHL teams, but it's incredible to see how long they've been in the game doing what they do best as scouts and talent evaluators. Clearly, there will be more men (and hopefully some women!) added to this section in the coming years!

It goes without saying that the men inducted into the WCPHSF's Wall of Honour on Tuesday are some of the best scouts the game has seen who call western Canada home. That's not to take anything away from the guys working out east, down south, or over in Europe who are doing incredible jobs in finding talent in those regions. The fact that there is a Western Canada Professional Hockey Scouts Foundation just goes to prove that these men deserve a tip of the cap for the work they do, and I'm glad they're getting the recognition of their tireless work in two night's time.

If you want to see the full list of the men being inducted, you can find the Wall of Honour list here with the quick write-ups on each of the men. If you're in or near Okotoks, head down to the Okotoks Centennial Arena where the Wall of Honour is located and check out the display they have. As the Foundation works to honour more scouts in the sport, that Wall of Honour will only see more talented people added to the inaugural class being inducted on Tuesday evening!

Congratulations to the 45 men on this prestigious honour!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

No Paris Coverage?

During the past Summer Olympiads, HBIC has done full coverage of the field hockey events. I have to admit that I am a fan of the game despite my limited playing experience of two physical education classes in high school, but I won't lie in saying that watching the teams in Paris is always a treat as these are the best teams on the planet competing for the sport's highest honour. It's a game built on speed, skill, accurate passing and shooting, and toughness, but it's poetry in motion when teams execute well. I won't do a full primer here today, but HBIC has been and will be watching this event through to the gold-medal games on August 8 and 9! Who will stand atop the podiums?

We'll start with the obvious in that if you're from the North American continent, there's just one team represented at the Paris Olympic Games with the American women qualifying in January for one of the final berths. They're ranked 13th-overall in the world, so they should be pretty competitive in Paris with countries like India (9th) and New Zealand (11th) missing out on spots in Paris while England (7th) and Ireland (12th) compete as Great Britain. There are still some powerhouses at the top of the FIH rankings that the US will need to defeat if they hope to medal, but that's why they play the games.

Netherlands enters both the men's and women's events as the top-ranked teams in the world, and there's no reason to believe they won't continue playing at that level. The men are looking to bounce back after being bounced by Australia in the quarterfinals, but they'll be in tough with Great Britain, 2020 fourth-place finisher Germany (6th), and 8th-ranked Spain in their pool. They avoid the "Group of Death" on the other side of the tournament, but the Dutch men will have to beat at least one of those teams if they hope to medal.

The Dutch women are the defending gold medalists from 2020, and they've won medals in seven-straight Olympic Games. They've won three gold medals in the last four Olympiads, and they are seen as the favorites coming into Paris. Despite all that hype, there will be strong challengers in the groups stage as Germany (3rd), Belgium (4th), and China (8th) could all make noise. Perhaps most shocking is that none of those teams medalled in 2020, but there's no doubt that Netherlands will need to be at the top of their game if they hope to earn the group's top seeding and repeat as Olympic champions.

Their path will likely lead through one of 2020 silver medallist Argentina (2nd), Australia (5th), or Spain (6th), and one shouldn't count out 2020 bronze medallist Great Britain despite the British attack being seen as one of the weaker attacks in the competition. In any case, the path for the Dutch women will see them crossover to play at least one of the Group-B teams, so they need to be ready for that battle. If they don't finish atop their group, things get considerably tougher for the Netherlands in their title defence.

In terms of coverage, I will recap the group stage at the end of that portion of both events as the quarterfinals begin on August 5. For once, I'm going to take some time and watch an event without thinking about this blog. If you haven't watched the sport, I highly recommend you tune in for a game or two as you'll likely be mesmerised by how well these teams move a ball using only one side of the stick. There are articles sprinkled through HBIC where you can find information on the game, so feel free to use the search bar at the top of the blog to find more information.

Just as a note, the Dutch women beat France by a 6-2 score to open the tournament with a win while the Dutch men downed South Africa by a 5-3 score to get their tournament started on the right foot. The competition gets a little more difficult for the women as Germany are the Netherlands' opponents today while the men will take on the host nation as France welcomes them to the pitch.

Check your local listings for the field hockey competition, and enjoy the action on the pitch as we near the medal rounds!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Hosts Begin Lining Up

One of the most prestigious trophies in sports will be awarded somewhere out in western Canada in 2026 as WHL teams begin to put together bids to host the 2026 CHL Memorial Cup tournament. Outside of the major cities which would have no issue with hosting the event, there are a handful of teams in cities that could bid for the honour of having the WHL, OHL, and QMJHL champions visit that would attract a lot of fans and sponsors. One has to wonder what the actual cost is to not only bid for the tournament hosting opportunity, but for some of the upgrades that are usually required for a handful of rinks to bring them up to Memorial Cup code. At the end of the day, a few cities are already in the running with another adding its name today!

The first team that I'll mention is the latest entry into the competition as the Lethbridge Hurricanes tossed their hat into the ring on Thursday as a potential host. This is the second time in the last five years that the Hurricanes have applied to be the host after missing out on the 2020 tournament. The city has never hosted a Memorial Cup tournament before, while Lethbridge-based WHL teams have appeared just twice at previous Memorial Cup tournaments since 1983. Alberta has hosted the event on five occasions with Red Deer being the most recent in 2016.

If the Hurricanes win the bid to host the tournament, Lethbridge City Council has approved $1.25 million in funds to help the Hurricanes with the hosting duties contingent upon that winning bid. Lethbridge has played host to a U SPORTS National Men's Hockey Championship prior to the Pronghorns hockey teams being axed from the University of Lethbridge, so it's not like the city hasn't played host to a major tournament in its past. Could they host another major hockey event?

"It's very exciting for us to once again bid for the Memorial Cup," Terry Huisman, Hurricanes General Manager of Business Operations, told Matthew DeMille. "We felt like we were very close with our bid for the 2020 tournament, but moving forward we think we have a better opportunity this time. There are many things that we have to get through in the four-step process, but we really feel good about where we are at, and we are going to work hard and do our due diligence to make sure we have the best bid."

