Issue #1: The Lady Byng Memorial Trophy

[Originally posted 4 September 2008 in different form.]

The Lady Byng Memorial Trophy is given each year to the NHL player “adjudged to have exhibited the best type of sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct combined with a high standard of playing ability.” Simply put: whoever racks up the most points with the least penalty minutes wins. Pavel Datsyuk of the Detroit Red Wings has won the trophy the last three years in a row. Paul Kariya, Joe Sakic and Stan “The Man” Makita are just a few of the other stars who, at one time or another, held the Lady Byng Trophy aloft. Wayne Gretzky hoisted the award 4 different times with 3 different teams, including local heroes the New York Rangers. But the biggest, most colorful character to have ever won the award is a guy named Robert “Butch” Goring who played for the New York Islanders from 1979-1985.

A few years ago, when Will was six or seven, we were driving back from a Southwest Lakers game. He was particularly upset that one of the teammates he most admired had taken three penalties that day. He didn’t understand how or why anyone would ever take a penalty under any circumstances, much less three in a single game. The idea was outrageous.

“When I’m in the NHL,” he said, “I’ll never get a penalty, ever.”

“Not even one?” I chided.

“No!” He was emphatic,

“Honey, that’s impossible––”

“No!” he interrupted. “I mean it!”

A year or so after that Will first learned of the Lady Byng Trophy and the “gentlemanly conduct” it embodies. Ever since that time he not only believes he will have a long and illustrious NHL career, he is absolutely convinced he will be awarded the Lady Byng Trophy year after year, the award ceremony/banquet being a mere formality, of course.

He believes with all his heart he will never, ever be called for a single penalty and points to Robert “Butch” Goring––a man he knew by name even before we moved to New York, osmotically, through poring over his numerous hockey record books and stacks of countless hockey cards––as proof that it can be done.

In theory, anyway.

In 1,107 career NHL games Butch Goring recorded just 102 penalty minutes (a miniscule .09 minutes or 5.5 seconds per game), the lowest total, by far, for any player who played at least 1,000 games. Seven different times he tallied a ridiculous of 2 total penalty minutes (a mere one minor penalty) in an entire NHL season. In 1980-81 he had none.

Zero.

Nothing.

Nada.

Not one single penalty minute.

More amazing still, during the Stanley Cup run of that magical season Goring scored 10 goals and added 10 assists in 20 playoff games. He won the playoff MVP “Conn Smythe Trophy” hands down while leading the Islanders to their second of an unprecedented four consecutive world championships.

But despite even all of this, Butch Goring is more often remembered for wearing the same exact helmet from the time he was 12 years old until the end of his pro career, eschewing socks at all costs and sporting retro-futuristic post-modern velcroed skates.
He retired as a player in 1987 and coached sporadically after that. Currently he can be seen in the New York Tri-State Area as color commentator on MSG-TV’s “Hockey Night Live.” He is also Hockey Director of the New York City Cyclones, Manhattan’s premiere youth traveling team.

We officially moved to Manhattan on Monday, September 1st, 2008. Less than 24 hours later the kids started school and Will started hockey.

At promptly three o’clock that first day I picked them both up from school. We stopped for a celebratory “we made it through the first day of school in Manhattan” smoothie, ran back to the apartment, got Will’s hockey gear and boarded the M15 for Sky Rink at Chelsea Piers, roughly 33 blocks south and nearly the entire island, east-west, away. Two busses and 45 minutes later [we had yet to discover the E-train: see NYM #11], we arrived at the same set of piers on the Hudson River where the ill-fated Titanic was to have docked in the spring of 1912, roughly a mile or so south of where Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger miraculously crash-landed US Airways flight 1549 almost 96 years later. [On January 15th, a Thursday, one of the two days a week we don’t have hockey at Chelsea Piers.]

Will hit the ice at 5:30 and skated until seven o’clock with one two minute break. For an hour-and-a-half the NYC Cyclone squirts, peewees and bantams did nothing but skate. There wasn’t a single puck on the ice. For the rest of the kids it was day one of “boot camp,” for Will it was his first day of try-outs.

Wednesday, more of the same. Thursday, they finally saw pucks. (They call it boot camp for a reason.)

“How many more days?” Will asked, stripping off his cold, wet gear.

“Well, tomorrow,” I said. “And Saturday, and….”

“When do I know if I made the team?” he wanted to know.

“Honey, just be patient. They’ll tell us when they tell us.”

A look of doubt crossed his face. Obviously, he was exhausted. And hungry. And more than a little overwhelmed by everything else––the time change, the move, the noise––the endless parade of humanity in all its bewildering forms.

He was definitely not looking forward to the 45 minute bus ride home.

But that all changed in a heartbeat when a character named Butch Goring sauntered over, shook Will’s hand and said, “You look great out there. Guess you’ll be skating with us all year.”

Will had made the team.

He looked up at Butch and said, “Can I have your autograph?”