Hi everyone! This week, we bring you a new article from January 1978 which describes a game in which the Barons mounted a failed comeback against the Montreal Canadiens. The fact the Barons even scored was enough of an accomplishment as the team never really had much success against Montreal. The Barons had gone on a pretty successful 4-1 stretch in early January to vault them back into playoff contention, and what was surprising about this was that they actually played four games in four nights. Then Pittsburgh came along on night number four to bring the Barons back to earth. The Barons then got three days off before Montreal came to Ohio. Maybe the Barons were a little loopy from all the games in a row, or perhaps from the three-day layoff, but Montreal came storming out to an insurmountable lead before the Barons made their comeback. Despite a few clunkers in January and early February, the Barons went 8-6-1 at one point and stayed within striking distance of the last “wild-card” spot. Yes, the 1977-78 season was one of the few back then which featured wild-card teams in the playoffs. Anyone who finished first or second was automatically accepted into the playoffs, while the other four playoff spots went to the next best third-and-fourth place teams. It was a good idea in that it allowed strong teams buried in the basement of a tough division to qualify for the playoffs. This short-lived playoff format provided a little excitement for Cleveland fans in what would prove to be the Barons’ last season in the NHL.

Also new to the site this week is a classic Joe Nieuwendyk card from the 1991-92 Topps Stadium Club. Sometimes, even the best of us has trouble tying our skates, but most of the time, when that happens, we don’t have a professional photographer capturing the moment for generations of hockey fans to enjoy in the comfort of their own home. Unless you count all those moments when strangers find us in the middle of awkward situations and start snapping away on their cell phones, in which case, you probably know exactly how Joe Nieuwendyk feels about this card. Or maybe not, since he’s currently sitting on a lifetime of hockey earnings and probably couldn’t care less about a card everyone’s has forgotten about. Everyone except me, that is, and you too very shortly.

For any of you who are going to be in the Ottawa area this Sunday, October 14, I will be at the Capital Trade Show, which is basically a sports card, memorabilia, and comic book show. I will be there from 10am to 3pm selling and signing copies of my book. The event will be taking place at Walkley Arena in the Jim Durrell Complex (1265 Walkley Road).

Until next time, stay gold!

Hi everyone! Thanks for coming back once again! Glad you were able to tear yourself away from watching your favorite team start off yet another NHL season. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised by Montreal’s first game, even though they lost in overtime to Toronto. I thought the Habs controlled the pace of the game, made nice crisp passes, and the defense held up nicely. Of course, “lots of shots and not many goals” has been Montreal’s mantra the last twenty-five years or so, so not everything was a total surprise. I have to say though, that I find this year’s line-up interesting. There aren’t any superstars up front, and the defense is pretty nondescript with the exception of Shea Weber, but I’m actually interested in seeing who will stand out this year and break out for 20 or 30 goals.

Check out the articles section for a new piece from the January 17, 1976 San Mateo Times. I haven’t posted any smaller articles about specific games in quite a while, so I thought this would be a good one, a rare blowout win for the Seals, this time over the fading New York Rangers. The article says it was a high-point for the season, and it was right. January 1976 was a very good time to be a Seals fan. The team went on a 7-1-1 stretch, easily the best nine-game period in club history. For the first time in years, the team was closing in on a playoff spot and a .500 record to boot. While neither of those things happened in the end, the franchise’s future never looked brighter.

After a brief break, we’re also back with a brand new induction in the Overexposed wing of the Hockey Hall of Shame: the classic 1970-71 Norm Beaudin rookie card! Not sure if you’ve ever seen this one before, but if not, be warned: once you see it, you cannot un-see it. Halloween is coming soon, so it might help you get into the spirit of the thing.

Happy Canadian Thanksgiving to all of you! Until next time, stay gold!

