I was never a Toronto Maple Leafs fan. My dislike of the Leafs started in the 1960s. I was a Gordie Howe fan as many from the Saskatoon area were. Howe led me to being an avid Detroit Red Wings supporter. One of my cousins was a Leafs fan, and Stanley Cup after Stanley Cup win, he rubbed it in my face. The Leafs won four in the 1960s. My Red Wings won none. Zero. Worse yet, the Leafs beat the Wings in two finals. I felt ill when I heard the names Armstrong, Bower, Horton, Kelly, Keon, Mahovlich, Pulford and Stanley. They were on all four Cup teams. These guys are all in the Hall of Fame. And looking back with an open mind, rightfully so. As the years passed, I respected the players on those Leafs teams. When you take the logo off their sweaters, they become human again. The Leafs became fodder for jokes in 1994. That is when I started writing a weekly sports column for the Saskatoon StarPhoenix. By that time, the Leafs had gone 27 years without a Cup. My jokes weren’t popular among many readers. They seemed to keep reading the column despite their dislike for me and my column. I ruined a lot of Saturday mornings for them, I fear.

I received letters and emails from a guy who scared me. I kept a folder of them. I said to the editor of the paper that should I suddenly disappear, the culprit is likely to be soand-so, who lived in a town not far from Saskatoon. He actually sent a letter with letters pasted on a piece of paper like you see in a movie. Eventually he quit writing. None of this is the point of this column, but perhaps sets the stage to some degree. One of the Leafs players of the era that I admired was Bobby Baun, even though he scored a legendary goal in 1964 against my Wings. How can you not respect someone who played with a broken leg? These days, there are athletes who won’t play with a hang nail. Not many of these are hockey players. These guys play with injuries like no others.

 I was sad to read that Baun had passed away at the age of 86. As tough as he was, he couldn’t cheat death. None of us do, of course. Baun was born in Lanigan in 1936, and moved to Ontario at the age of three. By my logic, we can claim him as one of us. He played in the NHL from 1956 to 1973. He was known as Boomer for his big hits. He won Stanley Cups with the Leafs in 1962, ‘63, ‘64 and ‘67. With reporting from The Canadian Press, the following is how he became a legend in the hockey wars. With the Leafs trailing 3-2 in the series, Baun was taken off the ice on a stretcher with 13:15 remaining in the third period of Game 6 after blocking a Gordie Howe shot just above the ankle while killing a penalty. “It was numb then and I couldn’t figure out what was wrong,” Baun said in an interview after the game. “And then when I went into the faceoff with Gordie Howe, I just heard a snap and it caved in underneath me. And I tried to get up and there was no way I could put any weight on it.” With his ankle frozen and taped, Baun came back late in the third period and scored the winning goal at the 1:43 mark of overtime to give the Leafs a 4-3 victory, and send the series back to Toronto for Game 7. Baun called the goal “the high point of 28 years of determination, dedication and desire.”

That is an understatement. At the time he thought the injury might be a pinched nerve. Baun could hardly walk, but he played in Game 7 as the Leafs won 4-0 at home to hoist the Cup for the third consecutive year. In an interview years later, Baun described the lead-up to Game 7. “I had my leg iced before that game and took shots of Novocain every 10 minutes. Only after the Cup was won did I go for X-rays, and they found a broken bone just above the ankle. “I was in a cast for the next six weeks. Was it worth it? Sure, it was. That’s how much winning the Stanley Cup meant to me. Most hockey players would tell you they’d do the very same thing.” No one else would, actually. Baun retired in 1972. He couldn’t beat a neck injury. After the injury, he said he wanted to keep playing. Doctors told him if he got hurt again, there was a 95 per cent chance he would end up in a wheelchair. He took the doctors’ advice. Playing with a broken leg in two Stanley Cup games made Baun a hockey legend.

-Cam Hutchinson