PLAYERS ARE RESPECTABLE ONLY AS THEY RESPECT
Posted: 2/9/2008 12:00:00 AM
I had the great honor of playing for Wayne Fleming in college (current coach KHL Avangard Omsk) and a greater honor playing for Wayne’s father Jake for 3 years as a kid. On this team we had 5 future NHL players and Bobby Hull’s son, Blake. And yes, Blake could shoot it like his Dad also!
I remember the first practice after tryouts in early September 1972, when Scott Mills, a skinny wise guy teammate, with great hockey skills asked our coach Jake, “hey snake” are we going to skate today in practice?” Millsy believed because his older brother had played for Jake in the past, he had the right to address Jake as “snake.” That was a mistake!
What followed next was my first real lesson of my young hockey life. “Everyone, in the corner of the rink,” demanded Jake. Future NHL enforcer Daryl Stanley (Philadelphia and Vancouver) skated by Millsy and said, “MILLSY! your dead.” We then began a 70 minute elaborate discipline skate.
At the end of the 10 minutes of patterned skating, Jake turned to the skinny 10 year old wise guy and asked rhetorically, “ok wise guy, what patterned letter have we been skating ?” “That was a Capital “R”. “Do you know what the Capital “R” stands for Millsy?” Jake was on a roll now, “It stands for “RESPECT.” Do you know what the meaning of the word respect is Millsy?” At this point every player on the team realized that this was not about Millsy any longer. Millsy just happened to fall on the sword for the team that day. We continued for another 60 minutes of intense letter patterned skating until we had systematically skated all the letters of the word “RESPECT.”
“IF ONE WANTS A ROSE, ONE MUST RESPECT THE THORNE”
“Millsy, do you know the meaning of the word respect now?” shouted Jake. Dan Bourbaonnais (future Hartford Whaler NHL) glared at Millsy to let this question pass. Millsy did one better; he collapsed out of total exhaustion. Geoff Wilson (future Pittsburgh Penguin and twin brother to Carey Wilson) skated by Millsy and told him to “stay down.” Jake liked to call these moments, “significant emotional events” that had the ability to permanently change one’s behavior. I think I can speak for Millsy and the entire team on this experience. We were changed forever and had an improved understanding of the word 'RESPECT'. Well, at least we now knew better than to address the coach as “hey snake.”