The Hurricanes will face some stiff competition as a team from British Columbia was the first to get in on the bids when the Kelowna Rockets announced in mid-June that they wanted to host the tournament. The Rockets are looking to host the tournament for the second time despite them winning two bids before this as they hosted in 2004 and were supposed to host in 2020 before the tournament was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It should be noted that the Rockets won the 2004 Memorial Cup as the hosts, so it seems like there may be a good lineage in the Okanagan Valley when it comes to successfully hosting the event.

The Kelowna bid offers the strength of being backed by the GSL Group which manages Prospera Place where the Rockets play. GSL has proposed upgrades to Prospera Place to be able to host the tournament, so we'll see if those upgrades are pushed through in time for May 2026. GSL president and CEO Graham Lee told Global News in the linked article that "the work would take seven months to complete", totalling in the ballpark of $18-$22 million. Clearly, that's more than the $1.25 million promised by Lethbridge, so there could be a pile of new toys for the CHL to work with in Kelowna.

"We are very excited to submit the Kelowna Rockets organization as a host for the 2026 Memorial Cup, along with the tremendous support and commitment from the City of Kelowna as our partner in this bid," Bruce Hamilton, Rockets President and General Manager, told Cami Kepke. "We also acknowledge the support of GSL. We are very excited to make every effort to host this event again, it would not be possible without the tremendous desire of the City of Kelowna in helping make this possible. This will be the first of a number of steps we will go through in this process."

Manitoba's lone WHL team saw Kelowna's entry and decided to get into the game as the Brandon Wheat Kings jumped into the bidding process with both feet one week later. Brandon last hosted the event in 2010, and may be the type of venue that the WHL is seeking with indoor conference areas, a hotel, a practice facility, and the main rink all connected under one roof. Brandon lost in the Memorial Cup Final that season to the Windsor Spitfires, and they've been involved in six Memorial Cup tournaments in team history, including 1949, 1979, 1995, 1996, 2010, and 2016. Brandon and the surrounding communities certainly will look to be a strong entry for the hosting duties in 2026.

The Keystone Centre, a partner in the bid, is undergoing a transformation this summer as the old red seats seen in the rink are being replaced with wider black ones. There will be air conditioning and dehumidification installed for the first time, bathrooms are being renovated, areas for better accessibility are being made, and upgraded security cameras were installed in 2022. While a lot of that doesn't sound like it would improve the product on the ice, it does make for a better fan experience which will come in handy during the warmer May temperatures when CHL fans arrive for the tournament.

"We are thrilled to announce our intent to bid for the 2026 Memorial Cup," Jared Jacobson, Owner and Governor of the Brandon Wheat Kings, said at the press conference. "Hosting this event would be a tremendous honor for our organization, our city and our province. Brandon, and Manitoba, have a storied history in hockey, and we are excited about the opportunity to showcase our community and province to the entire hockey world."

I know which team would receive my vote, but I am a little biased in this competition. I will admit that I am a little surprised that none of the Saskatchewan-based WHL teams got in on the bidding, but three of the four WHL provinces are in the hunt. None of the US-based WHL teams jumped at the chance either, so it appears it will be a three-team race to see who hosts the 2026 Memorial Cup in one of Kelowna, Brandon, or Lethbridge.

The next steps in the process of the bids is already underway, and the four-person committee will narrow the field to two teams. After that, the winning bid is announced by the CHL in late November. With each of the teams and cities having distinct cultures, communities, and bids, this one doesn't look like an easy decision by any means.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Hockey On Reality TV

I don't watch a lot of reality TV because it's not reality to 90% of the population. I understand why networks rely on them - cheap to produce, easy to edit, very easy to replicate for multiple seasons - but there are a lot of times where I question how real the situations are in reality TV. One of the reality TV shows that falls under those three elements week after week is Paramount's Bar Rescue where Jon Taffer is a well-versed, experienced consultant, but I never expected to see a former NHL player on the one of the older shows that aired on streaming service I happened to catch today.

Before we even get into the episode, it should be noted that for everything Jon Taffer knows, there are some businesses and owners who simply cannot be saved despite the lifeline he throws them. As of January 2024, Yahoo!'s Naomi Kennedy wrote that "of the 229 total bars featured on "Bar Rescue" from the series start in 2011 to now, 108 are still slinging drinks to customers, making the overall success rate of Taffer's interventions an impressive 47%". In short, Taffer's methods can and do work for owners who are willing to accept his help and suggestions. Keep that in mind as you read this article.

On Season 1, Episode 10 of the reality TV show, Taffer heads out to Framingham, Massachusetts to try and rescue a bar called "Angry Ham's Garage". The episode was filmed in June 2010, and the format, if you're familiar with Bar Rescue, is that Jon does surveillance and reconnaissance before going into the bar to meet the owners, and this one had all sorts of drama as we saw the chaos during the bar service before Taffer hears about situation with the bar that features a former NHL player who is involved with the bar.

This is where we learn that one of the owners of "Angry Ham's Garage" is former NHL player Lyndon Byers. When he and his two business partners, Tim Hanna and Richie Oleson, went to obtain a liquor license from the city of Framingham, they were denied by the city due Byers’ and Richie Oleson’s records of drunk driving arrests. As a result, Hanna bought the business outright, was able to gain a liquor license, and was finally able to open the bar. As a result, Byers was moved to being responsible for marketing while Oleson would be responsible for management and maintenance. Because neither have a financial stake in the bsuiness, however, Hanna officially had the final say on all of the big decisions for everything Jon proposed in the episode. Byers and Oleson have no financial stake in the business.

Before we even more forward, I realize there are two sides to every story. Editing allows the producers of Bar Rescue to show people how they need them to be framed to tell their story, so this story needed Byers' side of the story to be fair. Gayle Fee of the Boston Herald followed up with Byers in 2011, so let's hear his side of things as well.

