The Hansons, Killer and Reg going south?

I swear to Tebow, every time I see this threat I think these guys

are opening for these guys

And I can't figure out who this new band Reg is or why it is such big news they're going South.

 

Ahhhh, for the good ole days of the ECHL when it was guaranteed Knoxville and Birmingham would break out into a massive brawl in pregame warmups. It really was like Slap Shot.

 

No, but they do still have teams in Charlotte, North Charleston, S.C., Duluth, Ga., and Estero, Fla. The team in Columbia, S.C., is on hiatus and will supposedly return in 2011.

The old Eastern Hockey League, which is obviously a predecessor of the ECHL (although there is no direct connection), was actually a pioneer of pro hockey in the south, starting with Charlotte in 1956 and eventually including Greensboro, Knoxville, Nashville, Jacksonville and the retirement community of St. Petersburg, where I think there are a lot of shysters.

 

Don't think I ever saw the Cherokees, but Birmingham-Nashville used to produce quality pugilism as well.

 

Why the heck did they have three r's in the name? Was there some kind of local thing or was it to sound "menacing?"

 

I don't know what it was but the Cherokees and Nighthawks played like nice children. The Cherokees and Bulls was a friggin battle each night. It didn't help that the traveling Birmingham fans were asses. I guess there was some spillover from UT/Bama.

One of the funniest ECHL scenes I ever saw was at a Hampton Roads Admirals game when John Brophy (another Slap Shot inspiration, I think) was coaching. He and the opposite coach, can't remember who, got in a bench fight over the glass and were ejected.

 

Yes, Broph reportedly inspired Newman's Reggie Dunlop.

 

He didn't. Undoubtedly the biggest myth there is regarding "Slap Shot."

Every team in that league back in those days had a player-coach, and Brophy was far from unique. If he hadn't gone on to coach in the NHL, few people would ever have heard of him. Just like few people have ever heard of the real inspirations - there are two, one who inspired the character, and one who inspired the name - for Reggie Dunlop.

The only reason there's a character named Brophy in the movie is because the character's original name couldn't be used - it was the name of a real player who had gotten his start in the North American Hockey League just before the script was written, a guy who went on to a long NHL career.

But there were all kinds of instances where the name of a real person from the NAHL was used or altered somewhat for a character in the movie. In fact, there was a guy in that league whose name was Denis Lemieux. He was a defenceman for Cape Cod, which was Johnstown's first playoff opponent in its 1975 championship run. So, again, Brophy was not unique.

I'll tell you one interesting thing about John Brophy that I learned from researching this book - he is on record as both loving and loathing the movie. How can it be both? Weird fucking guy.

 

I can tell you from first-hand experience that John Brophy is nothing if not a serious character. But I had to hand it to the man ... he was usually a colorful interview and didn't tiptoe around questions, no matter how direct.

Then again, I never asked him about "Slap Shot." Didn't want to get tossed off the bus head-first like a VHS copy of the film reportedly did once.

 

I've heard that story, and how he hates the movie, saying it was all bullshit. Which, of course, it wasn't.

I've also read quotes from him saying he loves "Slap Shot." Maybe it all depends on what kind of a mood he's in when he's asked about it.

 

The Albany River Rats of the AHL are moving to Charlotte next year, and their new owner will be the Checkers' owner, Michael Kahn, who will keep the Checkers name and affiliation with the Hurricanes. Looks like the ECHL will be looking for another franchise in 2010-11?

 

Point of info., the ECHL had a slew of teams along the I-10 corridor at one point, stretching from Jacksonville to Tallahassee to Pensacola to Mobile to Biloxi to New Orleans to Baton Rouge to Lafayette. Even went as far as Beaumont, Texas, at one point.

Lafayette, Biloxi and Pensacola are now all part of the Southern Professional Hockey League, though only the Louisiana IceGators have retained their old name.

The ECHL's IceGators were certainly a colorful bunch, to say the least.

In addition to being one of the league's most penalized teams (several huge brawls over the years), the orginial owners were also a trio real characters.

Those guys not only got caught with multiple violations of the league's salary cap and veterans rules, they also were sued by a former business partner (in a deal separate from the team) and lost a multi-million dollar judgement. But when they tied it up in the courts for years on appeal, the guy who sued them tried to hire a hit man in Belize to rub out one of them. That guy was doing hard time in the slammer last I heard.

Through it all, the team did really well on the ice, making the Kelly Cup finals twice. They also drew like crazy for a time, drawing 11,000 fans per game in their heydey.

It was never a dull moment with that franchise.