Changing the Game

by Stephen Laroche

  One of the biggest hurdles the game faced in the early 1960s was that it lacked a national television contract in America. In Canada, there was little problem getting air time on radio and television. But at the time, the NHL was regional and simply did not appeal to audiences west of Chicago. Local minor league teams had strong followings, however, and the Western Hockey League was considered a major threat on the west coast.

  Team owners were finally convinced by William M. Jennings that to head off a catastrophe, they needed to double their membership to 12 teams. Clarence Campbell announced these intentions in March 1965. Some of the cities deemed acceptable or potential sites for new clubs included Vancouver, San Francisco-Oakland, Los Angeles and St. Louis. Less than a year later, the NHL was presented with 14 different applications — five from Los Angeles, two from Pittsburgh and one each from Philadelphia, San Francisco-Oakland, Baltimore, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Buffalo and Vancouver.

  Each successful applicant was expected to pay $2,000,000 for the privilege of membership. A few months later, the California Seals, Los Angeles Kings, Minnesota North Stars, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins and St. Louis Blues were welcomed to the league. Interestingly enough, the St. Louis franchise was granted without an ownership group in place, as the location was viewed as an opportunity for the Wirtz family to sell off the city’s arena and generate some cash.

  Many Canadian fans were rankled that Vancouver did not receive a team, but one of the primary reasons they were blocked was that the Canadiens and Maple Leafs did not want to share their television revenues.

  The six new clubs made up the new West Division and they were expected to primarily compete against one another during their early years. The teams were mostly assembled by way of the first NHL Expansion Draft on June 6, 1967, and existing clubs were permitted to protect most of their top stars. The Philadelphia and Los Angeles clubs augmented their lineups by purchasing minor league teams.

  Once the new clubs hit the ice, they suffered many growing pains, but the NHL’s first modern attempt to expand proved a success. In time, two of them relocated, but the remaining four have strong followings to this day and three of them have won the Stanley Cup at least once in their original cities.

  EXPANSION YEAR RECORD: 15–42–17

  (47 points — sixth in West Division)

  COACHES: Bert Olmstead and Gord Fashoway

  GENERAL MANAGER: Bert Olmstead

  FIRST GAME: October 11, 1967 —

  5–1 win vs. Philadelphia Flyers

  FIRST GOAL: October 11, 1967 by Kent Douglas

  CALIFORNIA

  SEALS

  Throughout most of the 1960s, the WHL’s San Francisco Seals were one of the most successful teams in the minors. Named after an old minor league baseball club, they played out of the Cow Palace and won league championships in 1962–63 and 1963–64. Known for their toughness, they had an intense rivalry with the Portland Buckaroos and the Los Angeles Blades and had little trouble drawing decent crowds.

  When the NHL was looking to expand for the 1967–68 season, Seals owner Barry Van Gerbig bid for a new franchise. The success of the San Francisco club undoubtedly made them an appealing choice, and they were selected as one of the new NHL teams in February 1966. In their last WHL season, the team changed their name to the California Seals and moved across the Bay to play in the Oakland-Alameda County Coliseum. Several of the players on that team, including Gerry Odrowski and Charlie Burns, were on the initial NHL roster.

  In preparation for NHL action, the big-league Seals originally hired veteran hockey-man Rudy Pilous, who had coached the Chicago Black Hawks to a Stanley Cup in 1960–61, to run the team. But the team fired him before the start of the 1967–68 season and replaced him with retired hockey great Bert Olmstead. Pilous launched a breach-of-contract suit against the Seals and later went on to help the WHL’s Denver Spurs to great success.

  Olmstead took over the team in time for the 1967 NHL Expansion Draft and with his first selection brought in a former teammate in netminder Charlie Hodge. Their goaltending was solidified, since Gary Smith, a prospect on the rise, backed up the former Vezina Trophy winner. The rest of the team started to come together with some experienced defencemen in Bob Baun, Kent Douglas and Larry Cahan and veteran forwards Bill Hicke and Billy Harris.

