The Meaning of Hockey, Chapter 13

Troy was eager as he entered the office.“What’s up Bobby?” he said, his perpetually goofy grin as large as ever.

“I need to talk to you and I need to keep what I say in this room. I don’t want anybody else, players, other coaches, to know about it,” said Bobby, trying to connect with the intelligence behind Troy’s honest blue eyes. “Okay?”

“Fuck Bobby, you got to fucking ask?” said Troy, who shifted his weight uncomfortably from one foot to the other. “Fuck, you say it’s a fucking secret and it’s a fucking secret. Fuck.”

Bobby never had any doubt about Troy’s ability to keep a secret. Instead, he had wanted to stress the importance of what he was about to tell his assistant coach. Bobby stared at Troy for a few seconds, then looked up at the “Feed the Dream” poster before speaking.

“What’s your dream, Troy?”

“Fuck Bobby, I don’t fucking know. Fuck. I guess my dream is to one day be a head fucking coach.”

“That’s it?” said Bobby.

Troy looked like a puppy caught pissing in the middle of the living room floor.

“What?” Bobby persisted. “Tell me. I’m going to tell you what my dream is.”

“My dream is for people like you, people I fucking respect, to think I’m smart enough to be a head coach,” said Troy.

“Fuck,” Bobby smiled. “That dream was fulfilled a long time ago. And anybody who thinks you’re not smart enough to be a head coach either hasn’t taken the time to listen to you or is too stupid himself to know.”

“Fuck Bobby.”

Bobby stood up and faced Troy.

“My dream, Troy, is to make a difference. Make an impact in at least one part of my life. My dream is to have people think that I was one of the greats.”

“Fuck Bobby, you were one of the fucking best players of your fucking time,” said Troy.

“Maybe,” said Bobby. “But I wasn’t great. Maybe I could have been, but I blew the opportunity. I see that now. I never changed the way the game is played. I never won a Stanley Cup. I never inspired my teammates to go beyond the ordinary. Those are the things the great players accomplish.”

Bobby could see the effort Troy was making to understand. Was that smoke coming from his ears?

“So you want to be fucking great, here, now, in junior hockey,” Troy said.

“Yes,” said Bobby. “I want to be fucking great, here, now, in junior hockey.”

“That’s cool,” said Troy.

“I need your help,” said Bobby.

“Fuck,” said Troy. “It would be fucking great to be a fucking part of fucking greatness.”

Bobby smiled.

“What do you need?” said Troy.

“First, I need someone to talk to. Someone I can trust.”

“Fuck, you know you got that.”

“Second, I need someone to understand what I’m doing and who will be honest with me and tell me if I’m messing up.”

“I’ll try Bobby.”

“Finally, I need someone who trusts me.”

“Fuck, Bobby.”

“Someone who trusts me no matter how crazy things seem to get,” Bobby interrupted. “Someone who trusts me enough to have the rest of the world think they’re crazy too.”

“You trust me Bobby, I know that,” said Troy. “So why the fuck wouldn’t I fucking trust you?”

“Good,” said Bobby, holding out his hand for Troy. “I knew I could count on you.”

They shook hands and as Bobby let go he once again looked straight into Troy’s eyes.

“I think I’m an anarchist,” he said. “You know what that means?”

All Troy could manage was a tiny shrug.

“Freedom. No government. No system. No coach telling the players what to do. Players being creative. Old time hockey.”

“Old time hockey,” repeated Troy.

“People already think I’m crazy,” said Bobby. “Be prepared for it to get worse before it gets better.”

Troy stared.

“Time for practice,” said Bobby.

An hour later the assembled the team at center ice. He stood above the red dot that was painted under an inch-thick layer of clear, frozen water. The players, wearing full gear, but most with helmets stuck on the butt ends of their sticks, were spread in a circle around him. Some chatted with their neighbors. The quiet ones gazed into a dream world where all was well with the hockey gods. All possessed the weary look that Bobby recognized from many past losing seasons.

Bobby stood motionless as he silently psyched himself into the necessary persona. He noticed John Baxter joking with B.J. Brisco, the team’s number-one goalie.

“You think losing our first five fucking games is fucking funny?” Bobby suddenly screamed as he pointed his stick at Baxter, the team captain. “You think allowing 36 fucking goals in five fucking games is fucking funny? You think scoring nine fucking goals in five fucking games is fucking funny?”

Bobby certainly had the team’s attention. Even his assistant, Brad, who likely came through the birth canal with not a hair out of place, gave away his surprise by the one-inch gap between the top and bottom rows of his urinal-white teeth.

“Sorry coach,” said Baxter.

“I don’t give a flying fuck for ‘I’m sorry’,” said Bobby, skating towards his captain with the blade end of his stick at Baxter’s eye level. “I’m fucking sorry that I’m the fucking loser coach of this sorry fucking bunch of fucking losers.”

Bobby maneuvered the blade of his stick to within a centimeter of Baxter’s face and made a carving motion.

Marshall, who hated the team captain, sniggered from across the circle of players. Bobby turned on him. He skated, stick up, until the vapor from Marshall’s heavy breathing mushroomed against the black tape on his blade. Again he made a carving motion, then skated back to the center of the circle.

“Losers pay a fucking price,” said Bobby, who turned to Brad. “They’re skating lines until I say it’s okay to stop.”

Brad smiled. The “tough coach” routine obviously met with his approval. Or maybe he took Bobby’s behavior as a sign of an impending nervous breakdown.

“You heard coach,” Brad screamed and before the three words had come out of his impeccably groomed mouth the players were putting on their helmets and headed to the end boards.