"I get that I had OUIs, and I live in the bed I made," Byers said. "So we decided Tim would be the owner, I would do marketing and PR and Richie would help manage and do maintenance, and we shook on it."

Things started off fairly well for "Angry Ham's Garage", but patronage dropped which caused sales to drop, putting "Angry Ham's Garage" into a deficit situation. Some of that was due to the neighbourhood as "Angry Ham's Garage" was situated in a neighbourhood with elderly people. Another factor was the bar name as "ham" is a term people from other cities use to insult the city's residents. The third may have directly related to the deficit seen as curb appeal, employee discipline, and management ignorance seemed to keep and/or drive people away. Hence the call to Bar Rescue.

There were some very clear problems that emerged when Taffer sat down with the three owners. As we know, Hanna has the financial investment while the other two men are simply there to assist, and that becomes a problem when you realize that Byers and Oleson cannot legally go behind the bar and train employees, assist the staff, or serve drinks due to their prior legal convictions. That clearly works against the entire premise of a bar, so Jon may be working shorthanded when it comes to who is being trained.

Speaking of shorthanded, the morning meeting where Jon meets the entire staff has a key person missing: Lyndon Byers. As the staff prepare for the stress test, Byers still hasn't arrived at the bar. Hanna calls him to find out where he is, and Byers doesn't answer. During the stress test, Hanna tries to get Byers on the phone again, but the calls go unanswered. In the end, Lyndon Byers is absent for the training and the entire stress test. Taffer states he's "disappointed".

Before Hanna and Oleson leave for the night, Taffer informs them that he has setup a meeting with city executives in order to try to fixed the broken relationship with the city. Hanna and Oleson seem pleased that they'll have the opportunity to meet with them, and Taffer hopes the third member of the trio shows up for the meeting.

In the morning, Byers is still AWOL, but Taffer says he's relieved that Byers didn't show for the meeting. The meeting with the city seems positive, and Hanna extends an invitation to the two city executives to visit the bar's re-opening. Both Framingham executives seem to accept the invitation as Hanna and Oleson leave smiling.

At the bar that evening, Taffer assembles the staff outside for the unveiling of the rebranded bar. For the first time in days, Lyndon Byers is at the bar, and Taffer notices his presence. He asks the three owners to gather away from the staff where they have a quick discussion about Byers' absence over the last few days. Byers tells Taffer that he had a charity event to attend which he admitted to Gayle Lee in the Boston Herald article.

"I went to Mark Wahlberg's charity golf tournament for the weekend and they called me like 100 times trying to get me to come back," he said, and, as an objective observer, my immediate thoughts went to wondering how much Byers cares about the failing bar if he's willing to walk away during a major rebrand. Yes, I realize he has commitments to uphold, but one would think he'd have more interest in saving his failing business, no?

Taffer wasn't having any of it, and he fired Lyndon Byers on the spot. Byers wasn't thrilled with how he was portrayed as per Lee's article.

"They (bleeped) all over me then sent me down the river," Byers said. "It's a comical thing."

Regardless of the effort that Taffer put in, it seems the changes at "Angry Ham's Garage" - now rebranded to Octane Bar and Grill - didn't last long. The follow-up at the end of the show stated that the bar's overall sales in the six weeks following the rebrand went up 27% and that the bar turned a profit for the first time in July. Unfortunately, though, Byers had not reconnected with Hanna or Oleson.

In July 2011, it seems Hanna and Oleson had a change of heart as they told Farmingham executives that they were reverting back to "Angry Ham's Garage" as Octane Bar and Grill wasn't "economically feasible". The re-rebrand turned the bar into "Angry Ham's Octane Bar and Grill". One year after they had shown a profit and turned a profit for the first time, everything Taffer had done for them seemed to have evaporated.

Reviews of the bar online were less than favorable, and didn't really show an upward trend after Bar Rescue had done their work. It doesn't seem that Hanna and Oleson ever recovered as the bar and property were sold to the Sharma Group, LLC, of Framingham sometime in 2016.

There's more to the story of the business, including its closure, that goes beyond the 2016 sale, but I was focused only on the hockey portion of this story. Byers, however, never reconnected with Hanna and/or Oleson, and Lee's article indicates that his presence at the bar was part of the reason some of the patrons were visiting.

"People come in and the first thing they ask is, 'Where’s L.B.?'" said one employee. "It's like going to Disney World and not seeing Mickey."

I'm not sure that comparing Lyndon Byers to Mickey Mouse is fair, but I understand the celebrity appeal. However, if going to a bar or restarant just to see a former NHL player is the attraction, it's not a business. If Byers had been a more involved owner who had a stake in the bar, he could have been a successful former NHLer-turned-businessman who could have shook hands with his customers as they were lining his pockets. His celebrity appeal would actually benefit him rather than just making him a character at the bar.

Am I blaming Byers for the problems that "Angry Ham's Garage" had? No, and it would be patently unfair to drop that at his feet. Did he play a part in the bar struggling? That part should be carried by him just as it's carried by Hanna and Oleson. Just as Taffer said in the episode, "The problem with every failing business is that it has a failing manager or owner."

Lyndon Byers seems like a good dude by every measure, but he's just not a great businessman. That's not a knock on him as a person - it's just the reality of the situation. For a guy who scored 71 points while amassing 1081 PIMs in 279 NHL games, he knows what it takes to reach the top in hockey. He may not be a bar guy, but Byers is a proud alumni of the Bruins and he still attends events for the team.

I know he's had a few medical issues in the past, but here's hoping that Lyndon Byers can keep bringing hockey stories and laughter to fans around the world. That's where he excels on a day-to-day basis.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

The Hockey Show - Episode 618

The Hockey Show, Canada's only campus-produced radio show that strictly talks hockey, is veering off its normal course of following the news and discussing major topics tonight for something a little more fun. In passing, Jason had mentioned the old McDonald's NHL mini goalie masks as he had seen a few for sale at a consignment store, and he and Teebz got to chatting about them prior to the last show they did in-studio before the renovations. There were many "do remember those" comments, and that's how we got here where our hosts will dive deep into NHL-McDonald's promotions tonight on The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT!

