by Bobby Orr
Whatever it was the Bruins liked about me, Wren was given the green light by Weston Adams, the owner of the team. And while the Leafs and the Canadiens could afford to focus on bigger things, the Bruins had no such luxury. They were building for the future.
Wren came to Parry Sound to visit with us many times over the next year. Though there was no question of signing any official documents, he got to know my parents pretty well. It was probably no easy matter to get my mother to trust him, but he managed to convince her eventually that he was of good character.
One thing he and the Bruins did to show their goodwill was to sponsor Parry Sound minor hockey for three years, from 1961 to 1964, to the tune of a thousand dollars a year. You might think that three grand doesn’t sound like a lot, but back then it was good money for a minor hockey group to get its hands on. That cash represented what would have been the receipts from a lot of bake sales for our local minor hockey association.
Because Wren was traveling a lot as part of his coaching duties, he managed to drop by pretty regularly. On one occasion, as his team was on its way to play in Sudbury, he actually made the bus driver take a detour into Parry Sound just so he could say hello. When Wren finally caught up with me, he found me cleaning floors at the school. Here I was, being courted by the Boston Bruins, and at the same time holding down a part-time job as a janitor. I guess I liked having that spending money.
I’ve often wondered what the guys on the Kingston team must have thought about the bus having to pull up and wait in Parry Sound. Kind of comical when you think about it—a bunch of pros on their way to play a game and their coach makes them wait while he says hello to a thirteen-year-old kid—but that is exactly what happened. He was a recruiter, and it was typical of Wren. It demonstrates how much he believed in me, and how hard he worked to ensure that I would eventually sign with his Bruins.
He was like a dog with a bone, and no one was going to horn in on his prospect. For a year and a half, those visits never stopped, and we got to know and trust Wren. And the more we thought about the Bruins, the better the idea appealed. If I’d signed with a perennial champion, I would have taken my place at the bottom of a crowded depth chart, and it could have taken me years to claim a spot as a regular on the blue line. The opportunity to get significant playing time would be questionable for any upcoming rookie. But the Bruins were at the opposite end of the spectrum. They were often a last-place team and needed help to get better. We all felt that Boston was the place to go, and in hindsight I can’t argue with that decision. And let’s not forget—Wren Blair was very persistent.
Eventually, in March of 1962, I hit the magic age of fourteen, an important birthday for prospective players in those days. A player had to be eighteen to sign a C Form, but parents could sign on his behalf once he was fourteen. Signing that deal would mean I was locked up with the Bruins for the duration of my career, at the option of the team, of course. That may sound unfair, particularly by today’s standards, when high draft picks sometimes seem to be able to dictate terms to teams. But back then, that’s just the way it was. The junior teams were affiliated with the NHL franchises, and scholarships to American universities were not the rival to junior hockey they are today. There was no way around signing a C Form, and in any case, we were happy to do it. After all, it meant being one step closer to the big league.
That summer, Wren came calling once more, and he had an offer. He wanted me to attend a junior camp in Niagara Falls, Ontario, and that was fine with Mom, Dad, and me. It was a weekend in late August that would be attended by both the Oshawa Generals and the Niagara Falls Flyers of the Ontario Hockey Association. Both teams were owned by the Boston Bruins, so the big club could watch a lot of their prospects in one location during the course of the weekend. It was the first step in moving me on to a signed contract with the Bruins.
That camp had a ton of great players who I would see again later in my career, some as teammates and some as opponents. People like Derek Sanderson, Wayne Cashman, Doug Favell, Gilles Marotte, and Bernie Parent were all there. You mention names like those, and you can’t help but think that a team with all of that talent would have been pretty tough to play against. It was a big step up from bantam.
I can distinctly remember going into that camp at a weight of 125 pounds soaking wet, and at one point I was asked, along with everyone else, to step on a scale for our weigh-in. When they announced my weight, I could hear chuckles in the background. I guess they thought I was a little small for a defenseman. But I was in my element, and my size, or lack of size, didn’t matter in my mind. Was I nervous at that first camp? Yes. Did I know how I would stack up against the competition? No. But I was where I wanted to be, and that was at a rink playing hockey.
• • •
I survived my initial test against that caliber of players, and after the camp concluded, Wren came to Parry Sound yet again. It was Labor Day weekend, 1962, and this time he came looking to finalize a deal. Wren wanted my signature on a C Form so I could play for the new Oshawa franchise, which was entering the Metro Junior A League. By signing that piece of paper, I would be committing my future to the Boston Bruins organization, and that was a very big decision.
What Wren didn’t realize at the time was that he wouldn’t have any trouble convincing Dad or me on the merits of going with the Bruins and playing junior hockey that season. His problem would be my mother. Mom was not willing to let me leave home before I had even completed Grade Eight, and no matter what Wren said, she was not going to budge. As I listened to the negotiations unfold around our kitchen table, my heart sank. I started to realize that this probably wasn’t going to happen, and that was tough to swallow. Of course, my mom was absolutely right in her concerns, and eventually everyone involved saw the wisdom of a mother’s love.
