No, you haven’t missed anything. Or, at least, you probably haven’t. The last time I sent out a story was my Happy Holidays post back in December. Just haven’t much felt like it lately. A winter spent squeezing in plenty of drives back and forth to Toronto between snowstorms hasn’t helped. Let’s go with that… Also, I don’t know about anyone else, but I enjoy these stories more these days when there’s something at least a little more involved with my own personal history rather than just hockey/sports history. (And yes, I did write about this a few years ago, but if you don’t like me repeating myself, you can ask for your money back!)

Anyway, with the better weather lately, and as I was driving home to Owen Sound this afternoon (yesterday as I post this), listening to speculation about the NHL Trade Deadline (which is today) and thoughts on the difficulty of dealing players in these days of no-trade clauses (Colton Parayko of St. Louis chose not to waive his when the Blues tried to trade him to Buffalo this week), I was reminded of my own personal Trade Deadline Day.

Like most Canadian kids, I played hockey as a boy. I started the year I turned nine years old. It was the winter of 1972–73. I was terrible. But I improved a lot that summer after the first of two years at the Roger Crozier Hockey School in Barrie, Ontario, near where we had a summer cottage. I played six years, but never beyond house league. My best years were my second and third seasons, when I was an Atom and a Minor Pee Wee. My teams won the championship in both of those seasons. (Kind of sad, but I peaked in hockey at age 11!)

Playing house league, the Willowdale Boys Club tried to keep the teams even. I can’t remember it all exactly, but I think we were just assigned to teams. I don’t know if our parents rated our skills on sign-up forms, or if we’d been “scouted” from previous seasons, but after playing for four or five weeks, the league would switch players around if some teams were too weak and others too strong.

I was a pretty good house league player. A defenceman who liked to rush the puck. (I knew I wasn’t Bobby Orr … but I tried!) Anyway, in December of 1974, I was traded to a weaker team to help prop them up. I remember it as being the night of our family Hanukkah party at our Freedman cousins’ house. Looking it up, I see Hanukkah started on Sunday night, December 8, 1974 … so I bet it was that very night. I remember getting a call from the convener of the league before we left home. He told me the coach of Andrew Morrison Real Estate wanted me for his team. But it was my choice.

I didn’t want to go. My current team, Jerrett’s Funeral Home (honestly!) was in first place. I agonized over what to do, but I remember my father saying, “The coach wants you. He thinks you can help them.” I can’t remember anymore how I actually made up my mind (and I’m pretty sure they didn’t give kids the choice any more after me!), but we called back the convener later that night and I told him I’d go.

It turned out, Andrew Morrison was a pretty strong team. We were led on offense by the coach’s son, Kerry McIntyre and Ross Takeuchi. I anchored the defence with Blake Jacobs. Our goalie was Andrew Spitzer; the best in the league. And we went on to win the championship.

Maybe the team would have come together without me. But they hadn’t yet.

Not until after my Trade Deadline Day.

NOTE: Later in the day, in the Zweig Brothers text group, David (who usually doesn’t remember things as well as Jonathan and I do), wrote: “wasn’t someone else who had to make a decision part of that trade?” I didn’t remember that, but when David and I were talking afterwards, he said he thought it was Ross Takeuchi. Then we sort of put it all together. Yes, Ross and I had been playing together with Jerrett’s and as I remember it now, Ross (who had played with David in our first season) only agreed to the trade after he heard that I’d agreed too! So, it was a more complicated Deadline Day deal than I first remembered.