Regardless of your stance on McDonald's and their food, it's hard to deny that they are a marketing force when it comes to toys and promotional products. Tonight, Teebz and Jason jump squarely into that world as they look at the run of McDonald's hockey cards and some of the interesting things found there, the NHL mini goalie masks and the story behind them, and the crossover the NHL and the Muppets did that brought McDonald's in as a third party to that promotional push. The entire show is dedicated to NHL-McDonald's promotions as the two hosts look at three fun campaigns from the mid-1990s, have some discussion surrounding those campaigns, and hopefully stir up some memories for listeners tonight on The Hockey Show at 5:30pm CT on one of 101.5 FM, Channel 718 on MTS TV, or via UMFM.com!

If you live outside Winnipeg and want to listen, we have options! The new UMFM website's online streaming player works well if you want to listen online. We also recommend Radio Garden if you need an easy-to-use online stream. If you're more of an app person, we recommend you use the TuneIn app found on the App Store or Google Play Store. It's a solid app.

If you have questions, you can email all show queries and comments to hockeyshow@umfm.com! Tweet me anytime with questions you may have by hitting me up at @TeebzHBIC on Twitter! I'm here to listen to you, so make your voice heard!

Tonight, Teebz and Jason chat hockey cards, goalie masks, french fries, Muppets All-Stars, jingle controversy, promotions, and much more exclusively on 101.5 UMFM and on the UMFM.com web stream!

PODCAST: July 25, 2024: Episode 618

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

The Other Expansion Team

There has been a lot of talk about the Tahoe Knight Monsters thanks to their recent news, and they're certainly trying to make a name for themselves before the team ever hits the ice. On the other side of the coin is the second team joining the ECHL in 2024-25 as the Bloomington Bison haven flown under the radar for the vast majority of their time since being founded in January. There is some news to report on the new team, though, as they've been quietly putting together affiliation agreements, they named their first GM, and they have coaches who will guide those players! Let's dig into the "other ECHL expansion team" today as we look at Bloomington Bison news!

May 30 was the first big checkpoint in Bison history as the Indiana-based team named Phillip Barski as the head coach and general manager of the Bison. Barski was an associate coach with the OHL's Barrie Colts last season, helping them to a 28-36-4-0 regular-season record, but he's made a few other stops where he's served as either an assistant coach or head coach as his coaching resumé to prove he's coming in with experience. The 45 year-old has coached in the GTHL and OJHL, stopped in the OUA with York University, spent time with HC Bolzano in Italy, was the head guy for Podhale Nowy Targ in Poland, and was hired by the ECHL's Greenville Swamp Rabbits as an assistant coach for two seasons before landing in Barrie.

Obviously, Barski will have some work to do in putting a solid team together in the team's inaugural year, but he'll get some help from one of the best teams in the NHL as the Bison signed an affiliation agreement with the New York Rangers. The Rangers had been affiliated with the Cincinnati Cyclones last season, but that affiliation lasted less than a calendar year for reasons that have yet to be given. Whatever the case may be, the Bison will now host players who need a little development time before ascending to the AHL's Hartford Wolf Pack or the bright lights of Madison Square Garden.

A few days after those big announcements, Jesse Messier was named as Barski's assistant coach on June 4. Messier and Barski have ties going back to their days at York University where Messier served as team captain while Barski was the assistant coach, so these two men are very familiar with each other's thoughts on how the game should be played. That should help since Messier's been in the coaching ranks since 2015 where he was an assistant coach with York after Barski had left, he was an assistant coach with the OHL's Saginaw Spirit, and he led the Kam River Fighting Walleye of the SIJHL to a 39-9-1-0 record as the head coach last season. Messier's playing career saw him skate with the OHL's Sudbury Wolves and Mississauga St. Michael's Majors, and the ECHL's Toledo Walleye and Allen Americans.

A couple of weeks later, the management team got a little stronger when Dan Larmer was named as the team's assistant general manager. A former NCAA player with Mercyhurst, Larmer's been a scout with the OHL's Peterborough Petes since 2015 where helped the Petes bring home the 2023 OHL championship banner. It seems the Bison will use his eye for talent in his assistant GM role as they look to fill out their roster, and it's always good to have a pro scout with his knowledge of the OHL on staff when building an ECHL team.

Things went quiet in Bloomington for a while until yesterday when the Bison announced a second NHL affiliation as the Carolina Hurricanes signed a working agreement with Bloomington in order to send players to the team. It's hard not to be impressed with Bloomington being an affiliate of two of the best current NHL teams, but Carolina may benefit from this affiliation nicely with their AHL affiliate, the Chicago Wolves, just four hours apart. After the roster juggling the Hurricanes did last season to have players in their NHL and AHL lineups some nights, this closer affiliation should pay dividends when players need to called up to either team.

While the Bison have yet to sign a player, it seems they have the right people in place to find some good players with Barski and Larmer scouring leagues across the world for talent. Once they have those players signed, Barski and Messier will begin to get them ready to play Bison hockey as they hope to see it, and it seems they'll get an infusion of talent from both the NHL's New York Rangers and Carolina Hurricanes once both squads identify who needs more development. The foundation for success has been set, it seems.

We're just a few months away from the ECHL season starting, and the 2024-25 edition will have two new teams. While one team in the southwest seems to be attracting fans through marketing events with mascots and jerseys, it sounds like the new ECHL team in the midwest is laying the groundwork for success by building relationships and installing a strong coaching and management team. I'm not saying the Bison won't need jerseys shortly, but it seems they have a solid plan on how they'll find players to fill those jerseys.

Despite not moking much noise on social media or through normal hockey channels, the Bloomington Bison look like they're almost ready for their inaugural season. Now about those jerseys....

