The Passion Returns!

This classic video was mentioned in the comments of the Clark-McSorely post. I mentioned (based on past searches) that the video wasn't available online.

Well, it turns out I was wrong. The full video was uploaded to YouTube a few weeks ago. God bless the webernet.

With a hat tip to youtuber "Jefflered", here's the full video:













Good times.

And seriously... Dougie, WTF?

Great Obscure Moments in Leafs History - Everything that happened immediately after the Clark-McSorley fight

Great Obscure Moments in Leafs History - An ongoing series to honor the greatest, completely meaningless moments in Toronto Maple Leaf history.

Wendel winding up: the last thing
hockey players see before they die

Ask any Maple Leaf to list their top five memories of the past 20 years, and every single one will include the Clark-McSorley fight from the 1993 playoffs. Even non-Leaf fans know the scene by heart: Clark looking over his shoulder at a fallen Doug Gilmour, then without hesitation dropping his gloves and heading directly for the twice-his-size McSorley and rocking him with a right handed haymaker that highlighted one of the best fights in NHL history, with the whole thing called perfectly by Bob Cole ("Oh! Clark is nailing McSorley!").

Every Leaf fan has this sequence memorized. But over time, many have forgotten the comedy gold that came in the immediate aftermath. And that's where I come in.

Today's great obscure moment in Leafs history is: Everything that happened immediately after the Clark-McSorley fight

The Todd Gill vs. Dave Taylor fight

Three things that make me laugh about this fight.

1.) Bob Cole is completely oblivious to it. He doesn't even notice it until after Clark and McSorley are off the ice.

2.) Remember a guy named Dave Taylor who played on the Triple Crown line with Dionne and Simmer in the late 70s? It's the same guy. The night of this fight, Taylor was 56 years old.

3.) The cameras only catch a few seconds of the entire fight, and even then only because they happen to skate by in the background of the main event. What happened in this fight? Who won? Was it any good? Does anyone have grainy handycam footage we could analyze? Can we run some kind of computer simulation to find out what happened?

Gilmour goes after the Kings bench

When I say "goes after", I mean it in the patented Doug Gilmour "look like you want to fight while staying out of reach" way. This may be the least enthusiastic bench confrontation in history, since Gilmour doesn't want to fight, Anderson and Ellett don't know how to fight, and the Kings players are all too busy trying not to make eye contact with Wendel as he skates by so that he doesn't kill them.

Everybody who will somedy
club a guy over the head with a
stick,raise your hand

McSorley goes Sean Penn on the cameraman

On his way off the ice, McSorley decides that he doesn't want anybody to film him. This seems like an odd choice for a professional athlete during a televised sporting event, but in his defence, you wouldn't want to have your picture taken either if Wendel Clark had just punched your left eyeball three inches into your brain.

Also, McSorley is naked from the waist up at this point. Don't ask.

Barry Melrose's mullet

Technically, this wasn't specific to this particular moment, but it still deserves a mention.

We all agree that any shot of Barry Melrose from the early 90s is guaranteed amusement. But the shots of him during this game are made even better by the bright pink Gummi Bears sign directly behind him. Not even Melrose's smoldering mulletude could look cool in front of that sign. It was close, though.

Somebody throws a crutch on the ice

Any loser can toss a cup of soda or a bag of popcorn on the ice. The really hardcore will throw coins or batteries. But you have to be a special kind of crazy to throw a crutch.

Here's my question: did somebody get so worked up that they forgot they couldn't walk and threw their own crutch on the ice? Or did somebody else steal a crutch for a handicapped person and fire it over the glass? I can't even decide which scenario would be funnier. (Yes I can: the second one.)

In either case, how did the crutch's owner get home? Can we even be sure that he did? Is it possible that there's still an angry fan hopping in circles around Maple Leaf Gardens and wondering how the series turned out?

The Gill-Taylor fight ends

That's right, during everything mentioned above, the Gill-Taylor fight is still going on. The John Ferguson Jr era was shorter than this fight. Did I mention that Dave Taylor was 68 years old? Halfway through this fight he retired from hockey and had a rink in his hometown named after him during a quiet ceremony that was marred by the fact the Gill was still hitting him.

Pat Burns charges the Kings bench

This is probably the most memorable post-fight moment. Burns is jawing and pointing at the Kings bench, then suddenly makes a break for it before being restrained by a policeman, various ushers, and a guy in a yellow jacket who appears to be the bass player from Def Leppard.

Clearly, Burns had no intention of actually attacking anyone. This was one of those "fire up the crowd" moments, which would be fine except that 90% of the crowd didn't notice because they were looking somewhere else. They couldn't watch it on the scoreboard either, since back then the Maple Leaf Gardens scoreboard had four colors, sixteen pixels and could only show the word "Noise" and strange images of Mickey Mouse hands clapping.