After much back-and-forth discussion, my dad, the great negotiator, solved the puzzle. Wren wanted me to play hockey in Oshawa but didn’t care where I lived. My mother wanted me at home but didn’t care where I played hockey. So Dad suggested that I spend the weekdays in Parry Sound, then on Friday, after my school day was finished, we would head to wherever the team was playing. Most of the games in the Metro League were played on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights, so my mom could be satisfied that I would be doing my schoolwork, and I would sleep in my own bed most nights. Mom agreed.
Wren got all this down in a handwritten agreement on letterhead from the Brunswick Hotel, where he was staying. It made clear that if I signed with Boston, my mother would have “the Orr house stuccoed” and my father would be provided with a vehicle, “up to a 1956 model, of the father’s choice.” Plus, we got the grand sum of one thousand dollars in cash. That was a considerable sum of money in 1962.
There was also a small signing bonus for me that Wren agreed to provide: the Bruins had to buy me a new suit. You have to understand, I had never owned a suit before, so this was pretty big news for me. I remember coming home from school, day after day, hoping that the suit would be waiting for me. It was charcoal, and when I finally slipped it on, I felt like the coolest dude in town.
The problem was, though I didn’t know it, my new suit didn’t fit very well. When I arrived in Oshawa, some of my new teammates with the Generals looked at me the first time I wore it and said, “You have to get that thing altered!” How was I supposed to know how a new suit should fit? In any case, off I went to get it done.
It is amusing to consider the types of bonuses that were paid out back then in order to get a player’s signature on paper. It certainly wasn’t about the payout for most guys, and it’s a good thing, because there simply wasn’t much money being thrown around. Imagine one of today’s players getting a new suit as a part of his signing bonus.
Apart from the suit and the bonus money, I was guaranteed only one thing. I would get my shot. I had no lock on a job, just an opportunity, and that was all I really wanted. There was no TV coverage when I signed, n
o fanfare when I arrived in Oshawa. It was all pretty quiet, and that is probably how it should be. In today’s game, we tend to anoint players before they play so much as a game as a pro, but in my time things didn’t happen that way. Players knew they would have to prove themselves under fire, and no amount of media coverage was going to help you land a spot.
• • •
There’s a story I have enjoyed sharing over the years about something that happened during my first training camp as a junior player. I was on the ice at the old Children’s Arena in Oshawa for what could have been my initial practice with the Generals when my stick broke. I headed over to get a replacement, and when I reached the bench, our trainer, Stan Waylett, checked out what was left of my stick. He looked up at me and asked, “What lie?” I stood there for a minute, thinking about the question. I had absolutely no idea what the guy was talking about. Was he implying I had made up the story about breaking my stick?
It was clearly broken, and he seemed to require an answer of some kind, so, trying to come up with a reasonable response, I blurted out, “Left.” Stan must have wondered if the Generals had picked me up after I’d fallen off a turnip truck. He got a good chuckle out of it, anyway. I guess it hadn’t taken me long to show I had a lot to learn. (The lie is the angle between the blade and the shaft of a stick, by the way.)
Later that same season, Stan delivered a line I have never forgotten, and it also had something to do with a hockey stick. I had gone to him to complain about some sticks the team had purchased. Once I had finished my little rant, Stan looked me right in the eye and said, “Hey, kid, it’s not the gun, it’s the gunner.” Basically, he wanted to let me know that excuses would not be looked upon kindly and I should just get on with my job. Point made.
The Generals were in their first year in the league, and we actually played our home games at Maple Leaf Gardens. As you can imagine, this kind of schedule meant my family would need some other people to help with driving duties to get me to the games on the weekend. Whenever possible, my dad would drive, but other folks like Bob Holmes or Doug Gignac would bite the bullet and help out. Sometimes Dad simply couldn’t make the trip because of work or other commitments, so those gentlemen would help get me to the rink, no matter how far away.
When I look back to some of those trips, I can still visualize that two-lane highway and remember as well the snowstorms we had to endure to get to and from our games. We would leave Friday after school to make the game that night, and I would always have to get back to Parry Sound for Sunday evening, because school was waiting for me on Monday morning. On some of those Mondays, I might be sporting a shiner, or still be feeling a few of the hits I had taken on the weekend. And of course, I can still hear some of the comments my opponents would share with me during those games as well. Hockey players know how to get under each other’s skin, and I was a pretty obvious target. They would often remind me to make sure I made it home in time for my Grade Eight classes.
But no amount of chirping or rough stuff was going to change me. Those days represent some of the most exciting moments in my life, because I realized then that I was going to get my shot to play hockey at the highest level. There were no guarantees, and I had no idea if I could cut it, but I was going to get an opportunity, and that was all I wanted. I was anxious for that chance, because when it came to my sport I had a kind of passion that drove me from the very first moments I began to play.
