Eddie was the second of the three goaltenders who've recently passed away. I think I was so stuck on the delicious, but very remote possibility the New York Times would put Robert Redford and Eddie Giacomin together on the front page, below the fold, that I forgot about Eddie when I read about Redford, who of course made it to the front page, and Eddie didn't.
The fold is the 49th Parallel. It is the Rubicon. Only the obits for the exalted get to appear above the print front page fold. (Of course online, there is no fold.)
But there are some subtle placings of front page obits that put a portion of the top of the obit above the fold. Such was the case for Robert Redford. His obit wasn't completely below the fold. If he was going to ascend to heaven, he also ascended a bit above the fold on his way.
Giacomin's career was an example of how hard it was to ascend to being an N.H.L. player. Before the league expanded in the late 1960s, there were only six teams. The Rangers were one of them. With 20 players on each team, that meant that there were only 120 N.H.L. hockey players, basically all from Canada. That is some restricted gene pool.
Giacomin played professional hockey first for the Providence Reds in the American Hockey League. (A.H.L.) I didn't realize the Reds were not affiliated with the Rangers, so it took a four-player trade with the Reds and the Rangers to bring Giacomin to the Rangers and the N.H.L.
Playing for the Reds, Giacomin was known as a "wandering goalie." one who would leave the net and try and get the puck back (or force a face off) from the opposing team behind the net. It was risky, and sometimes Giacomin got burned for being way out of position.
One terrible play resulted in the Rangers being eliminated in overtime from an opening round of Stanley Cup playoffs with the New York Islanders in 1975. (I think I once read that Babe Ruth ended a decisive World Series game and caused the Yankees to lose the Series by getting thrown out trying to steal second. You can look it up.)
It was at the Garden, and it was a deciding game of the best of three, or five in the first playoff round as it was played then. I'm not going to bother to look the game up. I can still see the play unfolding in front of me along the near boards.
The overtime period had just started, and Giacomin did a bit of wandering, coming out of the net trying to gain control of the puck. His efforts backfired, and someone on the New York Islanders got control of the puck and passed it to J.P. Parise standing in front of what is now an empty net. Goal. End of the game. End of continued playoff hopes. Start of a bitter Ranger-Islander rivalry.
The play was so early into the overtime (11 seconds) that many fans hadn't yet gotten back in their seats from the bathroom or buying beer. (Or both.) By the time they took to their seats, it was over. "What happened?" Time to go home, that's what happened.
Never mind. Giacomin was a fan favorite. I remember when Dennis Hull on the Chicago Black Hawks skated in almost alone on the left side and uncorked one of his wicked slap shots. Giacomin came of the net as he should to cut down the angle.
The shot caught Eddie in the mask and he went down in a heap. Not moving. You had to think he was dead. Moments passed and the worst fears were gaining. But no, Giacomin got up, and I'm guessing shook it off and finished the game. Hull hadn't scored.
In 1971 Giacomin and Gilles Villemure shared in wining the 1971 Vezina Trophy awarded to the league's best goaltender(s). As much as they earned it with their lowest goals-against average, a large part of the award was made possible by the Rangers acquiring veteran defenseman Tim Horton from the Toronto Maple Leafs at the start of the season
Tim Horton was an old school defenseman, seldom skating inside the offensive blue line. He was not particularly large, but he was enormously strong. He could bear hug a sequoia tree and probably uproot it.
Even after the 1975 baffling trade that sent Giacomin to the Detroit Red Wings Giacomin, was always a Ranger. The night he appeared in a Detroit uniform at the Garden was unforgettable. The fans wouldn't stop chanting his name. They booed every time the Rangers touched the puck; every time they scored. They cheered for the Red Wings, who would win the emotional game 6-4.
At one point in the game, I distinctly remember Giacomin forgetting who was playing for when he almost shoveled the puck to Ranger defenseman Arnie Brown, but quickly realized what he was doing and smothered the puck.
Compare the size of the pads to what goaltenders these days can use, and the lack of a catcher's headgear. It is amazing goalie's weren't carried off the ice on stretchers.
Phil Esposito, the Ranger general manager on the night when the Rangers retired Eddie's No. 1 remarked that, "Eddie was an incredible competitor, and he simply may have been the most popular player ever for the Rangers."
When Giacomin was traded to Detroit I remember reading that Phil Esposito—who himself was traded from Boston to New York soon after Eddie was traded to Detroit—shook his head at the Giacomin trade and said, "Eddie should die a Ranger."
For us, he did.
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