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Goalie Appreciation Piece

I'm pretty certain fans of the Winnipeg Jets know all about appreciating their goaltender after Connor Hellebuyck won some more hardware this past season. There are goalies who routinely excel at their position that ultimately land in the Hockey Hall of Fame, but there are many more who make it to the NHL, stop some pucks, and find themselves moving every few years as one of 64 coveted positions in the game are occupied by the best puck-stoppers found by general managers, coaches, and scouts. In saying that, it's always crazy when I hear a fan blurt out "I could have stopped that shot" following a goal scored on what looks like a relatively easy shot to save. But is it easy?

I'm here to tell you that it's not, and the proof comes from Hockey Alley's YouTube page. In the video below, you'll get a bird's eye view of what it looks like when a puck is coming towards you with no one standing between you and the shooter. Remember that most goalies have pads and skates on, so stopping these shots might look easy until you're wearing the same gear they do. And the key in this video? The shots get faster as the video gets longer. Have a watch below.
There's absolutely no way I'm making a save on any of those shots above 80mph, and I suspect that a lot of armchair goaltenders may have a new-found appreciation for why it looks like some goalies are guessing on where shots are going given the reaction time needed to stop some of the pucks. It seems pretty evident that the guys paid to stop pucks in the NHL are the best at what they do.

I may have led you to believe this is a goalie appreciation piece, and I still want to honour the armoured men stopping pucks because it's clear that they're incredible athletes. But it also may be a defensive player appreciation post because we often see skaters jumping in front of pucks or lying down in front of shots to help the goalies, and they often wear far less protective equipment than the guys and gals between the pipes. Often, we see players hobble back to the bench after a shot goes off a skate, and they're back out there a minute or two later. For as quick as the goalies have to be with their limbs and body stopping shots, the toughness shown by players to stand in the way of those shots is off the charts by my standards.

However, this piece is about what the goalies see, and imagine being able to have the reaction time to peek around two, three, sometimes four players in front of you, see the shot just as it's being released, and still making the save in the nanoseconds one would have to throw his or her body in the way. In saying that, what the best goalies do in the NHL on a nightly basis might just be magic. When you consider that Hellebuyck, Swayman, Bobrovksy, and Shesterkin are some of the best of the very best puck-stoppers the planet has to offer, seeing this video makes me appreciate just how difficult their jobs are.

Oh, and just for fun, let's roll one-timers into this too.
For anyone thinking, "I can do that", you're welcome to don the gear and show us how. Best of luck to you on that effort.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Welcome To Total Ignorance Arena

The image to the left is the rendering for Scotia Place, Calgary's newest arena to house the Flames. Ground was broken on the building today as all the usual suspects were there: Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek, and Flames executives. This is still one of the dumbest investments any province has made when it comes to spending public tax monies, and the $330 million committed to the project by Smith should see her cement her position as Alberta's most ineffective leader ever. With education, health care, and infrastructure all requiring some major investments at the provincial level, paying for a billionaire's new arena should win her a few more free hockey tickets when her time is up at the Alberta legislative building.

I'm not here to write Political Blog In Canada, though, so I won't mention how "61 per cent of the family doctors had been considering leaving the Alberta health-care system" in January or how half of Hinton, Alberta doesn't have a family doctor. Of course, when 250 education jobs are being cut due to budget constraints, it's hard to teach kids medicine, math, or anything else that they may need to succeed in society. Of course, there may be no society left soon with infrastructure projects such as "sidewalks, roads, underground infrastructure, water and wastewater" badly underfunded. But a new arena in downtown Calgary makes it all go away, right?

It's hard to imagine city employees using their heads for more than a hat rack as well, and it seems that Calgary Chief Administrative Officer David Duckworth fits that stereotype nicely, stating that the arena was "designed to be built on budget". I guess the city of Calgary operates in its own world since Montreal found out about overruns, Belmont, Massachusetts discovered overruns, Hamilton ran up costs, and Etobicoke finished with a higher price tag. But you do you, Mr. Duckworth, since this arena was "designed" to fall within the budget.

Rather than drone on about the all the shortfalls in Alberta that could use a $330 million investment, let's celebrate the new 18,400-seat arena that will host the Calgary Flames as the main tenant for as second before mentioning that "[t]he Flames will repay $316 million to the city in annual lease payments, but the city won't recoup this full amount until around 2060". For a cool $853 million, a budget-friendly building whose project management is entirely controlled by the rich men who own the Flames will be Calgary's newest landmark with the city of Calgary partly responsible for any and all budgetary costs above the initial price tag. Those same men managing the arena will have invested just $40 million of their own monies, so they may be able to afford a few overruns without worrying about shortfalls.

In the fine print of that $853 million price tag, you probably missed the part where David Duckworth's concerns about spending on costly projects had him saying, "There's no more big stuff. There is none." If there is none, how will Calgary pay for overruns?

"But Teebz, the Flames will pay property taxes for using the arena," you say, and this is where I grimace and ask "Will they?"

The city of Calgary actually owns the arena, and the city isn't paying itself any property taxes. According to Project Calgary, "the property taxes generated from any new developments in the Rivers District surrounding the new arena would not even begin to flow back to the City of Calgary general revenues until 2048", and we already know that most businesses surrounding an arena don't actually benefit from the foot traffic generated by the arena. Further to this, the Flames' control in running the arena will cease in 2049, so Calgary essentially operates at a half-billion dollar expenditure with virtually zero revenue generated for a quarter of a century.

Empirically, Calgary has negotiated a deal to reinforce all the statistics and economics about constructing arenas with no benefits for the city without even knowing it. That takes real skill considering there have been no cost-benefit analyses done on the new deal struck between the Flames and the various levels of government, and economic forecasts for this arena and entertainment district have risen from $550 million in 2018 to $631 million in 2021 to the current estimate of $926 million by the time the arena is finished in 2027. It seems like Calgary's answer to the Flames wanting a new arena is to spend whatever it takes to make that happen.

Do the Flames need a new arena? Arguably, yes as the Saddledome officially opened on October 15, 1983. It is the oldest arena used by any NHL team at this time, and it has shown its age over the years despite some renovations and touch-ups to keep it current. What's funny about the Saddledome's construction is that the cost was pegged at $80 million, yet the final bill came in at $97.7 million which makes me wonder if David Duckworth knows about his own city's issues with overruns when it comes to "no more big stuff".