Hi everyone! Well, it has been one interesting week here in the Nation’s Capital. For the first time, as far as I can remember, in my 39 years of living in Eastern Ontario, we had a tornado touch down and cause significant damage to the area. And it wasn’t just one tornado either, but rather six that blew through the area. I had actually fired off my last site update just a few minutes before leaving the office around 5 o’clock. On the highway on my way home, I couldn’t understand how there were so many fire trucks speeding West towards the outskirts of town. I left work thinking, “oh, that’s interesting, we’re getting a little wind, and a few drops of rain; big deal…” Little did I know what was actually going on thanks to our crack team of meteorologists here in Ottawa who just happened to forget that a weather event just short of the apocalypse was about to terrorize over one million citizens. Also got no reminders from the Canadian government, which has started sending out creepy (and loud!) cell phone warnings when major weather events threaten to turn homes into rubble. Reminds me of the time I was driving down the 417 (that’s a four-lane highway that basically connects Ottawa to Montreal) to visit my parents in nearby Cornwall and they closed the damn road from Ottawa to the Quebec border because snow squalls had caused dozens of cars to plummet into the ditch at the side of the road. Of course, there wasn’t a single weather report anywhere to explain, you know, the fact that a four-lane highway had been completely shut down. Even when I arrived back home three hours later, the Internet mentioned nothing about a 100 kilometer stretch of four-lane highway being shut down. Uh, weather people… sometimes I wonder if they just lick their fingers and stick them out the window to predict the weather.

Anyway, I digress… I’m happy to say that we were very lucky in my neighborhood last weekend. Sure, the tornadoes caused parts of the city to lose power for several days, we only went 22 hours without the Simpsons, Internet and Keurig coffee. Compared to a lot of other people, we got off pretty damn lucky. No injuries, no damage to the house or yard. The kitties are all ok and continuing to be terrible at aiming their poop for the litter box. We didn’t even lose the ice cream that was in our freezer, nor did we have to throw out our coffee cream. That being said, I lost a few days of website prep time due to the fact we had no internet for the better part of the weekend, and the fact work was ridiculously busy, so just a small update this week, but I think you’ll like what I’ve added.

In the photos section, I’ve added some beautiful action shots of the Seals taking on the Toronto Maple Leafs, featuring a few Hall-of-Famers and Seals legends. These great photos all come from the archives of the Toronto Star.

I’ve also added a new article about the time Charlie Finley cut ticket prices in half. That happened back in 1972-73, when it became pretty obvious by mid-November or so that the Seals were definitely not going to be challenging for a playoff spot.

Until next time, stay gold!

Hi everyone! The NHL pre-season is finally under way and my beloved Habs actually don’t look completely useless! Pretty nice win over New Jersey earlier in the week, and an impressive performance versus Washington on Thursday, so I’m happy. I don’t imagine this trend will continue, but after Vegas’s crazy first season, where absolutely everyone in the business of predicting hockey futures believed they were going to finish dead last, I have a hard time doubting anything anymore.

In honour of this year’s pre-season, this week, I’ve added Argosy‘s 1975-76 California Golden Seals team preview. Like the Vegas Golden Knights 42 years later, the 1975-76 Seals were also not expected to do much of anything. If it wasn’t for the expansion Kansas City Scouts and Washington Capitals, most experts would have probably picked the Seals to finish dead last, but the Seals were definitely heading in the right direction. 1975-76 would actually end up being one of their best seasons ever thanks to a bumper crop of rookies and sophomore stars, not to mention some rock-solid goaltending, a new and inspiring coach, and the promise of a new arena across the Bay.

The other new addition to the site this week is a lovely shot of San Jose Sharks legend Joe Thornton long before he became known for sporting the best beard this side of ZZ Top. I don’t have to tell you by now that it is a picture that will likely leave you with nightmares, but hey, we all need a reason to get up in the middle night in a cold sweat with a rapidly beating heart begging to leap out of your rib cage, right?

In case any of you are going to be in the Ottawa area October 14, I will be at the Walkley Arena/Jim Durrell Sports Complex from 10-3 selling and signing copies of my book as well as a few other articles I’ve written. I’ll be the one wearing the 1974-75 Seals jersey, so I’ll be hard to miss.

If you haven’t done so already, don’t be shy about spreading the word about Golden Seals Hockey! Tell your friends and colleagues who remember the Seals that they are still alive and well. Tell your friends about the Hockey Hall of Shame, the Overexposed wing, and our very special Hockeywood Disasterpieces.

