You may not know this, but the Flyers weren’t always the rough-and-tumble team that once struck fear in the eyes of most players in the National Hockey League. In fact, in their first few years, the Flyers were a pretty tame bunch of pussycats. In fact, it was the St. Louis Blues who were known as the goons of the NHL, and in the 1967-68 playoffs, they absolutely manhandled the Flyers. So much so that Flyers owner Ed Snider vowed to never let that happen again, and thus, Philadelphia began drafting bigger, tougher players to compete with teams like St. Louis.

Poor Ed Van Impe. He was actually one of their toughest players in their first year tallying 138 penalty minutes in the team’s first season. Unfortunately, here he looks to be batting away flies with his gloves… and losing the battle. Either that, or he’s hanging on for dear life on that “Broad St.” sign like he’s Bambi walking on ice for the first time. Why he’s using the arm farthest away from the sign to hold himself up is beyond me. Personally, I think Bambi would have had more sense than that. He probably would have used his mouth or something. He also could have got advice from that cute little rabbit Thumper. “Thumping” is definitely not something the Flyers did much of back in those days. Ed’s stick is also pointing right back at him, which seems pretty counter-productive to me. I thought one should follow through forward with the stick, not stick it back between one’s legs.

I’m just trying to answer the questions that are floating through my brain, folks; I don’t claim to actually know much of what is going on. Maybe it’s the way Ed’s butt is protruding that has me baffled. Many strange things are indeed afoot on Broad Street.