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Lindsay: A Legend Who Fought For The Little Guy |
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Dylan Larkin still remembers the moment. It wasn’t even training camp yet, still unsupervised skates amongst Detroit Red Wings and other area NHLers, and Larkin, hoping to crack Detroit’s lineup as a 19 year old, was approached in the dressing room by a guy who did just that.
It was Red Wings legend Ted Lindsay, extending his hand, looking Larkin in the eye and welcoming him to the team.
“At the time, I don’t even really think I realized it was him,” Larkin recalled to Detroitredwings.com on Monday, as word reached the Wings that Lindsay had died at the age of 93. “Just through my interactions with him over the years he was such a gentleman, such a nice guy.
“He always shook my hand, looked me in the eye and asked me how my day was going or how my summer was. He’s a legend of the game and for him to do that for me . . .”
Larkin’s words trailed off, but then he found the perfect closing to his sentence.
“He was someone I looked up to a lot,” Larkin said. “A great man.
“As someone who was a hockey player growing up in Michigan, he’s a man who built Hockeytown. Someone that embodied everything that it means to be a Red Wing, not only as a player but as a person.”
For those lucky enough to spend time within the confines of the Red Wings dressing room, over the years, the odds were pretty good that you’d encounter Lindsay. He was a frequent visitor, so much so that the team still has a stall with Lindsay’s name and number 7 situated in there.
“Ted Lindsay was a real Red Wing,” Detroit senior vice-president Jimmy Devellano said. “I can remember when he was in his 70s he’d be working out, skating, on the (exercise) equipment. He’d be around the team, talking to the players.
“They’d all look up to him, they knew his history, they saw his sweater hanging from the rafters. He was a joy to have around because he had such great pride in the Red Wings.”
Lindsay’s on-ice exploits are astonishing. He won an NHL scoring title, and he led the NHL in penalty minutes, something only he and Nels Stewart have done in NHL history.
“We were getting ready for training camp and Mr. Lindsay was at Joe Louis and walked into my office and said, ‘What are you doing?’” Wings coach Jeff Blashill recalled. “I said, ‘We’re getting ready for training camp, planning the practices,’ and he said, ‘You just tell those players one thing - if they go into the corner with another guy and don’t come up with the puck, they’re a horse(bleep) hockey player,’ and I just thought that kind of embodied his approach to hockey.
“It was true in the 1950s and it’s true today.”
Lindsay led the NHL with 33 goals in 1947-48, his fourth NHL season, and twice topped the league in assists. He never played a shift in the minor leagues, an almost unheard-of achievement in the six-team NHL.
The Production Line of Lindsay, Sid Abel and Gordie Howe terrorized the NHL in the early 1950s, leading Detroit to a pair of Stanley Cups. After Abel left, Lindsay captained the Wings to two more Cups.
Deep down, what made Lindsay unique was his passion for the game. It made him ultra-competitive on the ice, and off the ice, where he championed the cause of the NHLPA in 1956-57, leading to his departure from the Red Wings in a trade to the lowly Chicago Blackhawks.
“Ted was never comfortable in Chicago because he was a Red Wings at heart,” Devellano said.
Lindsay retired in 1960, but came back in 1964, playing one more season for the Wings at age 39, leading them to a first-place finish for the first time in a decade and leading the team with 173 penalty minutes.
When he retired for good at season’s end, the Hockey Hall of Fame waived the three-year waiting period and inducted Lindsay immediately. But when he was told he couldn’t bring his wife and kids to the ceremony, Lindsay didn’t attend his Hall of Fame induction.
He maintained his principles at all times.
“Today’s players owe him a debt of gratitude because he was really the guy that started what we now know today as the NHLPA,” Devellano said. “He made many contributions to the game.”
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