RIP Ted (Teeder) Kennedy - former Toronto Maple Leafs captain

"Perhaps the quintessential Maple Leaf." - Frank Orr, who oughta know.

A five-time Stanley Cup champion, captain of the Leafs from 1948 to 1957, and the last Leaf to win the Hart Trophy as league MVP, 1955.

http://www.thestar.com/sports/article/681400

Kennedy succeeded his hockey idol, Syl Apps, as Leafs captain when Apps retired after the '47-48 season, and was noted for his ''lead-by-example'' approach to the job.

Kennedy's hockey success came through hard work. He was not an easy skater, appearing to run, not glide, on the blades, often with a look on his face as if he were in pain, perspiring from the effort.

To compensate for his lack of speed, Kennedy carefully honed his other skills, especially passing the puck.

He was a master at using the players on the ice with him, notably wingers Howie Meeker and Vic Lynn, and most hockey oldtimers regard him as the best-ever at winning the draws of faceoffs.

"I never had much speed, certainly not in the way a Syl Apps or Max Bentley or Milt Schmidt, the great centres did, so I compensated by using my wingers,'' Kennedy once said.

"To be able to pass reasonably well made up for my lack of speed.''

While Leafs owner and manager Conn Smythe never stated it publicly, in private he said that Kennedy was his favorite player, the man who represented Smythe's ideals of hard work, loyalty and tenacity.

"Ted Kennedy was not a superbly gifted athlete the way some players were,'' Smythe said. "But he accomplished more than most of them by never playing a shift where he did not give everything he had.''

RIP, Teeder. :'(

 

Whew, gave me a startle there.

 

Even having written (Teeder), I figured I'd better also include a subtitle just so there was no mistake.

 

Betcha Gordie Howe shows at the funeral