  Once training camp began, it was evident that the Seals were going to run according to Olmstead’s strict rules. A multi-time Stanley Cup champion, he knew what it took to win and was not looking for other ways of doing things. The hockey press predicted California would finish first overall in the West Division thanks to their goaltending and defence, but there remained questions about their lack of offensive power.

  The biggest Seals news in the pre-season came in the form of a grizzled veteran trying to make a comeback. Jacques Plante had been retired for two years when he decided to try his luck with an expansion club. The Seals actually hired him as a goaltending coach, which was a first in the NHL, but he got a chance to play in a game against Los Angeles.

  “I feel like I never left,” he said. “My reflexes haven’t changed a bit and my eyesight is as good as ever. But wait until next week and you will have a better story.”

  He left the next day, though, after the New York Rangers cried foul since they held his rights. Van Gerbig claimed that the Seals had an arrangement with the Rangers to pay them per appearance for Plante, and more if he made the team, in addition to another amount for each year he played in the NHL with them.

  Luckily, the Seals inked a deal with Hodge soon after and were protected in net. In an interesting move, Van Gerbig chose to let some of the people who originally bid for the San Francisco-Oakland area franchise purchase a minority interest in the Seals. The group included Bing Crosby, among others, but their investment started to look shaky in a matter of months.

  On the ice, the Seals looked good, at least in their first two games. They won their debut against the Philadelphia Flyers on October 11, 1967, and then shut out the Minnesota North Stars three days later. From that point, they embarked on a 14-game winless streak, blanked in consecutive home outings. After these struggles, the owners decided to change their name to the Oakland Seals to try to draw more local fans, as their old supporters were not crossing the bridge from San Francisco. The logo also changed slightly as the “C” became an “O.”

  “It was the desire of the league that we try to identify with San Francisco,” said Van Gerbig. “The only way we could identify with both cities would be to play in the middle of the bridge. There should be no kidding ourselves. We’re Oakland… . The centre of population is right where our building is. We have access to four million people within an hour’s drive of our arena on freeways… . I don’t agree that our success depends wholly on getting people to come across from San Francisco.”

  On the hockey side, Olmstead started to show signs of frustration with his club.

  “I can’t explain it. It’s a mystery. I know we’ve got a better team than we’ve shown. We haven’t been skating, everything suffers — passing, playmaking, defence, everything. They can’t be tired, it’s too early in the season… . We’ve got a pretty good team and we are in the position now of just having to ride out the low spots. But no excuses for losing, the only way we’ll get better is to work harder.”

  There were also early rumours that Van Gerbig was going to sell the team when it was drawing fewer than 4,000 people per game. Buffalo and Vancouver apparently wanted an NHL team, but he was not quite ready to sell.

  “We are going to stay here as long as we can survive and I can’t set a time limit on that. We knew it was going to be rough in the first year, but frankly we are disappointed. We thought we’d do better than we did in the minors, but we know, too, that things are going to pick up. If we didn’t feel that things were going to improve then I probably would have started talking business with some of the people who want to buy the Seals franchise. But here it becomes a question of motives. Some of the new
owners probably are in this game strictly for the buck. Well, I’m not. I have other ideas about this sport but I’m not going to stay around and get killed either.”

  NHL president Clarence Campbell firmly supported their stance.

  “They’ve got all kinds of resources. I don’t consider them to be in a bad way and neither do the owners… . I don’t know why the NHL has to apologize. The NBA went with crowds as low as 875 at times. We don’t expect capacity crowds in our new division cities.”

  The rumour mill churned throughout the year, especially after Van Gerbig was spotted in Vancouver.

  On December 15, the Seals hosted the Boston Bruins and got a surprise win, but their rematch 10 days later was a Christmas Day massacre as penalties were called and fines administered. Even Olmstead got in on the action; he had to shell out $200 after chasing a fan with a stick and lost another $50 for going out onto the ice. Although the Seals could not land a radio contract their first year, they did get some celebrity attention from Peanuts creator Charles M. Schulz, and he eventually built a long-standing relationship with the team. Years later, he designed their mascot, a seal named Sparky.

