In just nine months from now, the NHL all-star game, which normally would be held at this time, won’t be because if all goes well, players will be suiting up as Olympians in Sochi instead. So women everywhere can breathe a sigh of relief, knowing they can get pregnant and not miss any all-star action [...]

When you see a building being built that takes maybe a year to finish, think about this; Maple Leaf Gardens was built during the depression in just five months. It takes me that long to build a fence gate. Conn Smythe recruited several rich buddies to invest in the Gardens, and when the money fell [...]

I pulled cards from my 1954-55 set to show you examples of what players back then did for summer jobs, which you can see on the last line of each player description. This was long before a players association, when the game was much different, and there was no such thing as a wealthy player. [...]

I see that Zdeno Chara has had a chat with Max Pacioretty sometime recently and that’s good. If Chara spoke from his heart, saying he worried for Max and never wanted to hurt but simply erase him from the play, then that’s excellent. Of course, it isn’t good if Chara warned Max to never, ever push him [...]

Another little ditty from my Bee Hive collection as we wait for the Habs to destroy Chicago on Tuesday. Roger Leger was not only in the running to replace Dick Irvin as coach of the Canadiens, a job Toe Blake was eventually given, but also managed to get his bridgework stuck in his throat one night against Detroit in [...]

Erwin “Murph” Chamberlain showed up at my door the other day. No, not the real Murph Chamberlain, he’s been dead since 1986, but the Bee Hive, from those lovely 5×8 photos of years gone by, and one of the few I needed to complete a 70-odd set from the 1944-64 Group 2 series. This was a guy, like Sprague Cleghorn [...]

  Previously I wrote about Ted Lindsay and how the Detroit Red Wings traded him to the lowly Chicago Black Hawks because he was of the movers and shakers involved in creating the first players’ association. Here’s another of the ringleaders, Jim Thomson, who absolutely infuriated Toronto Maple Leafs’ owner Conn Smythe by his union actions [...]

With the Chicago Blackhawks on the big stage now, I thought it was appropriate to post this picture I have of Ted Lindsay that I had clipped, along with many others, from Star Weekly’s in the late 1950′s. This is the guy every NHL player should thank, because he was one of the ones who organized the first player’s [...]

He had all the things I knew were good in life – a big talent and one who could skate like the wind, a great brush-cut, a lovely wife, was a heralded phenom when he was a kid, and he wore the sweater of the Montreal Canadiens. What could be better than all that? He was Ralph [...]

With the Habs and Wings clashing on this Saturday night, here’s a great old shot of Detroit’s Ted Lindsay flying over Montreal goalie Gerry McNeil. (circa very early 50′s). Lindsay didn’t score. I have no proof, I just feel it.