Archive for January, 2010

Bruins Friday! This week I present John “Chief” Bucyk.

One thing that I like about researching these players is finding out little bits of information that I hadn’t already known. I knew the basics of Bucyk; that he was a very good player for a very long time, that he was nicknamed “Chief”, and has been a fan favourite in Boston for as long as I can remember. But reading a little about him, I learned two new things.

First, I had always thought he played his entire career with the B’s. Nope. Much to my surprise, he originally came up with the Detroit Red Wings. He was traded after his second season for some bum named Terry Sawchuck. I kid, of course. Both are in the Hall of Fame now and I think this is a trade that both teams would probably do again.

The second thing I learned, although I already had a hunch, was that Bucyk was not NativeAmerican. A Boston sports cartoonist mistook his dark features as Native American heritage and nicknamed him Chief. The truth is, Bucyk is of Ukranian descent. He dug the nickname, though, and has been called Chief ever since. One of my earliest memories of Bucyk was seeing a photo of him in an elaborate Indian headdress.

Back to his career. He played 23 season in the NHL with 21 of those in a Bruins sweater. He has 556 career goals, the most in Bruinshistory and scored 51 during the 70-71 season. Oh, and he was a season 35 years old when he did that. In fact, he was better the older he got. In fact, he averaged 30 goals a season from the age of 35 until he retired at age 42. At the time, he was the fourthleading scorer of all time. He won two Stanley Cups (69-70, 71-72) and two Lady Byng Trophies (aaaah, more Byngs!). In fact, he has always been known for his gentlemanly play which makes the back of this card amusing. It’s hard to imagine people referring to Bucyk as “The Beast” but I have no doubt that he dished out a few big hits in his heyday. He was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1981.

Now, to the actual card. This is his second year card and I love the simplicity of it. Just a posed picture of Chief in that classy old Bruins sweater with a simple split colour scheme. I know people like action shots and no borders and high gloss, but there is certainly something to be said for simple and understated. People like this; why else are all these retro sets popular. And bring back the silly cartoons on the back! Also, O-Pee-Chee wasn’t yet a factor, so it was just Topps and Parkhurst. Obviously Topps saw the importance of the Canadian market and included both French and English on the cards.

Oh Topps, you use to care.

Derek Boogaard is a big dude. Like, REALLY big. This card lists him at 6’7″ and 270 pounds, but the team website currently lists him at 6’8″ and 257 pounds. Whatever may be the case, he is a giant. There are few players in the NHL who hold a physical edge over Boogaard and the ones who do (Chara, Gill, Myers) would more likely than not lose handedly. See, Boogaard fights and he does it well.

Nicknamed the Boogie Man, Derek broke into the NHL during the 2005-06 season with the Minnesota Wild. During his rookie year, he was in 16 fights, taking on all comers. Check out his fight card from that year: Fedoruk, Laraque, Brashear and Shelley to name a few. Needless to say, he became an instant fan favourite in Minnesota and amongst hockey fight fans.

I would have to say that he relishes the role of enforcer. Why? Well, he and his brother Aaron run an off-season fight camp for youngsters on how to fight. It has drawn a bit of criticism from uptight, politically correct folks, but I have no problems with it. They are teaching kids how to defend and look out for themselves on the ice.

Enforcers used to be able to put the puck in the net. Legendary tough guys like Schultz, Jonathan, and Probert each had a 20+ goal season or two. However, this is becoming less and less the case. They have shorter, specialized, and less productive careers. It’s the guys who bring a little more to the table who stick around; guys like Ray, Neil and Thornton. Derek knows what he is and doesn’t pretend to be anything else. He’s an enforcer, a goon, a guy there to protect his teammates, get into a scrap, and fire up the crowd. Odds are he won’t play 5 more years. In fact, he’s already started to miss games due to injuries and suspensions. But we love our enforcers. We love them for their singular talent and we understand that they are only on our team for a brief time. We love them because when they are on the ice, we move to the edge of our seats. We love them because opposing players suddenly start looking over their shoulder. We love them because they drop the gloves, take one to give one, and fire us up.

Below is one of Boogaard’s most famous fights. It’s against Todd “Fridge” Fedoruk who is certainly no slouch at 6’2″ and 230 pounds. Fedoruk has always been game to drop them and has offered up his fair share of ass-whoopins, but I think he’d like to rethink this bout. Boogaard essentially breaks Fedoruk’s face, shattering his orbital bone. Fedoruk has never been quite the same since. Boogaard was visibly shaken by the Fedoruk fight, leaving the game and not coming back. A lot of these guys are friends off ice. They fight because that is how they make their living and they all understand this. Nothing personal.

A note about Fleer Ultra. I am not generally a fan of the Ultra line because they come out early and usually don’t have the top rookies. One thing I LOVE about Ultra, though, is that they give you the phonetic spelling of the player’s last name which is quite useful in the NHL.