Thank Howe for Fielder’s astounding WHL career
SCENE & HEARD: Guyle Fielder will go down in hockey history as the greatest player never to make it big in the National Hockey League. Had it not been for Gordie Howe, Fielder’s 22 illustrious years in the Western Hockey League just might have been spent at the game’s highest level.
“I started the 1957-58 season with the Detroit Red Wings but had the misfortune to be on a line with Howe,” Fielder says.
“We were both puck carriers and there was room for only one on a line. I spent a lot of time on the bench and eventually asked them to send me back to Seattle. It wasn’t about money. I just wanted to play.”
The records show that Fielder dressed for only six games with the Red Wings. They also show he amassed 2,037 career points in the minors, primarily with the Seattle Totems back in the rollicking days of the WHL. In Jon C. Stott’s intriguing book, Ice Warriors, a history of the WHL that began as the Pacific Coast League in 1948, Fielder dominates page after page with Gretzky-like stats and awards. It was during a golden era that introduced fans in Victoria, Vancouver, Seattle, Portland, San Diego and Phoenix to some of the greatest hockey entertainment on the planet.
The WHL was overflowing with storybook characters such as “Slippery” Sid Finney, Phil (Fox) Maloney, Connie (Mad Dog) Madigan, Andy (Spuds) Hebenton, Eddie (Pistol) Dorohoy and goaltender Lucien (20, 30 beer never hurt nobody) Dechene.
Fielder, 85 and in supremely good shape, is being saluted by the Father Bauer Hockey Society at an afternoon gathering of the clan in Richmond on July 14.
“He’s driving from his home in Phoenix through Vancouver on his way to Alaska,” says Rick Noonan, one of the organizers.
“We just couldn’t let a legend of his stature slip by us without getting together.”
Fittingly, the location is The Pioneer Pub. Tickets are available through rnoonan@shaw.ca.
HERE ’N’ THERE: Because of the ongoing support of McDonald’s, the PNE, Vancouver Canadians and Toronto Blue Jays, the Challenger Baseball program in B.C. continues to flourish with the 2016 Little League Canadian Championships at Hastings Community Park Aug. 4-13. A special Challenger game for chil- dren with cognitive or physical disabilities is on the agenda.
With the baseball diamonds at Hastings Community Park having undergone a $1-million renovation, the Canadian championship for 11- and 12-year-olds includes the host team from Hastings Community Little League and visitors from six regions: Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario, Quebec and Atlantic Canada.
Just one spot is available for the annual Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa., Aug. 18-28. The Hastings kids were there in 2009 and 2012.
END ZONE: Personal memo to TSN Radio’s Matt Sekeres — Have you thought about buying lunch for Canucks general manager Jim Benning? It’s the least you could do after the poor guy was fined $50,000 by the NHL for talking to you on-air about his interest in Steven Stamkos and admitting he approached the Montreal Canadiens about a potential trade for P.K. Subban.
And Matt, forget Nick’s Spaghetti House or one of your Kitsilano haunts. Benning has been known to enjoy a quaint little place on Martha’s Vineyard south of Cape Cod.