James Duthie - Beauties - Hockeys Greatest Untold Stories

Contents

For my mom

Contents

Im about to get this book off to a crappy start.

No, no, no, I mean that literally! The book is great! (Especially my chapter.) But yeah, this foreword is full of... you know.

Its May 3, 2007, Game 5 of our second-round series against the Anaheim Ducks. My Vancouver Canucks are down, three games to one. Were hanging on for dear life. Ive had a good night, not gonna lie: 46 saves on 47 shots. Blind squirrel, 46 nuts!

But with about seven minutes left in the third period of a 11 tie, I get a stomach ache. Im thinking, This is weird. I never get stomach aches during a game. Before the game is a different story. I go to the bathroom five times a day on game day. Im talking number two here. I may have been a number one goalie most of my career, but Im all about number two on game days.

I go once in the morning when I get up, once at the morning skate, once after I wake up from my nap, once after the pre-game meeting, and once after warm-up, just in case. I dont want any accidents during the game. Its a skill.

The guys on my team all know about it. They see my big-ass toes sticking out from under the stall door and say, Luis goin again.

I finish the third, and were going to overtime. So I get back to my stall in the dressing room, and the tummy is rumbly, and Im wondering, Do I have to go? Or is this one of those times when I dont really have to go and once I get back into the game, itll just go away? After contemplating for a couple of minutes, I figure, Just relax, itll go away.

With about six minutes left on the intermission clock, I put all my gear back on and go out into the tunnel to get ready to go back on the ice. Thats my routine. But about two minutes before we go out, my stomach says, Lui, were not gonna make it. I call Red, our trainer, over and say, Red, I gotta go to the bathroom. What are we gonna do?!

Red says, Hold on, Im gonna go talk to the referee. So Red runs over to the refs room to talk to Bill McCreary. He comes running back 30 seconds later and says, Youre fine. Bill says theyll wait for you.

So I run to the bathroom, peel off my gear, and I go. And go. And go. Im trying to hurry, but figuring Im okay because Red said they wouldnt start without me. Then, after about four minutes, I hear the play start! Im like, Wait, what?! What happened to waiting for me?

You can find footage from the CBC broadcast of the game on YouTube. Ill give you Jim Hughsons exact commentary right before the overtime starts, and add my own analysis for you.

HUGHSON:This has been one of the most unusual, most curious playoff games I have ever seen, and it gets curiouser and curiouser. Dany Sabourin has led the Vancouver Canucks out and will be playing goal to start overtime. Roberto Luongo is not on the bench and is nowhere to be seen.

Yeah, Im taking a dump, Jim. Also, is curiouser a word?

HUGHSON:[Luongo] finished the third period, hes had a spectacular night, hes stopped 46 of 47 shots...

Told you guys I was awesome.

HUGHSON:Markus Naslund did come out early and was speaking with the referee as though he might be trying to buy some time...

Thats a good captain right there, stalling while his goalies butt explodes.

HARRY NEALE:Dehydrated, maybe?

I will be shortly, Harry, seeing that its been a back-end waterfall in here for the last five minutes.

HUGHSON:And overtime is under way...

WTF?!

Im sitting on the toilet with my pants on the floor, and overtime has started in an elimination game in the Stanley Cup playoffs! So, now Im in a full panic. Dont want to gross you out (I know... too late for that), but Im not sure I even wipe. I just throw my gear back on and rush to the bench.

And of course, there are no whistles. The play goes on for two or three minutes. Im dying. The Ducks get a bunch of Grade A chances. Sabourin is making unbelievable saves. All I keep thinking is, If they score, I will never get over this. It will be the worst thing in my life. For-ever. (Or at least until Boston in 2011. Freakin Bruins.)

A whistle! Finally! I get back in. And yeah, I know what youre asking in your head. It had stopped. Mostly. I think Ive gotten so anxious and panicked that everything... er... has tightened up... if you know what I mean.

No one scores in the first OT, and back in the dressing room, there is no chance I am going again.

Luis five-holeand six-holeis not open.

Funny thing is, I make 56 saves. Its probably one of the best games of my career. Until the end.

Four and a half minutes into double overtime, Jannik Hansen gets levelled by Rob Niedermayer out near our blue line. It distracts me, just for a millisecond. I put my arm up, looking to the refs for a penalty. Just as I do that, Robs brother Scott just throws the puck at the net and Im caught off guard. Its in. Game over. Series over. Season over.

And now Im feeling sick all over again. And this stomach ache lasts all summer.

* * *

I still dont know what went wrong that night with my stomach. There was no bad shrimp. Maybe Ducks defenceman Chris Pronger poisoned my water bottle. Hes always looked like a Bond villain. It had never happened before, and it never happened again. Thanks, hockey gods, or stomach gods, or whatever gods control this crap. Maybe it could have been a pre-season game in Edmonton instead of an elimination game in the playoffs?!

Sorry, still sour.

A few nights later, we are having our season-ending party at a place on Kits Beach in Vancouver. Its right on the corner of a street. And I am sitting at the corner table with a bunch of the guys, having a few beers. A fire truck drives by, and one of the firefighters yells, Hey, Luongo! and throws a roll of toilet paper onto my table.

I guess that was the 2007 Canucks version of a ticker-tape parade. Chucking toilet paper at Mr. Poopy Pants.

It was painful at the time (the loss and the diarrhea). But I can laugh now. Years go by, and these are the stories we tell endlessly over beers.

And thats what this book is. Ive known James a long time. He loves to hear, and loves to tell, a great hockey story. This book is full of them. Most will make you laugh. A few might make you cry. Hopefully, none will send you running for the toilet.

Hockey is full of characters. You know how we always say, That guys a beauty? This book is full of beauties.

And there is no way Im letting James restrict me to a foreword about the time I couldnt stop pooping and we lost. Strombone needs a happy ending. So, youll hear the 2010 Olympic story later. You should probably just flip to that chapter. Its poetry.

Oh, and by the way, I usually only tweet. This was a lot of words I had to write. Duthie should have paid me more.

My contract sucks. Again.

Heres how the books first interview goes.

One morning, Im lying on my couch in my underwear (too much already?), eating a bowl of oatmeal, watching SportsCentre, when my phone rings.

Hey, James. Bobby Orr. You have a few minutes now?

Uhhh... of course, Bobby... Mr. Orr... just give me one second.

Id emailed Bobby about doing a story for the book the night before, expecting it might take a few weeks or months for the greatest defenceman ever to get back to me. Its taken 10 hoursthree, if you dont count sleep. I sprint towards the kitchen, where my wifewonderful... loving... beautiful... zero sense of urgencyis on the phone with some trendy clothing store, trying to buy a gift for our daughter.

I need her phone, like now. Im an idiot when it comes to technology, so the only way Ive figured out how to record phone interviews for the book is to talk to the subject with my speaker on, and record to the voice memo folder on my wifes phone. (I know. There are better ways. Ive found them since. But Orrs call comes early in the process. This is all Ive got.)