The Blazing Bulls.

If you have already read some of my previous memories then my passion for the sport of hockey should be quite obvious. Having neither the financial or parental support growing up, organized hockey was simply out of the question for me as well as my younger brother. In our area of Toronto boys my age would wear the red Duffield Boy’s Club hockey jackets every winter. There were so many times when I was a kid that I wished I had been born into another family. A normal hockey loving family with two normal hockey loving parents.

Now that would have been my idea of the perfect family.

I never recall one school chum or friend I knew ever having the same fanatical passion for the game of hockey as I did. For most of them once they got into their teenage years they stopped playing ice hockey altogether. It would not be until I was in my early twenties when I would finally start playing organized rec league hockey for the very first time. 

There are dozens of arenas within the city of Toronto, both privately and city owned. When I was growing up it was very rare to find an arena in the city with multiple rinks. There was Westwood Arena along with Chesswood Arena each having four rinks and Forest Hill Arena had a couple ice pads. Doublerink Arena was located in Concord just north of the Toronto city limits. I remember always seeing ads in the Toronto Sun newspaper for both winter and summer recreational men’s hockey leagues. Back in the late 70's Doublerink Arena seemed like it was located in the middle of nowhere with absolutely no public transit in sight. Once I got my first car I finally went to check out what I thought would be a hockey paradise just north of the city.

And boy was I right.

From the parking lot Doublerink looked like a dumpy oversized old barn. Inside though Doublerink was a hockey oasis with four rinks, a gold, red, green and blue rink. The gold and the red rinks both had large seating areas able to host many of the big out of town tournaments. There was a fully stocked pro shop, skate sharpening, a restaurant/bar and lots of large dressing rooms. There was daily shinny every weekday year round and for a couple bucks you could play shinny for hours with whomever else showed up on that day. There were always goalies because goalies always played for free.

Before I left I helped myself to one of the white brochures for the upcoming summer season. Doublerink had two options for players. First, you could enter your own men’s team and second you could sign up to play as an individual player on a team made up of other individual players. The individual player's price also included your jersey. Teams would most likely already have their own jerseys, but if they didn’t there was a discount voucher from the pro shop also in the brochure.

The summer league ran every weeknight with no weekend games. There were four divisions, Premier, 'A', 'B' and 'C'. Premier was where the best teams and players played with the ‘C’ division being where the weakest players would play. The popular winter leagues were a lot more competitive with weekend games and more divisions added. If you wanted to play rec league hockey then Doublerink had a spot for you both in the winter and summer.

When I worked at Collegiate Sports, I would play morning shinny quite often before my afternoon shifts at Chesswood Arena. Chesswood was right within the city and was easily accessible by bus. Chesswood too also had year round leagues. But, for men’s recreational league hockey, Doublerink was by far the most popular and attracted the most teams and players. The Doublerink Hockey League advertised itself as the home of the biggest recreational men’s hockey league in Canada. Almost everyone I knew who played hockey at one time or another played up at Doublerink.

It was the summer of 1983 when both my brother and I signed up to play and we both listed our skill level as intermediate. We got a schedule and our jerseys when we showed up for our first game. We knew nobody there, but we all had matching jerseys. Since we were all individual players, most of the other guys did not know anyone else either. There was also another pair of brothers on the team that first summer.

The hockey was not that good as most the players definitely had overestimated their true skill levels when they signed up. If they were true intermediate players like they said they were then my brother and I along with a couple others were Premier players. Many guys on that team were ‘C’ division players at best. I played every game that summer and I enjoyed for the first time playing league games with referees, timekeepers and weekly posted stats. I decided that for the upcoming winter season I wanted to enter my own team, but only if I could find enough good players who wanted to play.

I started making phone calls to a few of my Collegiate buddies and most agreed to play. My brother also wanted to play. The other brother combo Jack and Jerry from summer hockey also both signed up. Jack for sure would be one of our better players and Jerry would no doubt be our worst player. I also added two Mike’s and a Rob from that summer team and our team was named the Blazing Bulls. I have always loved the Toronto Toros logo from the old WHA days and I had white jerseys made up with each player’s name on the back. They looked amazing and all the guys loved them.

We were all ready to play for our first winter season.

I had signed up early for the Thursday night league. Thursday nights were the best night for competition by far and filled up the quickest for each winter season. We got in right away because of our super early deposit. I had seen most of the guys who were on the team play and the couple that I had never seen play, I relied on other player’s scouting evaluations. I listed my team as a true intermediate skill level team. After a couple exhibition games the league conveners agreed and slotted us into the intermediate 'B2' division.

That first season was very memorable, we played pretty well in our six team division and we made the playoffs. When the season ended we were the 1983/84 Doublerink Arena Thursday night 'B2' division champions and we were all presented with trophies at our end of season banquet. For the most part I was very satisfied with our first year result, but the ‘A’ division was always our team's ultimate goal. It was where we as a team wanted to be playing. We did however have a couple weaker players on our team and I knew we would never reach our goal with those players. Our weakest player was Jerry, the brother of one of our best players Jack. I had hoped Jerry would just quit because he knew he was our weakest link, but he never did. It was after our first season and I knew my team would be around for a long time, but only if we could get better as a team.