Despite all the studies and forecasts and history proving that this deal might be one of the worst to ever be conceived in the history of major sports facilities, ground was broken on the new "Scotia Place" today. Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek, Councillor Sonya Sharpe, and Premier Danielle Smith all posed together with shovels for the cameras to commemorate the spending of over a billion dollars of public money while the Calgary Flames - the manager, main tenant, and primary benefactor of this new facility - enjoyed seeing 96% of the costs covered by someone else... assuming there are no overruns.

Does Calgary need a new arena? Yes, the city does, but it should be one where they profit from it more than the main tenant does. Scotia Place will likely have all the bells and whistles for it to be a state-of-the-art arena, but it seems more apt to call this new structure "Total Ignorance Arena" because of how terrible this deal is for the city of Calgary and the province of Alberta.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

Heading Home

I missed the news earlier this week, but it seems that former Columbus Blue Jackets head coach Pascal Vincent is heading home as he's accepted the head coaching position with the AHL's Laval Rocket! Vincent got his professional start as an assistant coach with the Winnipeg Jets before moving to the head coaching spot behind the bench of the AHL's Manitoba Moose. Following those jobs, he joined the the Columbus Blue Jackets as an assistant coach before being thrust into the head coaching position after the Mike Babcock debacle. He was relieved of that job after the organizational changes in Columbus, but the 52-year-old is back in Quebec doing what he does best after being hired by the Montreal Canadiens on Tuesday.

If you're looking at Pascal Vincent's record with the Blue Jackets in trying to figure out if he'll fit with the Rocket, stop looking because that entire Columbus franchise was a gong show last season. Instead, look back to his time with the Moose where he was effective as a head coach thanks to a solid roster. Vincent was 155-139-18-13 in his time as the Moose head coach, and he was recognized as the AHL's top coach in 2017-18 while serving as the head coach of the Central Division in the 2018 AHL All-Star Classic. He's a good communicator with younger players, and he should fit nicely in Laval with the Rocket's impressive roster of young talent.

For Vincent, the homecoming is a return to a city with which he's very familiar as he spent eleven seasons as a head coach in the QMJHL where he learned his trade, and three of those seasons were with the Montreal Juniors. 13 years after bouncing around the NHL and AHL, he'll stand behind the bench for the Rocket, just a stone's throw from the team he grew up watching in the Montreal Canadiens.

"The Montreal Canadiens are the Montreal Canadiens," Vincent said in his introductory press conference on Tuesday. "It runs through your blood when you're from the province of Quebec. It's quite a prestigious organization and you find that out even more when you're away from Montreal. When you work for another organization and you come to the Bell Centre and you play against the Habs, you can see the intensity and the passion of the fans, yes, but you can also sense how special it is for opponents to come to Montreal. So I knew it from a guy that grew up in Laval and being a big Habs fan. But when you experience that aspect from an opponent's side of view, I really realized how prestigious this organization is as of today. I'm really happy to be part of the family now."

The Rocket enter the season having missed the playoffs by six points in 2023-24 with a 33-31-8 record, and discipline might be the first thing that Vincent begins to preach after the Rocket amassed the second-most penalty minutes in the AHL. Laval's 19-13-4 record at home proves that they can play good hockey, but their 14-18-4 record on the road was the worst in their division. Only nine teams had a worse power-play efficiency this past season so improvements can certainly be made with the extra player, and only five teams were worse while down a player so Vincent can work on special teams play if he wants to see some quick improvements to the Rocket's place in the standings.

Montreal finished in the bottom-third of the NHL for both the power-play and penalty-killing efficiencies so improvement at the AHL level may help some of those young players get a longer look from the Canadiens, and it sounds like Vincent has a clear vision for his players after speaking to Montreal head coach Martin St. Louis.

"We want to be able to evaluate our players at the American league level but also when they're being called up we don't want them to think too much," Vincent said. "We want them to play and to showcase themselves. And if they have to learn a new system it doesn't do them any favours."

There's clearly more of a development effort at the AHL level, but winning still matters to the players and coaches. I imagine that Pascal Vincent will set up a culture where guys won't lose the vision of moving up to the NHL level, but will allow them to compete hard every night while skating with the Rocket. That ultimately should help both clubs find success.

“At the end of the day," he told Patrick Williams of the AHL, "the goal is how can we create an environment where the players will benefit from it. I think the relationship between the two teams, I see it as one big coaching staff, the Montreal Canadiens and the Laval Rocket. Making sure we’re on the same page. Push each other. Obviously ask questions. But at the end of the day, they make the decisions, and our job is to execute the plan, and I'm on board 100 percent."

I don't have a crystal ball to say whether this was a good hire by the Canadiens or not, but the initial prognosis is that the Laval Rocket should be better with Pascal Vincent behind the bench. He has a clear track record of developing talent for the Jets, he's worked at the highest levels in the game and with some excellent hockey minds, and he's going home to help the team he grew up cheering for and idolizing.

I'm not saying that Pascal Vincent will change the course of the Montreal Canadiens' overall plan, but he's saying all the right things when it comes to being a team guy. In that regard, welcome home, Pascal Vincent, and here's hoping you're as effective for the Canadiens as some of your boyhood heroes were!

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

The First To Be Hired And Fired

It's a pretty well-known fact that former hockey players often become head coaches at various levels of hockey. In most cases, these players start out at lower levels below the NHL to hone their coaching skills because, like any job, it's a new set of skills and knowledge that one has to learn and apply. Great players may not be great coaches, and fourth-line grinders could turn out to be brilliant coaches. It's all up to the individual when it comes to how successful one will be in any job in any industry, but learning and applying that knowledge is the common theme across all industries. This is why it's always a good idea for NHL teams to avoid hiring coaches that have zero coaching experience after retiring from the game regardless of how successful those playing careers were. Case in point? The New York Islanders.