  With losses piling up, the Seals dealt away problematic defenceman Kent Douglas to Detroit for a three-player package that included Ted Hampson, who gave Oakland some spark. The problems between Olmstead and his players intensified, though, when Billy Harris walked out during a loss to the New York Rangers. In the face of extended practices, ridiculous fines and other contentious issues, the players seemed ready for mutiny. The coach called it quits and focused solely on his GM duties with just 10 games left.

  “I was sick and tired of looking at them and I’m sure they were sick and tired of looking at me,” said Olmstead. “I had to get off the bench to keep my sanity but I’m getting a new perspective; maybe players and I aren’t made of the same material.… I saw a lack of effort and a lack of trying. They are not passing, and not checking, and not skating. Ninety-nine percent of the time when you aren’t skating you aren’t putting out.”

  After Gord Fashoway got behind the bench, the Seals went 4–5–1 the rest of the way and finished in last place. Knowing that the team was troubled, the NHL gave them until May 15, 1968, to straighten out their ownership setup. It still owed the league $700,000 of the $2 million initiation fee, but Labatt Breweries wanted to buy the Seals on condition that they could be moved to Vancouver. Most insiders did not think that would happen and Campbell said there had been no application to move the franchise.

  The NHL agreed to accept Labatt’s offer to advance the Seals the $700,000 the NHL was owed. Campbell listed two conditions for the transfer of the franchise: nine of the 12 league governors needed to approve the move, and the Vancouver WHL franchise owner needed to agree with the transfer and also satisfy its obligations to its partners in the WHL in defecting from that league.

  “Insofar as Vancouver now is equipped with a first-class rink, it is conceivable that a further expansion of two clubs could be conducted without too much difficulty, taking in Vancouver and some other new club,” said Campbell.

  At the end of the year, Olmstead was let go and the NHL ultimately decided to let the Seals stay put. Van Gerbig eventually launched a lawsuit claiming that the league violated the Sherman Act, but the suit was settled in the NHL’s favour in 1974. And instead, Vancouver got a franchise of their own that would start play in 1970–71.

  The legacy of the Seals is one of failure and futility in the eyes of many hockey fans. To be fair, it almost seemed as if they were doomed from the start. Even though the Seals rebounded and made the playoffs in their second and third years in the league, their slide back to the bottom of the standings was swift — especially once Charles O. Finley took over ownership.

  Baseball fans are familiar with the exploits of Finley, who packed up the Kansas City Athletics and moved them to Oakland. He had a reputation for making some eccentric moves. When he entered the world of the NHL, he changed the team name to the California Golden Seals and changed their jerseys to a so-bad-it’s-good combination of green and yellow to match the baseball club’s colours. He also came up with the much-maligned idea of painting the team’s skates white, provoking the laughter of fans and opponents alike.

  Under Finley’s oppressive thumb, the Golden Seals never did contend, even though at times they had some solid young talent. Their best season during his tenure came in 1971–72 when Gilles Meloche arrived as their number one netminder. But they were unprepared for the WHA talent raids and by the next year were a vastly different club. Finley refused to pay higher salaries to keep players happy, and they were more than ready to leave for bigger contracts. The team also gave up many high draft-picks along the way. When Finley tried to sell them to a group out of Indianapolis, the league rejected the idea and took over the franchise in 1974.

  In early 1975, the press reported that the Golden Seals were heading to Denver, as that city had already been granted a conditional expansion club set to begin play in 1976–77. The NHL also said that if a sale to the Denver group was not completed, the team would be liquidated. They hung on long enough to be purchased instead by hotelier Mel Swig, but he wanted to move them from Oakland to a proposed arena in San Francisco. Unfortunately for Bay Area fans, the arena deal fell through and the Seals were on the move, as minority owners George and Gordon Gund convinced Swig that their fortunes might improve elsewhere.