Until next time, stay gold!

Hi everyone! Well, another week has come and gone, and my Montreal Canadiens have taken yet another step towards total dismantlement, this time sending Max Pacioretty to the land of craps and gambling chaps for a mercurial forward, a prospect, and a draft pick. Could the Habs have done worse? Probably. Could they have done better. Absolutely, had they not dragged out the whole our-captain-is-soon-to-be-a-free-agent-so-let’s-trade-him-now-to-get-something-in-return-but-not-before-dragging-this-out-all-over-the-media-for-months-on-end fiasco. I’ve always had a wait and see attitude when it comes to trades and free agent signings, so I’ll reserve judgment until the season is at least half over, but in my experience, Montreal almost always comes out on the losing end of blockbuster trades. Need I remind anyone of Subban for Weber? Whatever happened to the days when they fleeced the Seals for first-round picks and got Hall of Famers to just fall into their laps? Anyway, the NHL is full of trades involving draft picks that turned into winners, so who knows where this here trade will end up on the list of greatest or worst trades. Remember when the Quebec Nordiques were criticized for letting Dale Hunter go to Washington for a first-round pick? I’m sure their general manager thought he would never hear the end of it. That is, until they drafted Joe Sakic shortly afterwards, and well, you all know how that went. Poor Joe. The kid just never stood a chance, really ;), so I’ll wait and see whether or not Tomas Tatar, Nick Suzuki, or the team’s future second-round pick materialize into something of substance for Montreal before passing judgment.

Same goes for the other big trade that happened in my neck of the woods. I’m of course talking about Erik Karlsson heading off to the Seals’ indirect descendants, the San Jose Sharks. Can’t say I disagree with San Jose’s logic with this one. Wow, is that going to be one scary offensive blue line with Karlsson and Brent Burns! What I do find baffling, however, is how the people of my current home town have reacted. For the most part, everyone seemed either shocked or offended, or both at the recent turn of events. Why? I don’t know. It’s not like this was a surprise; they were talking about trading Karlsson, or at least the possibility of him not resigning since January! And the return for Karlsson? What did you expect, Sidney Crosby? Everyone knew he was heading out of town, so they held Pierre Dorion’s head over a barrel and told him to accept a bunch of prospects and draft picks or else he would get nothing. Dorion chose the first option. I don’t want to get into the blame game over who caused Karlsson’s departure, but needless to say, after months of speculation and rumours, I wasn’t surprised in the least by what happened on Thursday.

Anyhow, back to the subject of this here website: the California Golden Seals. This week, I’ve got a great new article for y’all from November 1971, a great time in franchise history when everything seemed to be going right. The team started the year off horribly, going winless in their first seven games, but then they turned it around, thanks in part to a rookie goalie named Gilles Meloche, and by November, they were firmly in a playoff spot, even harboring thoughts of finishing as high as third place in the West Division. While that didn’t quite work out, 1971-72 was a fun season until about March when everything went to hell.

Also, I’ve added a few autograph photos to the photo section, so be sure to check them out as well.

Until next time, stay gold!

 

Hi everyone! Well, it’s that time of year again. The kids are off to school, and that includes my little lad too. Hopefully, with him going back to his old sleep schedule, that will mean more time for watching hockey. While the NHL gets itself ready to kick off its 2018-19 season, I’ve been busy writing a new induction to the Hockey Hall of Shame! This week, I’d like to turn your attention to the Ottawa Senators and their legendarily bad 1992 Expansion Draft. If youhaven’t figured it out, this would be the “bonehead” reference in the title of this week’s blog entry.

In the articles section, there is a new piece about Wayne “Bones” Merrick, who was traded to the Seals early in the 1975-76 season, and who made a significant impact his first and only season in Oakland. Blues fans were in love with the guy, and when he left they were more than disappointed in their team’s management. While Larry Patey, who went the other way in the trade, became a solid contributor in St. Louis, particularly on their penalty kill, he struggled early on in Missouri, but he too enjoyed a nice career with the Blues, and was by the way, a very good interview as well.