Pinky finger

The guy in the pink shirt giving the Kings bench the finger

Just as Burns gives up his half-hearted charge, a random fan in a pink golf shirt and what appear to be acid-wash jeans strikes a mighty archer pose and flips off the Kings bench for about half a second before realizing he's on TV and switching to polite applause.

I love this guy. Some day I'm going to track him down and get a picture of him giving me the finger. Seriously, if anyone knows who he is, let me know.

When Nikolai Borschevsky gets his own talk show, I want this guy to be his sidekick. I want him to sit on the couch in his Zack Morris outfit while Borschevsky asks rambling questions, and then furiously flip off the confused guest as we cut to commercial. Make it happen, CBC!

The video evidence

Thanks to the wonders of Youtube, here's the entire sequence. Enjoy...

These things are heavier than they look

In case you've ever wondered what a Toronto Maple Leaf Stanely Cup celebration would look like.

Shocking news: Winning is fun

From today's Toronto Sun.

Hal Gill needs to send Cliff Fletcher a nice "Thank You Card."

Had Fletcher not shipped the towering defenceman at the Feb. 26 trade deadline from the Maple Leafs to the Pittsburgh Penguins for a 2008 second-round draft pick and a fifth rounder in '09, Gill would be hitting golf balls right now, not opposing forwards.

"I miss the guys (in Toronto) but this is pretty exciting," Gill said of the anticipation he is feeling about his first appearance in a Stanley Cup final.

He has reason to be stoked. One moment you are playing for a Leafs team headed for nowhere; the next, you are on a star-studded Penguins squad that is on the road to the Stanley Cup final.

Gill admits his days in Toronto seem like a million years ago.

"I kind of fit in here in Pittsburgh right away," he said. "It's not easy to click all the time. Your world is tossed upside down but in this case the pieces all fell into place."

"I'll tell you one thing," added Gill. "I'm sure glad I don't have to worry about facing Mats Sundin in the finals. On that Wings team, he'd be unstoppable, the toast of the hockey world. It's a good thing he doesn't care about winning, or else I'd really have my work cut out."

Yes, I made one of those paragraphs up.

But imagine that. Apparently, playing for your first Stanley Cup ring is more fun than holding your wife's purse while she tries on shoes at the Eaton Centre.

Look, I don't ask for much. But I'm asking -- nay, demanding -- that somebody cut out a few copies of this article and mail them to McCabe, Tucker, Sundin, Kaberle and Kubina.

If you wanted to, maybe add in a bonus item to Sundin's envelope: a photoshopped picture of him playing on a line with Chris Higgens and Jeff Carter. With a little note that says "Thanks for nothing".

Optimism Week is over, in case you were wondering.

Going under cover

Sports Illustrated recently launched an online feature called the Archive, which allows you to search for any player or team and browse through all of SI's articles, photos and videos. It's addictive stuff. And you can learn a lot.

For example: Did you know that the Toronto Maple Leafs have never been on the cover of Sports Illustrated?

According to their archive, no Leaf has ever made the cover -- not even in the background of another hockey photo. That seems odd, although you have to consider that SI's hockey coverage peaked in the 70s and 80s, and the Leafs weren't exactly... um... newsworthy back then. Still, the Leafs have apparently shown up in over 550 SI articles over the years, so it's a little strange that they never even managed a cameo on the cover.

All of which begs the question: if there's an SI cover curse, how bad would the Leafs be if they had ever been on one? Not to worry. Considering the current state of the team, and the current almost complete lack of hockey coverage in Sports Illustrated, I wouldn't expect any cover appearances any time soon.

What about the other Canadian teams?

Montreal Canadiens - Thirteen covers. The team made frequent appearances in the 60s and 70s, but since then have only been on twice -- once each for their Cup wins in 1986 and 1993.

Edmonton Oilers - Ten covers. For some reason this surprised me -- I would have expected more, since SI had a lot of hockey coverage in the 80s. Needless to say, all but one of the covers feature Gretzky and the appearances end in 1989. Another surprise: Gretzky made only one cover appearance as a King, and two more as a Ranger.

Ottawa Senators - No covers.

Vancouver Canucks - Two covers, but in both cases a Canuck is only shown in the background of a cover that focuses on the New York Rangers.

Calgary Flames - Two covers. One featuring Jarome Iginla's face along with a few dozen others on a "Minorities in Sports" feature, and another with an unindentified Flames being run over by Tomas Sandstrong of the Kings. Oddly enough, there is a cover featuring Jim Craig of the Atlanta Flames.

Neither the Jets or Nordiques ever made an appearance.

For whatever it's worth, the Toronto Blue Jays have made the cover eight times, including three weeks in a two in 1992 and this sweet shot of Shaker Mo rounding third at the Ex.

(Note: The SI Archive doesn't seem to be 100% reliable, and they're not completely consistent with how they tag each cover. For example, I found two old Wayne Gretzky covers that showed up under his name but not in a search for the Oilers. So please forgive any errors above.)