Bobby looked at his watch, then skated to the home players’ box and sat on the bench to put on skate guards. As he slipped them on, the team had begun the drill. Half the squad skated hard to the first blueline, stopped and returned quickly to the end boards. The other half of the players then did the same while the first group rested. The first group then skated to the center redline and back. The second group did the same. Then to the far blueline and back and finally to the opposite end boards and back. The drill was designed to build stamina or to punish players or both.

I always hated lines, thought Bobby, as he climbed up a few rows behind the home players’ box and took a seat. A drill for Nazis. He stared at the scene below him as Brad blew his whistle to send off each wave of players and Troy yelled at them to skate harder.

Brad looked up at Bobby for the first time after about ten minutes of skating as the two goalies were already laboring. The head coach did not react. Another ten minutes passed and most of the players had slowed considerably. Again Brad looked at Bobby, who this time shook his head.

The drill continued. Players were now, on their turn to rest, bending over in pain. All knew better than to kneel or lean against the boards. Finally, what Bobby was waiting for occurred. Brisco, the goalie, puked. As he bent over in pain, his breakfast was launched onto the ice. Bobby stood and climbed down the six stairs to the players’ box. He slipped off the skate guards and stepped onto the ice. He skated to center ice and blew his whistle, interrupting the faltering rhythm of the drill. All the players and the two assistant coaches skated towards him. Bobby looked at his watch, then took a deep breath before beginning another tirade.

“Twenty-eight fucking minutes and we’ve already got the first fucking puker,” screamed Bobby. “Twenty-eight fucking minutes. No wonder we can’t win a fucking game. Does anyone know how long a fucking game is?”

Silence, as the players gulped air to replenish their bloodstreams with oxygen.

“Nobody knows how long a fucking game is?” screamed Bobby, his voice breaking.

“Sixty minutes coach,” shouted Kiniski.

Bobby skated quickly to Kiniski, throwing ice onto his skates as he stopped.

“Who the fuck gave you permission to say anything?” he screamed at Kiniski. “Who the fuck gave you permission to say anything? You think because you’re the leading scorer on this fucking losing team that gives you permission to talk whenever you like?”

Players shuffled their weight from skate to skate in nervousness.

“No sir,” said Kiniski.

“Twenty push-ups,” Bobby said. “Now.”

As Kiniski went down to the ice for his punishment, and Bobby turned to skate away, Picard whispered.

“What the hell has got into him?” he said to his buddy who was already on his fourth trip down to the ice surface.

Bobby turned on him, pointing the stick at his face.

“When you have a winning record, maybe then you can talk,” he said, not too loud, but with a venomous tone. “Twenty push-ups.”

As Picard joined Kiniski on the ice, Bobby looked around at the other players.

“Anybody else care to join them?” Bobby said.

Most eyes looked down and not directly at their coach. Bobby skated from player to player, not saying a word. He returned to a spot near Picard and Kiniski, who were finishing their punishment.

“What the fuck am I supposed to do to make it clear to you that losing is unacceptable?” said Bobby. “What the fuck am I supposed to do?”

He skated around, looking each player directly in his eyes. Then he went back to the middle of the circle.

“I can’t seem to come up with a good answer, so I’m just going to go back up into those stands to think about it. And while I’m thinking about that, guess what? You guys are going to skate.”

Bobby smiled.

“Skating drills. I don’t care which ones,” he said to Brad and then looked back at the players. “Feel free to take a drink of water anytime you puke.”

He stepped off the ice.

Over the next half-hour the players skated circles, forward and backwards, did wind sprints, forward and backwards, from sideboards to sideboards, but mostly they just skated hard around and around the rink. Bobby sat in the stands glaring at his players until finally two more puked and he heard Picard say to Kiniski, “Is he trying to kill us?”

Once more Bobby climbed down from the stands and blew his whistle to assemble the players at center ice. As they skated towards him, Neal Marshall doubled over at the blueline and became the fourth Totem to toss his cookies.

Bobby shook his head as the tough guy finally skated into the circle of players. They coughed and wheezed and gasped for air and Bobby skated around slowly, looking for a moment at each one of them. After he completed the circle, he skated to Brad and Troy.

“Go take a rest, both of you,” he said, motioning for them to sit in the stands behind the home players’ bench.

Brad raised one perfectly coifed eyebrow then skated away. Troy smiled as he too headed off the ice.

Left alone with the players, Bobby stood, hands on top of his stick, and spoke quietly.

“I honestly don’t know what to do,” he said. “I’ve sat up there thinking, but you’ve got me beat. How do we transform 20 losers into a winning team?”

The players’ coughing and wheezing continued as no one answered his question. Once more, Bobby psyched himself into his Nazi prison camp commandant persona.

“How the fuck do we transform 20 losers into a fucking winning team,” he screamed? “Any fucking ideas?”

This time no one answered. Bobby skated to Kiniski and Picard who stood beside each other.

“Any fucking ideas?” he repeated.

Neither answered and neither made eye contact. Bobby looked at the rest of players and skated back to the middle of the group.

“Well, I tell you what,” he said in a more calm tone. “Since I don’t have anymore ideas right now, and since Picard and Kiniski were the only two of you shitheads who had the balls to say anything to me, they’re going to run the practice for the next hour. Let’s see if they have any brilliant ideas.”

Bobby made a sweeping motion with his right hand, inviting Picard and Kiniski to his spot in the middle of the circle and then he skated off the ice, put on his skate guards and climbed up to a seat a few rows higher than where Brad and Troy were sitting.

He stared down at the ice and thought: This is the weirdest thing I’ve ever done.

Feels good.

Next Chapter: Friday

The Meaning of Hockey runs three times a week for 16 weeks exclusively on The Tyee. To offer advice, to criticize or to reserve your printed copy of The Meaning of Hockey email [email protected]