Guy Lafleur is a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame and one of the greatest Montreal Canadiens of all time. But, how did he even get his start with the Habs?
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45 Comments
That's when men were men! Thank you Mr. Lafleur, you made all the battles in the school yard against the leaf fans worth every second! The memories you gave us on Saturday nights, with Danny Gallivan calling the game are priceless!! Condolences to the Lafleur family.
Mr Polock was a gangster…… merci beaucoup
Great memories watching him play. First Bossy now Guy. Great players great team
Nice tribute and information clip
How about him growing up and playing against gilbert Perreault and marcel dionne??
P.s. Dionne is the nicest, happiest person ever. I grew up playing against his son Garret who again is the nicest person.
That trade is exactly the kind of thing I would do. I think like Pollack. If I were Kyle Dubas for example I would trade my 2022 1st rounder to some team that you forecast will not be so good in 2024 for a 2024 1st and a 3rd lets say. Some teams would make that trade. The Leafs cannot really use/pay and high drafts now but down the round will need them. He should have been making deals like this all along and stock piling draft picks. Instead he makes deals like the Nick Foligno trade and we all know how well that worked out. Dubas has no imagination. Montreal was lucky to have had a guy like Pollack running the ship. Smart GM
Lafleur was great, but, Dionne would have also done well in Montreal. Just saying.👉
this didn't explain why Selke of the Seals traded away such a good spot in the draft for the spot of one of the best teams. Even with Hickie, he would have known it was a bad move. And throw in the fact that Selke's father had been GM of the Canadians for 2 decades. Pretty shady.
Montreal screwed the Seals.
Seen him play. Remember the speed the hair…rip guy
What is are stupid discussions that mean nothing. He was taken by the Habs and did what he did to become a legend. Dione was a legend two. But his problem is he never won a cup, and played mostly in western conference that very few people watched.
That's the kind of trades I've only seen in video games when building a stacked roster..
Rest in peace Guy 💙🤍♥️
Say hi to my Dad ♥️ he was a huge fan and got to play against you once during a tournament in Montreal
Hmmmmm, i knew all about this and the genius of Pollack. What i didn't know is that it was Frank Selke JR. that right there tells me that there were some back door shenanigans going on . No wonder Pollack always played it down .
How did we get the number 1 draft pick after being a winning team? why not the California Seals , Cleveland Barons , Colorado Rockies, Washington Capitals , Buffalo Sabres , Minnesota North Stars ?
Not everybody knows who the Quebec Ramparts are ? I would say if you ask 100% of people living in the US that work for teams or are fans of teams
about 20% have heard of that team?
I remember the slap shots and breakaways.
Backstrom was the key to "seal" the deal!
I hated the Montreal Canadiens. I despised Guy Lafleur. I was 10 years-old in '77. I cried many times over the goals he scored on my beloved Bruins. With all that being said, Guy Lafleur was a SUPERSTAR. After Bobby Orr and before Wayne Gretzky, there was "The flower". In retrospect, I feel privileged to have watched him play. R.I.P. Mr. Lafleur. Condolences to all his family and friends.
Another Canadian legend gone, god damn it! Pierre Trudeau, Neil Peart and, now, The Flower!!! A sad day for Canada, but an opportunity to celebrate his legend! So crack open the nearest bottle of Molson Canadian beer, light up an Export 'A' cig in his memory, watch Don Cherry's latest installment of Rock'em Sock'em! and pour yourself some EXTRA maple syrup on those pancakes tomorrow morning! I'll miss Guy… RIP… and I hope his family accepts the STATE FUNERAL offered by the Province of Quebec (Canada)! Millions will appreciate it!!! LL
130 goals in 62 games! Absolutely insane!
guy lafleur is my uncle
The 2nd part of that trade is most interesting. Who has the forsight to also trade "help" to a division rival of the team they just traded with to ensure the rival got better and the first team tthey traded with finished dead last?
It's amazing that Pollock engineered this one, while Selke Jr. and the Seals were so equally inept that they didn't have the foresight to see this coming.
Typical crooked stuff that Habs did.
did not know about the extra trade with LA. Wow.
Is there ANYthing new here?
