Gordie Howe

Punch Imlach's opinion of Keon after those early championship years tells you how highly the coach regarded him.

Imlach wrote that he would trade-- he wouldn't trade Davey for anyone in the NHL, specifically naming Gordie Howe, Stan Mikita, and Henri Richard, and then added he wouldn't take a million dollars for him either.

Coming from the notoriously difficult Imlach, that was extraordinary praise.

Keon delivered one of his greatest playoff performances in the 1964 semifinal against Montreal.

Bill Waters later said Keon's contract request from Troc- from Toronto had not been unreasonable, making the split feel even more unnecessary in retrospect.

The WHA gave Keon one of the most remarkable late career chapters imaginable.

He became teammates with Gordie Howe.

Keon joined the Whalers and eventually played alongside Howe, who continued playing past age 50, which is nuts.

Ovechkin is the all-time goal-scoring leader in the National Hockey League, though he does not have the overall Major League Hockey goal-scoring record on this continent.

That still belongs to Gordie Howe.

But more importantly for the moment, Alex Ovechkin, who is, like, 95 years old, uh, has appeared in a commercial, a political campaign ad in Russia for Vladimir Putin.

Not this is something that favored Putin, not something subtle, an ad in which he and other paid Putin propagandists and liars, led by the deplorable Foreign Minister Lavrov, who Putin is seen standing behind in this commercial.

And then so, so we were golfing and, um, I, I got the pleasure, honor, whatever you wanna say.

Gordie Howe was in front of me with his group.

Now Gordie Howe can tell stories, and I had guys from that era in my group and from his era kind of in his group.

Well, John, we, we were, Jim Bedard called me and asked me where I was.

He was off the course for an hour.

Yeah.

You've shared this story-

Gordie Howe-

Like just yesterday, I get it on Gretzky Rookies almost every day.

Like, okay, three days a week probably I get asked about, hey, what do you think about this Gretzky card? Just the other day, it was a Gordie Howe, 51 Parkers.

The guy sends me a picture, says...

What do you think? I think this has great eye appeal.

So yeah, Yeah, I mean, it was really fun.

And then I think I'd be remiss in saying, obviously, Wise Blatt had the Gordie Howe hat trick.

And then also, too, they had an invite who was also at the rookie camp that played defense.

And I thought he played really, really well.

The next guy that I wanted to talk about was somebody that I was pretty high on last year when the Devils were able to actually get him and sign him ultimately, 'cause he was one of those guys that was a surprising young free agent that the Devils signed, and that is defenseman Mikael Dyotte, who, again, mentioned before, I told you I was gonna bring him up again.

He had a goal and an assist in this one, and he completed the Gordie Howe hat trick after a big hit on one of the Islanders players.

Got into a fight as well.

Uh, he was definitely all over the ice in this one.

"When you go back in history, innovation has played a central role in Detroit Red Wings Stanley Cups.

The production line was a tremendous innovation in its time, mixing Sid Abel's playmaking, Ted Lindsay's checking, and Gr- and Gordie Howe's generational blend of skill and physicality." Now, I agree with Chris Ilitch that, like, you need-- There was a lot of history and innovation in the Red Wings, and the production line was awesome for them.

But I need this man, who-- How old is Chris Ilitch right now? Um, Chris Ilitch, let me just look up his age.

He's, he's only 61.