The man pictured about is four-time Stanley Cup winner Phil Goyette. Phil grew up in Lachine, Quebec and became property of the Montreal Canadiens, eventually ascending to the NHL club in 1956 where he played 14 games at the end of the season and ten more in the playoffs en route to a Stanley Cup championship. Three more seasons with the Canadiens that followed brought three more Stanley Cups as Goyette played alongside the likes of Jean Beliveau, Henri Richard, Maurice Richard, and Bernie Geoffrion where he was a solid performer every year.

Goyette would remain a Canadiens forward for three more seasons until he was traded to the New York Rangers on June 4, 1963 in a blockbuster deal that saw Goyette, Don Marshall, and goaltender Jacques Plante head to Broadway in exchange for Dave Balon, Leon Rochefort, Len Ronson, and Lorne "Gump" Worsley. Goyette would be one of the Rangers' top scorers for the next six seasons including twice where he led the team in scoring. The Rangers, unfortunately, couldn't find postseason success, and he was traded to St. Louis on June 10, 1969 for their first-round pick who was Andre Dupont.

Goyette's tenure as a Blues player lasted all of 364 days as St. Louis left him unprotected in the expansion draft following a 29-goal, 78-point season where he led the team in scoring. With Buffalo and Vancouver needing immediate scoring, Goyette was the 13th player selected in the expansion draft on June 9, 1970 as the Buffalo Sabres added him to their list of players which included Tom Webster, Don Marshall, and Francois Lacombe.

Goyette finished the 1970-71 season as the second-leading scorer on the Sabres behind some kid named Gilbert Perreault, but injuries limited his 1971-72 season to just 37 games. In March 1972, he was traded back to the New York Rangers for an undisclosed amount of cash for the final eight games of the season, and he'd close out his career by retiring after 14 playoff games with the Rangers. He would end his career 674 points in 941 NHL games that saw him win four Stanley Cups and the 1970 Lady Byng Trophy.

Remember how I started this article? Well, it seems the desire to compete was still in Phil Goyette's body because the New York Islanders hired 38‐year‐old Goyette on this day in 1972 to be their first head coach in franchise history just six weeks before training camp started. I mentioned how NHL teams probably should avoid hiring rookie coaches, right? Expansion teams might just up the urgency to find an experienced coach by one-thousand percent, yet the Islanders decided to go with "a soft‐spoken, chain‐smoking center who has coached just one big‐league game" as their head coach according to Gerald Eskenazi of The New York Times.

Islanders GM Bill Torrey apparently wanted a different kind of coach as the Islanders began to write their history. He told Eskenazi, "There are so many more teams around now. Today, you must force the opposition into your style. You must break down their style," which is a strange thing to say after hiring a guy who had a grand total of one game of experience behind a bench. Nevertheless, Goyette was Torrey's man as training camp approached.

Goyette's comments in that article about how he would run training camp might have been a harbinger for the Islanders that season. Goyette said, "Camp isn't a place where you prepare to run the mile. I'll make the players work, but there'll also be relaxation periods."

Well, there seemed to be a very extended relaxation period as Phil Goyette's Islanders skated to a 6-40-4 record before Bill Torrey had seen enough and fired Goyette after fifty games, replacing him with Earl Ingarfield Sr. who fared virtually no better. Ingarfield actually finished the season with a 6-20-2 record - his .250 winning percentage only slightly better than Goyette's .160 - floundering to an overall 12-60-6 record, worst in the NHL and 18 points back of second-to-last California in 1971-72.

According to a 2013 article in the Observer-Dispatch, Goyette said about his dismissal, "The team wanted me to stay with them in a different capacity. I went home to Quebec. They made a change, I imagine to keep the fans from leaving. I don't hold any grudges with the organization."

He added, "I took the opportunity offered but I should have never done it. I was just out of the NHL as a player."

Of course, after that forgettable first season, Al Arbour took over the head coaching duties in 1973 as he and Torrey began putting the pieces of the Islanders' dynasty together. For most fans, Arbour was always seen as the first head coach of the team thanks to the success they had, but history shows there were two guys that came before him that helped get the franchise off the ground.

Of course, neither of them lasted a season, but Phil Goyette will always be the first coach in New York Islanders history that was hired and fired. The footnote in the history books will unfortunately show that both those events happened in the same 1972-73 season.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!

The McDonald's Muppets?

I have no idea from where this image was pulled, but it was found on a Pinterest page that's owned by a "Betsy". If you don't recognize the two plush Sharks fans, those are Statler and Waldorf from The Muppet Show. For a short time, there were two fans in San Jose who showed up to Sharks games dressed as two balcony commentators from The Muppet Show, and it seems that Disney and Jim Henson Productions went ahead and made some sort of promotion with the actual Statler and Waldorf - the puppets - sometime after seeing the flesh-and-blood Statler and Waldorf in the stands.

This wasn't the first time the NHL had its brush with Jim Henson's famous puppet characters, though, as a few were featured as a McDonald's promotion in 1994-95 after the shortened season began.
I'm not one to hammer away on commercials, but that ad has more cheese than a double cheeseburger from McDonald's. Nonetheless, the offer of the four Muppet characters at McDonald's happened as the NHL and Jim Henson came together to help each other promote their brands to kids and and their corresponding adult guardians.

The story of the Muppet NHL All-Stars isn't as glamourous or fun as the NHL goalie masks, but there is a story. Before we get into that story, the four Muppet NHL All-Stars included:

• Kermit the Frog - a plush skater representing the Muppet Conference in the NHL's Eastern Conference's teal. He wore his name, not "Frog", on the back.
• Miss Piggy - a plush skater with a rubber head wearing Western Conference colours. She had "Miss Piggy" on the back.
• Fozzie Bear - a plush goalie wearing Western Conference colours. Like Kermit, he just had "Fozzie" on the back.
• Animal - a plush skater with rubber head wearing an unseen red Muppet Conference jersey. He wore "Animal" on the back.