It was also during that summer that I knew my relationship with my own brother would never be the same again. He had buckled under pressure from his Kingdom Hall elders and he decided his God and cult was more important than playing hockey. He quit after our first season where he had been one of our better defensemen.

The Bulls team that I started in the fall of ‘83 went on to play for nine seasons. After the first two seasons and with two championships in hand we were finally moved up to the much coveted Thursday night ‘A’ division. We failed miserably during that third season not even making the playoffs and then we lost in the finals in season four. We were then relegated back to the ‘B’ division for season five where we won our third championship in five years, all in the ‘B’ divisions.

As the team rep I look back and regret some of the mean and hurtful things I did to some of my fellow teammates over those first five seasons. The win at all cost attitude had taken over the team and I was to blame more than anyone else because I ran the team. A few of our superior players grew frustrated with some of their weaker teammates and wanted them all replaced with much better players. Rather than risk losing those better players, I simply did not invite the weaker players back. Some of them actually cared and they were pretty upset, but most didn't care. They all knew our team's goal and they knew they were preventing us from advancing back up to the ‘A’ division.

I can recall two incidents that I regret the most.

The first one was after our second season and with two championships we were promoted up to the higher ‘A’ division. After telling Jack that I would not be inviting Jerry back for the third season, Jack naturally was very upset with me. He told me that if I was cutting his brother then I would also be cutting him. I did cut Jerry and like he had told me Jack quit too. I admired Jack for his stance and he always had an open invite if he ever changed his mind, but he never did and I never saw either Jack or Jerry again.

The second was an issue the team had with Mike. He was one of our defensemen from my first summer team and he had already played our first three seasons. Mike was a great guy and everyone liked him. He always showed up and he never complained, but he was a bit too slow on the left side. Players were blowing past Mike and scoring a lot more goals a lot more often on our now much weaker goaltending during that first season in the ‘A’ division.

We finished seventh out of eight teams. It was clear we as a team could not compete in the 'A' division and Mike would become our scapegoat. Mike was a bit overweight and that is why I assumed he was too slow. I, in a friendly manner suggested that he might want to lose a few pounds over the summer. The following fall Mike showed up all eager to play his fourth season. He had not lost any weight, but instead he had gained weight and I cut him. I still can’t believe I did that to another human being.

I found out many years later how much I had really hurt Mike by cutting him. He was devastated, he loved being a Bull and playing on Thursday nights with us. I had taken that away. It took me almost twenty years, but I finally tracked Mike down and I apologized sincerely for hurting him almost two decades earlier. He did admit he was very hurt by my actions, he accepted my apology graciously and we buried the hatchet. Mike told me he had some major hip problems and he would only play one more year after his time with the Bulls.

He never played hockey again.

To put it bluntly, my selfishness ruined my Bulls hockey team. I got carried away with the perception that we were much better than we really were and the win at all cost attitude hurt us. As season six began we all found ourselves now playing in the Etobicoke Senior League on Monday nights at Weston Arena. Doublerink was now becoming a real dump; ice conditions were bad too often and registration fees just got too expensive.

We all agreed it was time for a change of scenery anyway.

While playing at Weston many new players would come and go and the Bulls would survive four more seasons, winning two more championships both in the ‘B’ division. We always had a pretty good team and there were always guys eager to play with us. After two seasons and after finally reaching the ‘A’ division we once again failed miserably, finishing last place in the 1991-92 season, our final season.

I pulled the plug, the Blazing Bulls had lost their blaze. 

We had played nine seasons at a pretty good caliber of men's rec league hockey. The bottom line was we were a good solid ‘B’ division team, nothing more nothing less. We were champs five times during those nine seasons. Over the years we had many premier caliber players, but they were unable to carry the team up in the higher divisions.

Hockey truly is a team sport and you are only as strong as your weakest link.

During the nine seasons I had exactly fifty teammates who wore the Bulls jersey. Twenty-one of those guys played just a single season. I wonder how many still have their Bulls jersey? We ended up having four sets of jerseys made up, all with that great Toros snorting bull logo and only two guys other than myself played all nine seasons.

In the end, our ninth and final season was just like my first summer back in 1983. We were all just a group of individuals that played together once a week; we were no longer a team anymore. I always admired teams that seemed to play together for decades. I honestly believed back in those early Doublerink years that the group I had assembled would be together a lot longer than just nine seasons. We all got along, our wives got along and we all loved playing hockey. Sure guys would come and go, but I believed the core group would always stay together.

It never happened. 

I am not proud of some of the things that I did while running my team. I just remember one total asshole that played with the Bulls during those nine seasons. He played just one season; he was a friend of some other teammates and was brought out when we recruited new players. I didn't have to worry about cutting him because he went to jail.

Because of my selfish win at all cost behavior, I’m sure many of my fifty teammates would have considered me an asshole too.

And seriously, could you really blame them?