Ok Let's talk about Doug Gilmour

[vadim sharifijanov]

Come on now. So because people thought he was a poor skater in his teens and early 20s he wasn't able to play in the NHL ? I have news for you, that was still the knock on him when he actually did make it and beyond, though obviously his numbers helped silence a lot of the critics. You guys are simply going by one aspect of his game that people figured to be a weak point back then. You don't think they were wrong at all ? What I'm saying is he proved everyone he did not need to be Mr.Fitness or Pavel Bure all along. So if someone had taken a chance on him earlier it's very possible he begins his NHL career earlier and a ppg is nothing to scoff at for him.

Martin St.Louis is another example of someone who just wasn't really given a fair shake ( for a different reason ) until later on. Does that mean he couldn't have played in this league earlier ? No. It just means all it took was for someone to say " Okay kid, here's your shot."

Players get overlooked ya know. It happens.

And as I said, Hull had a better ppg average than Oates before their St.Louis days, during their St.Louis days, and over their careers.

Regardless of what you guys think, how you want to twist things, dissect them, etc etc it doesnt matter, my original point still remains. The boardie posted that Gilmour and Hull had the same amount of career points. Hull played 200 less games. Twist that how you want.

I find it ironic that we're talking about a guy who scored 741 goals all while being "too slow" and "out of shape", yet you guys are believing the hype that when he was in his late teens/early 20s he was "too slow" and "out of shape" to play, disregarding the possibility that he could have anyways. Now THAT'S illogical.

i don't think you realize just how out of shape hull was, or how bad his skating was. he was 5'10" and 220 pounds at one point. his peak playing weight was somewhere around 185, and while he wasn't fedorov, he could get to where he needed to go.

also, you give MSL as an example. when he finally got a chance, was he automatically a 100 point scorer? no. it took him time to adjust, learn the pace of the NHL, etc. could MSL have entered the league at 20? no. he had to get stronger first.

the fact is, hull had dug himself into an enormous hole in his late teens, and it took him until he was 22, 23 to dig himself out of it. seriously, look for hull's autobiography then look at the pictures of him (without equipment on) as a teenager, then pictures of him at duluth, then pictures of him as a pro. it's astonishing the transformation, and he was still in mediocre shape in st. louis.

here's a hockey card from him at college:

here he is as a rookie:

his weight would go back up as he got older, but in his autobiography ('90 or '91) he was very proud of making it down to his 185 playing weight.

 

[Peter9]

Gilmour should be a shoo-in for the Hall of Fame. It goes far beyond his numbers. He brought to his team a tremendous will to win, a fighting spirit, that was infectious. He had an almost unparalleled ability to lift his team. If anyone ever set a good example for others to follow, it was Gilmour. After a Gilmour shift, anyone who gave less than full effort would have had to feel huge shame.

I've been a Montreal Canadiens fan since I was first exposed to NHL hockey in 1953, and he is one of the few players I have desperately wished were on my team (a wish that became true as to Gilmour, but far later than I wished). His display against the Canadiens in the 1989 playoff finals was truly superb, but he did the same sort of thing with the Blues and the Flames on less important occasions. I really hated him because he played for the opposition, but my hatred was based on intense admiration. It was nothing personal.

Without any conviction, there is no substance to the statutory **** allegation, and it ought to play no part in any consideration he is given for selection to the Hall of Fame. The matter came before a grand jury, which refused to indict him. That's the end of it, no matter how many unsubstantiated rumors of hush money payments and undue influence of sports celebrities on law enforcement authorities are repeated in this forum. If you disagree, please give me a single credible source recounting the hush money payments made or undue influence exercised in the Gilmour case. In the absence of response, I will take it that those who repeated the rumors have no credible sources.

I note that the New York Times story reporting that the grand jury refused to return an indictment also states the girl's family had filed a $1 million lawsuit against Gilmour and his then wife. There is as much a basis on offer in this thread for concluding that this whole scenario was a scheme by the girl's parents to extort money from a relatively wealthy professional sports star as for concluding that hush money was paid or undue influence exercised. And that goes even if--and I don't know whether this is fact--the civil suit was eventually settled to avoid the time, expense and bother of litigation. If it was settled, I'll guarantee it was done with a clause stating that Gilmour did not concede guilt.

Edit: A word has been censored from my post, as denoted by the asterisks. [mod edit]. My God, what is freedom of expression coming to when you cannot even use, in a serious discussion, a word that appears in most, if not all, law codes in the world.

 

[Big Phil]

Gilmour should be a shoo-in for the Hall of Fame. It goes far beyond his numbers. He brought to his team a tremendous will to win, a fighting spirit, that was infectious. He had an almost unparalleled ability to lift his team. If anyone ever set a good example for others to follow, it was Gilmour. After a Gilmour shift, anyone who gave less than full effort would have had to feel huge shame.

I've been a Montreal Canadiens fan since I was first exposed to NHL hockey in 1953, and he is one of the few players I have desperately wished were on my team (a wish that became true as to Gilmour, but far later than I wished). His display against the Canadiens in the 1989 playoff finals was truly superb, but he did the same sort of thing with the Blues and the Flames on less important occasions. I really hated him because he played for the opposition, but my hatred was based on intense admiration. It was nothing personal.