To finish things off this week, just a reminder that I will be appearing at the Ottawa Capital Fair on October 14, location still to be determined, but if you interested in attending, I can send you a link to the event website. I will be the one wearing the white Seals jersey, but I’m sure you would have figured that out anyway. Also, don’t forget to keep spreading the news about my book, but I should know that I don’t have to ask; you guys have been awesome in doing that already. Ask for it in your local libraries, write comments online about it, give it a star rating on Amazon, whatever… all publicity is appreciated.

Until next time, stay gold!

 

 

Hi everyone! Just got home from another busy day at the office, and I was delighted to find my brand new replica 1974-75 Seals home jersey in my mailbox! It’s not exactly like the ones we’ve all seen in hockey cards, but I love that jersey’s colours and design, so I took what I could get as most replicas are sorry excuses for a jersey. I really think some people are designing Seals jerseys in their basements and trying to pass them off as the real thing on eBay. This one, though, looks almost the same as the real thing, and it even comes complete with a “27” on the back (no “Meloche” though). I’m looking forward to wearing it to my next book sale, which will take place October 14, at the Ernst & Young Centre in Ottawa. It’s going to be a sports card and memorabilia show, which should help me push a few units, and I’ll even have a few other short articles for sale as well, so it should be an interesting day, although most of the money I make, I’ll probably sink it right back into hockey cards and magazines, so I’m not expecting to strike it rich no matter how many copies I sell.

I was looking through my archives for some new and interesting articles about the Seals, and I came across one from the Society for International Hockey Research’s 1999 Annual Research Journal. Scott Surgent, who has compiled data on the World Hockey Association for many years, wrote a wonderful piece on the Seals Booster Club, which I’m sure you will enjoy whether you yourself are a member or not.

Of course, I have to mention this week’s new induction to the Overexposed wing of the Hockey Hall of Shame. Travel back in time to when you first learned to skate. Remember going out onto the ice for the first time and both pushing an old wooden chair around while at the same time hanging on for dear life? Well, Kevin MacKay of the Windsor Spitfires probably wished he had said chair the moment this picture was taken, and you can check it out here!

That’s about it for new stuff this week. I’m looking for some articles about the late Paul Shmyr, but I’ve yet to find any, so if anyone has one of him, please pass it along and I’ll be sure to post it.

I’d also like to remind everyone, as usual, to keep posting those comments about my book on Amazon, Goodreads, Library Thing, YouTube, or any other website that allows you to post comments about books and other creative ventures. Good publicity is always helpful and keeps the book in the public eye long after it’s been published. If you don’t want to spend the money to pick it up for yourself, head on over to your local library to borrow it, and if the library doesn’t have it, ask the person at the counter to get it.

Thanks again, all of you, for your continued support! Until next time, stay gold!

 

Hi everyone! I’m back and I’ve got lots of new stuff to share. Had a great holiday with the family. Got a chance to read Moneyball, the great baseball insider’s book about the Oakland A’s of the early 2000s, and I advanced quite a bit on my new book on the early years of the Washington Capitals and Kansas City Scouts. The little one got to spend lots of time with his friends, and for the most part, he hung on to his uncle Mark like a cape on Superman. I also got my first royalty check while I was away so that was pretty cool ($264,000!… just kidding), not to mention the new Hockey News season preview issue (Spoiler alert: Montreal is going to suck badly this year too), and George Swarbrick and Gerry Pinder autographed cards (I’ll post those soon along with a few other great custom cards I’ve had signed recently).

It’s been a while since I posted anything related to the Cleveland Barons so this week I’m posting two interesting pieces that I discovered in my archives. The first article is about how the Cleveland Barons’ logo was created. I don’t know who wrote it, however, and I’ll I know about it is that I found it years and years ago on a long-defunct site called The Cleveland Barons Retrospective. The other article, from the Cleveland Press, is about how the 1976-77 Barons looked to build their team like the Montreal Canadiens, that is stressing skill and speed rather than muscle, like the Philadelphia Flyers had done with such success. Of course, in the 1976 playoffs, the Canadiens had handed the Flyers an embarrassing four-game thrashing and wrested the Stanley Cup from the Bullies, and it would remain in Montreal for four years before moving on to Long Island and Edmonton, two other teams who possessed a dazzling array of talent. While the Barons never came close to capturing that elusive Cup, they never did jump on the goon band-wagon either. Today, the Barons, and the Seals, are known for their skill players rather than their tough guys.

