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"To avoid criticism say nothing,do nothing,be nothing", BuzzCast and Rumors |
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We live in a fast world. A world of tweets and quick fixes. A world where rich teams get mulligans and threats of ending NHL playoff games with shootouts feels like it is just a matter of the right network with the right money...(that's the day I quit.).
In this world I honestly don't care if some in the Professional Hockey Writers Association didn't know what wing Ovechkin played this year, but the PHWA does concern me when some want to make public who they voted for in the NHL awards mandatory. Terrible idea on so many levels. Another blog for another day...
But the Hockey Hall of Fame has managed to stay above that and will never make their votes public. This is good because the Hall of Fame voters seem to inherently know how they themselves are NOT the story. The process of voting is fascinating and I recently got to sit down with Eric Duhatchek who explained it out. It was just a discussion over a dinner, but I hope to actually interview him at some point and write that story for another day as well.
Today and tomorrow I wanted to put in my two cents on two men who have impacted the sport to the level so distinct and prominantly that they should have been Hall worthy for years now but are more than likely canceling each other out in the voting.
next year, the great Pat Burns.
Today: Fred Shero.
New hockey fans may know Fred as the father of the NHL's most recent executive of the year award winner, Ray Shero, but anyone who grew up in the '70's and '80's, like myself, knows Fred Shero as the head coach of the Cup winning, and sport altering, Broad Street Bullies. The Flyers team of the '70s that scared the hell out of the hockey world and hockey purists everywhere with their fighting style. I feel many out there still hold the style of his teams in Philly against him and I have actually had people say directly to me that had the Montreal Canadiens not won the Cup in 1976 the game would have never recovered.
But do you also know that Fred Shero was the first NHL coach to hire a full-time assistant?
The first to have a morning skate?
The first to emphasize year round conditioning?
The first to use video sessons with his players?
The first to extensively study the Soviet hockey style, including off-season trips behind the Iron Curtain?
Are these not essential building blocks of the modern game?
And not only that...
Shero gave the game some of its most iconic quotes.
Here are a few of my favorites:
"I swear I have never told a player to attack another player. In fact, I have told my players if they ever hear me saying something like this, they can break a stick over my skull. I ask only that they play aggressively"
"Arrive at the net with the puck and in ill humor"
"When you have bacon and eggs for breakfast, the chicken makes a contribution, the pig makes a commitment."
"We know that hockey is where we live, where we can best meet and overcome pain and wrong and death. Life is just a place where we spend time between games."
"Success is not the result of spontaneous combustion. You must first set yourself on fire"
And this one which I absolutely adore...
"When someone who was always called a kook starts being called an innovator it means he is not innovative any more."
The famous quote on the wall in the Flyers locker room:
"Win today, and we walk together forever”
And a quote I have made a personal motto, a quote I have written on my office wall...
"To avoid criticism say nothing, do nothing, be nothing."
When they came up with the "builders" part of the hall of fame they did so because of people like Shero and Burns. This much I know to be true. Shero built the sport's popularity while innovating its practices and systems.
And even if you hate the Flyers and fighting in hockey know this: Without Freddy there would have never been a movie Slapshot! I mean really, shouldn't that be enough?
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