Hi everyone and Happy New Year! May 2022 be a mere trash can fire in comparison to the raging dumpster fire that was 2021 and the towering inferno of steel, asbestos and chemical fumes that was 2020. I pray we are finally going to see a light at the end of the tunnel, and if you are a Montreal Canadiens fan like me, I pray we are finally going to see a light in the shape of a first-overall scoring sensation that is going to lead the club out of the ashes. Twenty-twenty-two has gotten off to a rather rocky start so far thanks to Omicron. The NHL has looked absolutely directionless of late, games are getting postponed left, right and centre I have absolutely no idea how they are all going to be made up. The kids here in Ontario have returned to online learning until January 14 (ha ha ha ha, I know, I know… it’s going to be a LOT longer than that if you have any recollection of the Doug Ford government’s past decisions involving schools). Yes, 2022 is not exactly giving me the warm and fuzzies so far as I write this entry exactly 9 days into the new year.

I can say, however, that on the personal side things could not be much better. My son and I have discovered a love for outdoor skating, which I honestly thought he would want to have nothing to do with, but lo and behold, the minute he strapped on the skates he became Mr. Persistent and absolutely refused to use any kind of device to hold him up, and he refused to let me help him skate around the ice. By the end of that first hour, he was able to run-skate everywhere. By the second session, he was gliding around just a bit, and by the third session, he was practically full-on skating. As a Dad, and as my first child to learn to skate, I was very proud. Where I was less proud was how I performed on the ice. You see, I’m really more of a hockey writer than a hockey player. Remember that Kevin MacKay 1991-92 7th Inning Sketch card (check it out right here) where he looks to be doing a dead-on impression of Bambi walking on ice for the first time? Well, the hockey gods punished me yesterday for making fun of Kevin by having me endure the exact same thing. Why I thought I’d be able to just glide out there and do a couple of laps without embarrassing myself, I have no idea. I hadn’t skated in 15 years easy and it’s not like I was Connor McDavid out there way back then either. In fact, I was, and am, more MacKay than McDavid. I mean, I still don’t even know how to properly stop on my skates, which I had also forgotten over the years. After falling flat on my ass (and hip, and knee) more times than I can count, I finally managed to stay on my feet enough to regain some of my pride, and skate a few half-decent looking laps around the rink, but next time I will at least bring a stick and puck to provide me with something to lean on, and make it look like I know what I’m doing.

Anyway, enough about me.

This week, I received an email from Chuck Nan, who did some personal research and managed to fill in some of the gaps in my San Francisco Seals and California Golden Seals game-by-game summaries, not to mention give me some insight into the Seals’ participation in the Western Hockey League all-star games. I have posted updated versions of the two game-by-game summaries, which now feature a complete roundup of all exhibition games played by the minor-league and major-league Seals, and I have added to the all-star and awards sections of the Definitive Franchise Record Book. Thanks Chuck for all your contributions to the site! You can find the three updated pdf files over in the Stats section.

If you are looking for some new reading material, might I suggest this nice piece about former Seals general manager Garry Young. It was written for the Original Hockey Hall of Fame’s which is located in Kingston, Ontario, where I went to university for four years. The article, which you can find here at the OHHOF’s website, talks about the Boston Bruins’ Kingston connection, and how Garry Young was instrumental in building the Bruins into Stanley Cup champions.

UPDATE: McFarland Press has pushed back the publication date of my new book When the NHL Invaded Japan: The Washington Capitals, the Kansas City Scouts, and the Coca-Cola Bottlers’ Cup, 1975-76 to May 6, 2022, so you can still pre-order the book on Amazon.com or on the McFarland website, but you’ll be celebrating Valentines’ Day, St. Patrick’s Day, and Easter before you receive it in the mail. That said, it IS coming, so I can’t complain too much, and it will hopefully provide some of you with some summer hockey reading material.

That’s about it for this week. If your team’s games have been postponed due to Covid, enjoy the time away from the NHL, and, if you are lucky enough to be able to do so, take advantage of the winter weather to get some of your own hockey games organized, or get the kids their own sticks and pucks so they can do what we hockey fans have always done in January, and that is skate, skate, skate, and shoot, shoot, shoot. And if you’re like me, and you haven’t skated in over a decade, take my advice and wear some extra padding, and maybe a helmet.

Until next time, stay gold!