The Canadiens GM would be a good options trader
He was the best player the ice ever had. I will miss him. Lung cancer took him . He was 70
R.I.P Lafleur
Guy Lafleur would have been good on any team, but Sam Pollock made one of the smartest deals in hockey history when he got him for Montreal. Guy was the spark that lit up that incredible Canadiens dynasty of the 1970s. I was lucky and privileged to see that Habs team play live several times, and Guy Lafleur was always a stand-out. But he was surrounded by other fantastic hockey talents as well. That was a team that to this day sets the golden standard for hockey greatness. RIP to one of the greatest players in NHL history.
We're the Canucks really in existence?
Sam Pollock was a very clever guy…
I'm not trying to trash this video, but it's pretty naive. Pro sports is a business and businesses are manipulated by the cabal that stand to make profits. End of story. Hicke/Finley and Regan/Cooke made the trades with Molson/Pollock because they knew it was profitable and in the league's interests to have a strong team in Montreal during that time. Period. Clarence Campbell wanted Montreal good, always.
Hi, I'm a hockey historian. This story is one we all grew up with, and it's highly entertaining. But it's actually mythical, with little basis in reality.
When the first trade was made in May 1970, the Seals were not in fact the worst team in the NHL. They had finished fourth in the West Division, beating out the Flyers and the Kings for a playoff spot.
And then when Backstrom was traded to Los Angeles in January 1971, mostly due to his own request, the Kings were already well ahead of the Seals in the standings. They were in no real danger of the Seals overtaking them. Trading Backstrom to LA had no real impact on where California ended up finishing. The Seals did it all on their own.
That's the real story. Perhaps not as entertaining as the myth, but for a country that likes to claim that "Hockey is Our Game," it would really be nice if we could start taking its history more seriously.
Dionne was better.
I'm met him, Yvonne cornway and Peter mahovoge back in the day in my Hometown it was quite exhilarating as a kid. Good to have met and spoke with u Guy u will be missed
Dion was a better 2 way player & better fit on a weak Kings team & Guy was Guy, pure goal scorer.
Sam Pollock is a genius. I knew about the trade for the first pick but not about the other trade to help the Kings be better than the Seals
It is very debatable as to Guy being the Seals' saviour had Montreal not arranged these trades with them and Los Angeles. Guy was already homesick for Quebec City when he became a Canadien and probably that would have been even more so the case if he went all the way over to the Bay Area. He undoubtedly would have helped the Seals as they were that fairly decent and solid team in 1971-72 (under coach Vic Stasiuk) that fell just that few points out of a playoff spot in the West Division. However, he may have gotten fed up with owner Charlie Finley's cheap and eccentric ways (like others on that team) and the WHA would likely be that even more tempting, as he was already in talks with the Quebec Nordiques even as a Montreal Canadien. It took Jean Beliveau's intervention with a good solid offer to stay with Montreal.
I think Marcel Dionne would have done just fine as a Hab lol.
Would it have been with the same style and flair as Mr. Lafleur? Who knows…
RIP GUY
Very informative. I had no idea that is how LaFleur ended up with the great Canadiens of that era!
Lafleur was my favorite player growing up. To kids who never saw him live, even on tv, there was an extremely amount of charisma surrounding him. Even when he was slowing. Went from being a 50+ goal guy in thw 70s to having five straight 27-30 goal seasons from 80-84. The charisma and the having to Watch whenever he was playing never went away. Even when he came back after four years away from the league he had the flair, especially with the rangers in 88-89 when he would at times dominate, even at 37. His last two years playing with ultra young Sakic and Sundin he put up pretty good point totals 34 in 39. He was badly hurt snd missed half of the first season leading to a brawl for the dirty hit by Cam Neely almost killing Lafleur. Played one last year at 39, but now it was a final tour. Waved after every away game.
the question everybody should be asking should be: how good was ernie hicky? what is good player comparison from today's age
Marcel Dionne, Reggie Leach and anyone else.
Seeing that healine reading 'LaFleur and Dionne could go to Montreal' makes wonder about THAT what if. 10 Cups in a row? 12? My poor mind boggles at this.
my mother, a noted hockey fan of many decades preceding my own obsession, in fact did see these 2 play together in an old timers game. She told me it was like watching them play keep away form BOTH sides. So much fun.
Everyone loved Lafleur he was such an amazing player and from what I have seen and heard outside hockey he was a great person. The only sad thing was when he retired maybe forced to retire and then came back a few years later with the Nordique and Rangers. He was special and greatly missed. We miss you Guy so much even when you were in Nordiques and Rangers uniform we still wanted you to have a great game when playing against then Habs that is how much we loved and respected you.