At $3.49 per character, it seems the cost might be a little high for these promotional items when compared to other offerings by McDonald's, but I assume the branding costs for The Muppets may have factored into the price point. These four characters would be the only plush dolls offered by McDonald's at any point in this set, but it wouldn't be the last time The Muppets would be at McDonald's.

The following season saw the NHL and The Muppets partner on a new promotion that appears to be a spin-off of another popular promotion run every year - the McDonald's Monopoly contest! Take a look!

It seems that McDonald's enlisted the help of TSN's Jim Van Horne to push the promotion via this commercial, but goal of this promotion was similar to the Monopoly contest as participants were required to obtain specific stickers with Muppet-themed NHL logos on them in order to win prizes like a Ford Taurus or Mercury Sable.

Game boards were available at every McDonald's location whereas game pieces were obtained off beverage and french fry containers. The stickers were assigned randomly on each container, and each container featured two stickers that could be applied to the game board in its appropriate location as shown below. The key, though, is that each sticker featured an NHL logo that had a Muppets character incorporated into the logo. Click the image to see it enlarged.

Pretty simple contest, right? Collect the six or seven logos for the necessary prize, and win said prize. But this is where we pump the breaks because those Muppet-ized logos didn't just come along for this contest. They were an actual collectible thing back in 1993!

I worked at a sports store during the late-1990s, and they had an entire room devoted to NHL collectible pins. At the time, there were only 21 NHL teams, but each team had a pin where the logo had been modified to feature one of Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie, Gonzo, or Animal. Made by InGlasCo (yes, the same company that made hockey pucks), it seems the NHL saw these as collectible pieces that fans would want. Some of these logo pins were very well done as seen to the right, but other logos simply had one of the characters thrown into the logo in order to meet the requirements. For example, the Anaheim Mighty Ducks pin that was created in 1994 to add to the collection is nothing more than Gonzo in some crude hockey equipment riding what appears to be some sort of vehicle with the Mighty Ducks logo on it. You can see a full list of the pins here, but there was a display made for the pins as shown below!

It's pretty easy to see where the logos in the 1996 McDonald's Muppetmania contest came from once we see these pins. I'll admit that pin collecting in the 1990s wasn't something a lot of kids were doing, so I have no idea how the sales of these pins went for InGlasCo. What I do know is that the room at the store where I worked was filled with all sorts of NHL pins including the Muppets ones, so either they overproduced them or they weren't as popular during that era as the NHL and InGlasCo may have thought.

One thing that was popular in the early-1990s for kids to collect is something that seems just as popular today: hockey cards! The NHL and the The Jim Henson Company joined forces with Cardz Distribution in 1994 to release a set of hockey cards that featured all of Kermit, Miss Piggy, Fozzie, Gonzo, and Animal on various subsets of cards within the overall set. There were equipment cards that displayed the important equipment being used in hockey, rules cards that explained various rules and situations, NHL team facts where interesting facts about each team were published, and NHL team history cards that gave a brief hsitorical description of each of the NHL teams. It's this historical subset where the Muppet NHL logos were featured once again as the pin designs were transferred to card stock with each of the 26 teams featured. You can see a full list of all the cards here in the "Jim Henson's Muppets Take the Ice" set.

If you dig into the link for the cards above and look at the "Positions" subset, you'll notice something that ties back into the Muppets All-Star plush dolls that McDonald's offered in 1995, and that's each of the Muppets featured in that four-doll set is playing the exact same position they're shown as representing in the McDonald's Muppets All-Stars! Not only that, but you'll notice that Animal is wearing both the red jersey he wears for the McDonald's promotion and his skates are tied to his feet as opposed to wearing proper skates just as they are in the McDonald's promotion! In short, the McDonald's Muppets All-Stars were literally based off the NHL Muppets hockey cards!

So let's review quickly:

• In 1993, the NHL and Jim Henson Company partnered with InGlasCo to make Muppets-themed NHL logo collectible pins.
• In 1994, the NHL and Jim Henson Company teamed up with Cardz Distribution to make Muppets-themed NHL hockey cards.
• In 1995, the NHL and Jim Henson Company partnered with McDonald's to produce Muppets All-Star plush hockey dolls based off the characters featured in the 1994 hockey card set.
• In 1996, the NHL and Jim Henson Company teamed up with McDonald's to make the Muppetmania sticker game featuring the Muppets-themed NHL logos from the InGlasCo pin set.

It's almost like McDonald's allowed the NHL and the Jim Henson Company to run a few market tests for promotional items before they jumped in with their ideas for their own promotional items. Pin collecting in the 1990s wasn't a very popular thing, and the option for Muppets-themed hockey cards would take McDonald's out of that market since they had already partnered with Upper Deck for their own NHL hockey card sets since 1991-92. They clearly saw value, though, so McDonald's came through with two NHL promotions that intertwined with the products that had already been introduced to thw world through the NHL-Jim Henson Company partnership.

There's no denying McDonald's reach as a restaurant when it comes to their promotions, and it seems the NHL-Jim Henson Company partnership recognized McDonald's market share when it came to marketing their products. Because the NHL-Jim Henson Company partnership owned the rights to the logos, characters, and images used for the pins and hockey cards, transferring those rights to McDonald's for them to produce promotional products would be easy.

Let me asterisk the above by saying that I have zero proof that the NHL-Jim Henson Company partnership identified McDonald's as a delivery method for their brands to the public, but it makes sense logically that they'd go to a bigger distributor and far better promotor after they had some success with InGlasCo and Cardz Distribution. Based on how many Muppets All-Star plush dolls are on the market, it seemed they sold well. As for the Muppetmania game, I can't speak to how well that promotion helped to sell product, but it appears that using the McDonald's Monopoly blueprint for the Muppetmania game was an easy way to adapt a promotional idea for the public.

McDonald's doesn't do 2-for-1 deals, but HBIC is happy to offer that when talking about McDonald's promotions as we saw the Muppets All-Stars plush dolls and the Muppetmania promotions evolve from two other products the NHL and the Jim Henson Company offered. There was likely varying success of all of these products seen above, but there's no denying the effectiveness of the McDonald's marketing machine.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!