  For two seasons, the former California club played as the Cleveland Barons. Their time in Ohio was plagued with problems. Besides having little hope of being playoff contenders, they also had to play in the suburb of Richfield in a large arena not even close to being filled with hockey fans. Even with the most seating in the league at the time, they rarely drew more than 10,000 fans per game. The city had long supported pro hockey, but the distance to the new rink was viewed as a major inconvenience, and the club was stuck with a tight schedule for relocation and inadequate time to promote ticket sales locally.

  The 1976–77 season was barely half over when Swig openly hinted that the Barons might not be able to finish the season due to a lack of revenue. They actually missed making payroll twice in the month of February. The league and the NHL Players’ Association (NHLPA) made a loan to cover the shortfall and avoid the potential embarrassment of a team folding in the middle of the year. Soon after, Swig sold his stake of the Barons to the Gund brothers.

  Cleveland’s second season in the NHL was even worse than the first one when it came to their on-ice record, and the financial bleeding simply could not be stopped. Instead of closing shop, they merged with the Minnesota North Stars, who were also having money problems. That was a smart move on many levels, and the fortified club quickly became a contender, making it to the Stanley Cup Final in 1980–81 with several former Barons players on the roster.

  Gerry Ehman

  Ehman is a perfect example of a talented minor league player who put up solid numbers throughout the 1960s but could not really crack an NHL lineup. He was a mainstay with the Rochester Americans for several years but never got a lot of consideration from Toronto coach and GM Punch Imlach. While he was part of a run to the Stanley Cup in 1963–64, and he averaged well over a point per game on the farm, the Leafs made him available to the Seals — a new club that was prepared to give up a pair of top young prospects for a crafty, high-scoring vet.

  Coach Bert Olmstead already knew what Ehman could do on the ice because they had been teammates on the Maple Leafs several years earlier. He became linemates with Billy Harris and Bill Hicke and recorded a goal and two assists in their opening game, helping give them a major lead over the Philadelphia Flyers.

  At times in the 1967–68 season, Ehman was the hottest performer in the West Division. He had a nice stretch in early January when he scored a pair against Minnesota and then a hat trick playing the Los Angeles Kings the following night. He also won West Player of the Week honours by scoring a pair, including the winner, against Pittsburgh on February 24 and potting
one more in a clash with the North Stars the next day. He finished the year as Oakland’s top scorer and led the team with 189 shots on net.

  Bill Hicke

  At one time, the media hailed Hicke as an heir apparent to Maurice Richard in Montreal. He became a solid NHL performer but didn’t live up to the hype and was eventually traded to the New York Rangers. By the end of the 1966–67 season, the Broadway Blueshirts had given up on him, but the Seals knew that he had a lot more to give and picked him up in the expansion draft.

  Hicke suffered a groin injury in training camp but came through with a huge performance in the season opener with three points — including the first game-winning goal in franchise history, scored against Philadelphia’s Bernie Parent at 12:04 of the second period. Following a hot start, he ended up battling bronchial pneumonia, which was the result of an asthmatic condition that was discovered during a conversation with a doctor at a publicity appearance. He sat out for five games to recuperate and managed to get back to scoring, tallying four goals against Boston that included two game-winners on December 15, 1967, and February 17, 1968.

  Coach Bert Olmstead was glad to have one of his top performers back in the lineup.

  “He does wonders for our offence,” he said. “He has a great attitude and he gives everything he’s got… . Back in training camp and later I thought his tiredness was because he wasn’t in condition, and tried to tell him how important it was that he get into shape. But since we’ve found out he has this bronchial condition — and has had it for a long time — a lot of things become clearer and you can understand him a lot better.”

  Hicke finished the year as the team’s top goal scorer and put in 12 pucks in power-play situations. Had he not missed more than 20 games, he likely would have been the prime offensive performer for Oakland.

  Charlie Burns

  From 1958–59 to 1962–63, Burns regularly played with Detroit and Boston, but after that he found himself mired in the minors for four seasons with the WHL’s San Francisco Seals. When it became apparent the NHL was coming to the Bay Area, the big-league Seals got his rights and he had a good shot at coming back.