In the Overexposed wing of the Hockey Hall of Shame, we have a feature on former Seals draft pick Chris Oddleifson, whose rookie card is… intimidating-looking to say the least. You’ll have to check it out for yourself to see what I mean, unless you already own the card. In this case, you’ve probably already been scarred for life and don’t really need to be reminded of past horrors. Enjoy!

Until next time, stay gold!

 

Hi everyone! It’s been a long time since I’ve written a new article for the site, so this week I give you my take on what the Seals/Barons’ all-time greatest team would look like if you combined the best players from all eras in franchise history. Hope you enjoy it!

Also, there is a new induction in the Overexposed wing of the Hockey Hall of Shame, a 1994-95 card of a quizzically confused-looking Kevin Dineen. Poor dude, I just feel like helping him out so badly, but I don’t know what I can do to ease his pain. Head on over there to find out what I mean.

As mentioned in this week’s headline, I will be on holidays next week, and probably won’t have access to much in the way of Internet service, so there will be no update next week. To keep you busy in the meantime, might I suggest a few older postings? Here are some of my favorite classic Overexposed inductions, which you may or may not have already read. We got Dan Cleary, acting irresponsibly with a sharp metal blade, we got The Memorial Cup-winning Oshawa Generals cozying up to their favorite TV set, and we got Pat Elyniuk pawning off his worthless 1991-92 Topps collection. And of course, we’ve also got one of my favorite Hockey Hall of Shame inductions, the incredibly awful movie MVP: Most Valuable Primate. MVP? Ha! The only award this movie would ever win would be “Most Frustrating and Asinine Hockey Movie of All-Time.”

Until next time, stay gold!

 

Hi everyone! As I was surfing the Net looking for new stuff on the Seals, I came across a great article on goaltender Ted Tucker, who you may remember played 5 games for the Seals during their awful 1973-74 season. He surprisingly came out of the experience sporting a .500 record, which should have qualified him for a spot in the Hockey Hall of Fame. A few weeks ago, I included a link to an article about the various draft picks of the Cleveland Barons written by Nathaniel Oliver of the Hockey Writers. This week, I present to you another great article from Mr. Oliver, and you can find it in the articles archive here, or you can visit his site, Musings of a Hockey Enthusiast for other articles on various other hockey topics. The online version of the article can be found here as well.

And for those of you always looking to dig deeper into the weird world of hockey, I present to you this week’s Overexposed subject: former NHL and WHA defenseman Al McLeod gettin’ in the Christmas spirit, I think. As usual, I don’t really know what’s going on in these cards; I just interpret them as best I can. You can check out Al here.

Keep that feedback coming, folks, as I love reading all your stories and memories of the Seals. If you haven’t already picked up a hardcover or Kindle version of my book, I encourage you to do so, not just because I wrote it and I think it is awesome (it seriously is!), but because if you’re here, that means you’re probably a Seals fan, and if you’re a Seals fan, this book is going to be a real page-turner that is going to cost you some sleep time. Don’t worry, you can catch up on your sleep reading somebody’s else’s book afterwards. That sound like a good deal? Cool. I knew you’d see things my way. You’re awesome, by the way, and you are definitely looking like you’ve lost weight!

If, however, you already have full bookshelves, and you just can’t bare to replace that copy of How to Make Friends and Influence People with my book, I completely understand. In your case, if you’re lucky, you might also be able to find the book at your local library, as I’ve heard rumors it is starting to find its way here and there across North America. If you’re looking for it, and your library doesn’t have it, ask them what they are waiting for and then politely ask them, nay, demand, that they pick it up so you and other like-minded individuals can read it too. Tell them it might help encourage world peace or something. You never know, they might be convinced.

Until next time, stay gold!