| Subject: Reggie Fleming, Hockey Player Known for Physical Style, Dies at 73 |
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died July 11
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Date Posted: Thursday, July 16, 2009, 05:37:10pm
Reggie Fleming, one of the National Hockey League’s toughest players in the 1960s, died Saturday in a suburban Chicago hospital. He was 73.
Fleming had been in declining health after having a stroke and heart attack five years ago, his son, Chris Fleming, said.
Fleming spent 12 full seasons in the N.H.L. from 1960 to 1971, playing 749 games, scoring 108 goals and compiling 1,468 penalty minutes. During his stint with the Rangers from 1966 through 1970, he spent so much time in the Madison Square Garden penalty box, he told John Halligan, the team’s longtime public-relations director, that “I got my mail delivered there.”
He was a fan favorite in the cities where he played, including six in the N.H.L. Although renowned for his willingness and ability to fight, Fleming was also versatile enough to be used as a defenseman and as a forward, shutting down star players on the other team.
With the Chicago Blackhawks in 1960-61, his first full season in the N.H.L., he scored one of the most important goals in club history. The Blackhawks were leading the Stanley Cup finals against Detroit, three games to two, but trailing in Game 6, 1-0. Fleming, assigned to check Gordie Howe, stole the puck in the Red Wings’ end and scored. That goal changed the momentum, enabling the Blackhawks to win the game and the series — the third and most recent Stanley Cup title in team history.
“The one that I really see clearly in my mind is Reggie Fleming, who scored the first goal in the game that we beat Detroit for the Cup,” a teammate, Pierre Pilote, said this year about his memories from that game. “I can still see him celebrating.”
Fleming was born in the east end of Montreal where, as an only child, he lived with his parents, grandparents and nine uncles and aunts. Growing up English in a mostly French neighborhood, he frequently got into fights. As a teenager playing with the Montreal Junior Canadiens, his coach, Sam Pollock, asked Fleming to fight often.
“I was going to tell Pollock to stop using my child this way,” Fleming’s mother, Julie, said in a 1975 article in The Canadian magazine, “but Reggie told me: ‘Mother, don’t. It’s my job, what I’m supposed to do, it’s the only way I’ll make it.’ ”
Fleming told Earl McRae, who wrote the article, about his start with the Blackhawks.
“My first game in Chicago, there was a brawl and I just sort of watched,” Fleming said. “In the dressing room, Rudy Pilous, he was our coach, he said: ‘Fleming, if your buddies are in trouble, don’t just stand there. Your job is to help them out, fight for them. If you don’t, you might as well pack your bag, you’re no use to us.’ So I went out and fought. That was always my job, eh? I didn’t do it to be cruel; I was just following orders.”
Fleming also played forMontreal, Boston, Philadelphia and Buffalo in the N.H.L., for Chicago in the World Hockey Association and for several minor league teams before retiring at 41.
In addition to his son, Fleming is survived by a daughter, Kelly, according to The Chicago Tribune.
Fleming, who was nicknamed Mr. Clean for his muscular build and severe crew cut, was confined to bed during the last five years because of complications arising from a stroke. His son posted several videos on YouTube in which his father reminisced about his life from his hospital bed.
In one, Fleming told his son why, after his hockey career was over, he settled in Chicago. Was it because he had won his only Stanley Cup there?
“The people, their friendliness,” Fleming said. “Their comfort. They made it easy for me to make a living.”
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