Passion is a key word for any athlete, regardless of the sport. It’s important in any profession, for that matter. I’m grateful I had a deep love for the game, and I’m even more thankful that I never lost it. But it wasn’t an easy ride. People who look at some athletes and say things like, “It was no problem for him, he’s a natural,” are way off base. Although all successful athletes certainly have a measure of natural talent, they all have had to put in hour after hour of work in order to bring out their gifts.
Saying that someone is a natural is usually meant as praise, but it is in fact disrespectful to the people who have worked to master any discipline, be it music, literature, medicine, or sports. No one can control what they are born with, but they can control how hard they work. The fact is that talent counts for almost nothing in the absence of hard work. Plenty of gifted athletes never make it. Other guys work their way to the top with very modest gifts. Whether you are talented or not, the only thing that is going to get you where you want to go is hard work.
Of course, the final piece of the puzzle is passion. Without it, the hard work is just too hard. Virtually all of the successful people I have ever met seem to carry that quality with them. I don’t care what it is you are pursuing, if you don’t have a love for it, I would suggest you should go and try something else, because eventually you will be disappointed. Any skill or skill set is the result of a combination of a couple of things. First, you must have an ability to do it, and second, you must have a willingness to pay the price to perfect it. That is where the passion comes in. At the end of the day, it’s difficult for anyone to put in the hours of practice required to succeed at a sport if they don’t have an internal drive to commit.
I suppose that whenever you make a run at something in your life, regardless of what that might be, there is a certain degree of selfishness that has to become a part of the quest. Ultimately, your time becomes more and more focused on your goal. If you want to be successful, you also have to be prepared to sacrifice some things as well. Sometimes you forget that not all the sacrifices are your own. Later in your life, you find out what other people were going through while your journey was unfolding.
For example, after my first year with the Generals, when I had moved to Oshawa full-time, I would go home to Parry Sound and visit with my family whenever the team had a day or two off. They were always fun gatherings, and of course questions would be asked about how the team was doing, how I was getting along, and so on. Inevitably, though, I would have to get in a car or jump on a bus and head back to Oshawa.
That was no problem for me, because I was chasing something, and leaving Parry Sound was a part of that pursuit. But what I didn’t realize, and what I only found out later in life, was that my departure wasn’t as easy for others. As my car would pull away, my mother and sister Pat would stand outside in front of our house and cry. I never knew that at the time. Of course, they never knew that some nights in Oshawa that first year away from home, I would cry myself to sleep as well. You didn’t talk about those things, because no hockey player would. You had to learn to handle the loneliness—I signed on for it, because it was the price of pursuing my dream. Everybody paid a price one way or another, but I was paying it for my own benefit. As I see now, my family was paying it, too.
If I told you everything went smoothly that first year in junior hockey, I’d be lying. No fourteen-year-old is going to have an easy time playing against grown men. When I first played for the Generals, I was out there against guys who were bigger than me, faster than me, and more experienced than me. I can tell you, when you really get caught by someone sixty pounds heavier than you, it hurts.
The good thing about competing against older and more mature players is that it makes you pick up your level of play. You have to learn how to sidestep checks, how to shift gears to avoid big collisions. You figure out pretty quickly to keep your head up and not put yourself in vulnerable positions.
You learn those things because you must, in order to survive. And as you do, something strange happens. What I’m about to say might not make a lot of sense to you if you have never competed at a high level in sports. For the highly skilled athlete, the arena becomes a place of comfort. Whether it is a hockey arena, football stadium, or basketball court, many athletes come to feel most comfortable where they do what they do best.
You might imagine a young player trying to cut his teeth at a higher level could get so nervous he couldn’t play to his potential. The reality is very different. At least, it was for
me. Being nervous before a game is only natural and probably a good thing, because it means you are getting ready to play. Once I got on the ice, however, and the puck was dropped to start the game, I would calm down and everything made sense. I could almost feel a kind of peace come over me. I was in my element. You get to a place that sports psychologists have identified as the “comfort zone.” Getting there allows you to play your game at your particular level.
All the practice and training athletes go through over years of playing their sport helps to combat feelings of pressure or fear. I have been told by friends and family members that at certain points watching a crucial game, many of them had to turn their heads away from the TV. They found it that difficult to deal with the tension. But for a player, those are the moments you live for. It’s not really all that hard to understand. Although the stakes may be high when you’re in the middle of a game, you’re in control. You’re doing the thing you’re good at, the thing you have trained to do and love to do. It may look nerve-racking to an outsider, but that is only because he or she hasn’t trained for years, day in and day out, to do the things a player is called on to do during the course of a game.
Those were the times when I most wanted to be on the ice and have the puck on my stick. I can’t speak for other athletes, but that is how I felt. Even during that initial junior season with the Generals, when I was overmatched physically, I still felt comfortable on the ice. I may not have been in control of my life off the ice, where, after all, I was just a shy, skinny kid far from home. But on the ice, I was somewhere familiar where I could control what happened. As a result, that whole first year with Oshawa was a great learning experience for me. It went a long way toward building my confidence that I could compete, and maybe even excel, with players at that level.