>Theo fleury

ONCE IN AN INTERVIEW with your trusty correspondent, Fleury referred to himself as “one of the greatest small men to ever play the game,” and he’s not wrong. It remains something of a mystery why Fleury is not yet in the Hall of Fame. When he played in the WHL for the Moose Jaw Warriors, opposing teams used to play Pop Goes the Weasel when he hit the ice and, later in his junior career, he was a central figure in the Piestany Punch-Up that led to Canada being kicked out of the World Junior Championship in 1987. In the NHL, Fleury scored 90-plus points four times and racked up 100-plus penalty minutes 10 times. But Fleury was not only battling opponents during his NHL career. He was also battling his own demons.