Canada's Greatest Chess Player of All Time?

[Larry Castle]

I believe when Bobby Hull started (first couple of years) there were still goalies in the league without masks. Can you imagine?

It is really hard to imagine. I don't know how they did it and lived to tell the story. Remember Gerry Cheevers mask that had all the marks where the puck hit it ? Insane

[Brad Thomson]

In those days the players wore no helmets, and the pads were far smaller and less protective, so they could not go all over the place blasting into each other because they would hurt themselves more than they would hurt the other guy. Also, until the 1950s there was no such thing as a slapshot.

[Peter McKillop]

In those days the players wore no helmets, and the pads were far smaller and less protective, so they could not go all over the place blasting into each other because they would hurt themselves more than they would hurt the other guy. Also, until the 1950s there was no such thing as a slapshot.

And one of the guys who popularized the slapshot had a great nickname: Boom Boom Geoffrion.

[Erik Malmsten]

And one of the guys who popularized the slapshot had a great nickname: Boom Boom Geoffrion.

But it was the curved sticks used by Bobby Hull and Stan Mikita that increased speed, but decreased accuracy of predicting where it will end up, that led to more use of masks. I think the first mask I saw was on the great veteran Terry Sawchuk for the Stanley Cup winning Leafs. When the Leafs got him in the draft, they didn't need to bring in their youngster Gerry Cheevers.

[George Stajov]

In the 50's, the shifts were two or three minutes long, so everyone paced themselves.
Much like soccer. Burst of speed, coast along, burst again.
Plus you could get whistle by freezing the puck against the boards.
Now, they're on for 45 seconds, full speed on one or two rushes, then off you go.
Plus they're bigger, so contact is a lot more severe.

[Wayne Komer]

Canada’s Greatest Chess Player of All Time?

May 6, 2021

Bobby Hull and Stan Mikita went to my high school.
Bobby played for the juniors, the St. Catharines Teepees, before joining the Blackhawks in 1957.

Stan also played on the school football team – as a running back, if I recall correctly. There would be a wave of tacklers for the opposing team with Stan, holding the ball, riding on top.

Stan was one of the first players in the NHL to wear a helmet full-time after almost losing an ear in 1967.

[Kerry Liles]

It is really hard to imagine. I don't know how they did it and lived to tell the story. Remember Gerry Cheevers mask that had all the marks where the puck hit it ? Insane

I remember Gump Worsley's face had marks where all the pucks had hit (stich marks)...

[Ian Findlay]

As much as I like hockey and I did watch Sittler's 10 point night, albeit after playing shinny hockey in the park that night, I thought this was a chess post?
Peter Nurmi had tremendous talent as a junior, but gave up chess. Mark Bluvshtein was easily Canada's most talented junior. He beat Shirov in a nice game and was not that much weaker than Carlsen. In fact, I would be curious to know, when Mark stayed at Carlsen's house as a junior, his score against Carlsen at blitz. Honorable mention goes to Lawrence Day who won the Canadian Junior in 1967 and qualified for the A group at the World Junior, which included such notables at Timman and Huebner.