Without any conviction, there is no substance to the statutory **** allegation, and it ought to play no part in any consideration he is given for selection to the Hall of Fame. The matter came before a grand jury, which refused to indict him. That's the end of it, no matter how many unsubstantiated rumors of hush money payments and undue influence of sports celebrities on law enforcement authorities are repeated in this forum. If you disagree, please give me a single credible source recounting the hush money payments made or undue influence exercised in the Gilmour case. In the absence of response, I will take it that those who repeated the rumors have no credible sources.

I note that the New York Times story reporting that the grand jury refused to return an indictment also states the girl's family had filed a $1 million lawsuit against Gilmour and his then wife. There is as much a basis on offer in this thread for concluding that this whole scenario was a scheme by the girl's parents to extort money from a relatively wealthy professional sports star as for concluding that hush money was paid or undue influence exercised. And that goes even if--and I don't know whether this is fact--the civil suit was eventually settled to avoid the time, expense and bother of litigation. If it was settled, I'll guarantee it was done with a clause stating that Gilmour did not concede guilt.

Edit: A word has been censored from my post, as denoted by the asterisks. [mod edit]. My God, what is freedom of expression coming to when you cannot even use, in a serious discussion, a word that appears in most, if not all, law codes in the world.

Agree with this, Gilmour has finally earned his 2011 upcoming selection. Off the ice, okay, he's probably not the best husband on the face of the earth (he's on his third marriage) but if you really want to get into it, neither was Terry Sawchuk.

 

[koyvoo]

So who is the most Gilmour-like player in today’s game?

 

[The Panther]

Wow, quite an epic thread-bump by koyvoo -- a thread from 2008!

It's a bit sad that back in 2008, forum members were seriously arguing over whether Doug Gilmour was a Hall of Famer. Nowadays, the bar has been lowered so much...

 

[Passchendaele]

I dislike Gilmour after reading his (somewhat) recently released biography.

Barely mentioned the babysitter scandal in passing, only claiming that it was a bunch of lies without any context whatsoever.

He had an opportunity to come clean about this, and he didn't.

Sounds like there's something fishy about the whole thing.

 

[The Panther]

I dislike Gilmour after reading his (somewhat) recently released biography.

Barely mentioned the babysitter scandal in passing, only claiming that it was a bunch of lies without any context whatsoever.

He had an opportunity to come clean about the whole thing, and he didn't.

Sounds like there's something fishy about the whole thing.

Why are we so quick to assume the worst? The case was dismissed from court, right? So, to me, that's the end of it. Anything else is just misguided speculation on our part.

As to why he wouldn't go into detail in his book, it could be (a) nothing really happened, or (b) something sketchy happened, but Gilmour is almost certainly under legal advisement not to talk about it publicly.

 

[Passchendaele]

Why are we so quick to assume the worst? The case was dismissed from court, right? So, to me, that's the end of it. Anything else is just misguided speculation on our part.

As to why he wouldn't go into detail in his book, it could be (a) nothing really happened, or (b) something sketchy happened, but Gilmour is almost certainly under legal advisement not to talk about it publicly.

Meh.. if I remember correctly the words he used, he mentioned something about people wanting to get at him/hurt his reputation.

Again, if you're going to sell a book, people are mostly interested in reading about what is/was happening behind the scenes, not only what was shown/known in the media.

Theo Fleury (and J.R. to an extent) got it right in that way.

Maybe Gilmour had something to conceal. Maybe he didn't. Either way, there are two sides to every story.

 

[FerrisRox]

That might be the most detailed article I have seen in a while on that issue, but to me just by reading that all I see is a guy who denies the accusations. Far as anyone knows he is innocent. I am not going to pretend to know that I have all the facts from behind the scenes and while there could have been "hush money" I am just going to go by the actual outcome of the case.

BTW - His first wife, Robyn, not sure when he divorced her, but when he was in Toronto his wife was Amy.

...who he started dating while she was still in high school.

Gilmour was 30.

 

[scott clam]

Since Gilmour is not a total idiot, he talked as little as possible about the lawsuit in his memoir.

Whether or not it actually happened, talking about it in detail is going to look incriminating.

Theo Fleury's situation was really the exact opposite thing as Gilmour's was(alleged to be), so it's not really a good comparison. Gilmour's book was really the exact opposite kind of sports memoir as Fleury's was, tonewise.

 

[Yozhik v tumane]

Wow, quite an epic thread-bump by koyvoo -- a thread from 2008!

It's a bit sad that back in 2008, forum members were seriously arguing over whether Doug Gilmour was a Hall of Famer. Nowadays, the bar has been lowered so much...

It’s a bit sad that in 2008, people were seriously arguing whether R Kelly was a Hall of Famer. Nowadays, the bar has been raised so much...

 

[DeysArena]

I was an 11-year old kid living in Toronto when Gilmour joined the Leafs after years of Ballard-induced hockey futility.

As such, I am incapable of rational analysis when it comes to Doug Gilmour.