Ridiculous things you used to think about hockey

[KrugAvoy]

When I was a kid I used to think icing was when a player stopped skating and sprayed ice on a player.

I also used to think that they genuinely hated the other team regardless and were not friends off the ice .

That the players only job was from 7-930 each game night. Literally just show up put on skates and play hockey. Nothing else to it

That they lifted the ice up to the ceiling and didn't melt it when the season was over or a basketball game was happening

 

[vadim sharifijanov]

How do Quebecois pronounce it? Rhymes with yeux ?

add a y in there but yeah

it means the best

 

[Rubi]

That Toronto and Edmonton would eventually win another cup because they each have so many good players.
Also, that Toronto would get another nhl team ... in my lifetime.
And finally... Allan Eagleson was a great person.

 

[dr robbie]

A bit of a tangent, but I used to think that packs of hockey cards were completely randomized up until I opened them and that I would get a good card or not depending on exactly how I opened the pack.

Someone told me once that Paul Kariya was Korean and I believe him for like 10 years because, you know, his name was Paula Kariya....

 

[KirkAlbuquerque]

I used to think it was the greatest sport in the world.

I still do, but I used to, too

 

[Rorschach]

When I was a new hockey fan, I thought those who score the most points in a season would win the most games. That lasted about six months. Back in 1991.

 

[mlse2kk]

That a Canadian team could ever win the Cup in the Buttman era.

 

[Hanji]

When I was a toddler I thought Toronto was called ‘The Make Believes’.

In hindsight I was somewhat right.

 

[Brad C]

When I first started watching around age 10, I thought icing was when a player stopped fast and sprayed another player or the goalie with ice.

Me too

 

[MoreDifferentS]

When I was a kid, I thought that a "stay-at-home defenseman" was a player who didn't join their team for road trips, and only dressed for home games.

 

[Nerowoy nora tolad]

When I was really young I thought players had fake NHL names.

My favourite player was Mario Lemieux...I just figured he picked Mario because of super Mario and then le Mieux because he was the best or something.

And I'd hear European names that almost sound made up like Radek Bonk.

But I always thought they flowed well and sounded cool (because of the announcers) so they must be chosen.

Its true though, if you put a Radek Bonk as a playable character in Street Fighter, nobody would have batted an eye

 

[Nerowoy nora tolad]

As crazy as some of these comments are, the thing that strikes me as truly crazy was the fact that one of the earliest instances of pro goalies wearing masks in-game (which I heard about at the time) was Jacques Plante in 1959, AFTER he had already been struck in the face and gotten injured by it. So that he could go back in to play. Any goalies in the thread, how safe would you feel facing vulcanized rubber at high speeds with an unprotected face/ head??

Ive noticed a few anecdotes from that era in my reading that the situation with goalies and face protection across all of hockey wasnt quite as crazy as it sounded. Pretty sure junior goalies were consistently wearing baseball catchers masks up to teenage years before Plante introduced it to the NHL, and there might have been a few minor pros doing it as well. It was mostly an "NHL goalies are marketing stars, so we cant have them covering their faces" sort of thing.

I know it sounds nuts, but it wasnt really that insane to play maskless before the curved stick revolution happened with Bobby Hull turning flat bladed sticks into banana blades. If you watch footage from the flat-bladed stick era of say, Howe unleashing the scariest shot in the league from 50 feet straight through the goalie, its still only around the 3/4 mark to the top corner.

The really insane part imo was the era that came after masks arrived 1960-1980 where the players got significantly bigger and stronger, their shot power increased to match, the curves on sticks were literally 1 to 2" deep, (absolute max now is 1/2" I think?), so the resulting shots had the power and movement of an MLB closer throwing curveballs and sliders. You couldnt just track that kind of shot straight into a glove the way you can now, with all that movement. And to compensate for those changes, all the goalies gained was a molded fibreglass shield on their face that did nothing to deflect the blow from a puckstrike.

There was a point in the 1970 finals where the Espo line did a set play with a slapshot and tip to the top corner that hit Plante directly on the mask so hard he was knocked out cold. Standing over him the Bruins players are like "Oh ****, is he dead? "

 

[Bizz]

Back when I first got DirecTV when I was in college (2002) I thought that just having access to all the RSNs meant I got to watch all the hockey games. (Center Ice came out the year before)

 

[Keke]

In Finland there is a term "wooden leg" (puujalka) which means minor leg injury. I was horrified when one of my childhood heroes Timo Pärssinen received a wooden leg in WHC, like how can he play hockey anymore! Didn't know it means an injury and thought he actually got a wooden leg

 

[Suntouchable13]

I thought refs were supposed to be actual referees, not game managers. How ridiculous of me.

 

[Rodgerwilco]

I remember when I first got into hockey I thought that the team that "won" a fight got some kind of tangible benefit from winning.

 

[Konnan511]

In NHL 94, you could play the first line the whole game. I never understood why NHL teams didn't just do that.

 

[CraigBillington]

That the playoffs were 16 teams on the ice. All at once. I was 5 when I asked my brother

Had some hockey cards where the reverse side with the stats had the notation “League leader in italics.” I understood that to mean they were the best out of all the Italian players in the league

Explains this:

 

[SnowblindNYR]

Two things:

1) I thought that the Washington Capitals were in Washington state.

2) The first two final games I watched as an older kid (13) were games 5 (1-0 3OT) and game 6 (2-1 2OT) of the 2000 Cup Final, I thought that every potentially clinching game in the Stanley Cup Final has a low score like that.

 

[9911]

Terry Yake played in Hartford in the early 90s. I thought his name was teriyaki.

 

[sandwichbird2023]

I watched soccer before I started watching hockey. First time I saw a player was awarded a penalty shot in hockey (in a game I watched with my younger brother on TV, neither of us knows the rule) and lined up at center ice, I thought that is where they have to take the shot. I thought to myself that "this is the worst 'reward' ever, nobody can score from that far!" When the player takes the puck and start skating it in, I was super confused. I think I was about 10 years old then?

A couple years later, I start reading up on draft preview on THN. I thought every single first round pick will become superstars, just based on the write ups on them. I legit thought Josh Holden would be a 50 goals, 100 points Roenick-type player just because that was how the THN described him, and was over the moon when the Canucks drafted him. It was devastating when he busted.

 

[Dickie Dunn]

That it’s a cold weather sport.

 

[brentashton]

How old are some of you?

 

[brentashton]

Terry Yake played in Hartford in the early 90s. I thought his name was teriyaki.

@Terry Yake

 

[Terry Yake]

@Terry Yake

I am teriyaki