The Final Call (4 page)

We went through the rule book from cover to cover during camp and arduously analyzed every rule—the history of each, and the “what-ifs” that always came up. In the late afternoon, the sun would blaze through the chalet windows so intensely that some guys would nod off, looking like turtles basking on a rock. For me, the rules discussions were fascinating—to hear the actual circumstances under which various rules came to be written into the book, as a result of calls made by such legends as King Clancy, Red Storey, and George Hayes. I felt privileged to gain these insights; they were a valuable education, one that gave me cause not only to see the game from a different perspective but to feel
the depth of passion that the game stirred within me. This sharing of knowledge enabled each official to enforce the rules with a commonsense approach that does not seem so common today.

The rule book has expanded extensively since 1972, and as time passed I was able to pass along the historical background I had gained in those early years. While some of the group seemed to care, the reality was that many didn’t.

On the evening of the fourth day of training camp, Scotty organized a squash tournament at the Skyline Hotel on Dixon Road, with a reception to follow. It was part of the agenda, so attendance was mandatory. While it was designed under the guise of keeping the group together and letting them enjoy a “few” beers in a social setting, I think Scotty’s real goal was to control and limit the amount of socializing that took place on a nightly basis. I made an appearance and also a conscious effort to maintain a low profile by having two beers away from the main crowd that had gathered in the room. I was about to leave the party when Dave Newell approached me and introduced himself.

Dave began the conversation by complimenting my skating ability, saying that he wished he could skate as well as me. Next, he asked if I had any plans for the rest of the evening because, as he put it, “some of the veterans have been observing you since the start of training camp and we really like the way that you carry yourself. We would like you to join us tonight for a few beers if you don’t have any plans.” I felt humbled and privileged by the invitation to join the upper echelon of the officiating fraternity, even if only for one night.

In addition to Newell, the core members of this “welcome wagon” comprised Art Skov, Lloyd Gilmour, Bob Myers, John McCauley, Ron Hoggarth, and linesman Jim Christison. Even though I socialized to the fullest extent that my tolerance would allow, I remained true to my “two ears, one mouth” philosophy and soaked up as much as I could from my newly acquired mentors.

A couple of days later, I would feel the genuine warmth that came from being fully accepted—initiated—by the number-one referee in the world, Art Skov. I was standing in the shower after an on-ice session when I felt a warm spray against the back of my leg—and it wasn’t coming from the shower nozzle. Turning around, I saw Art with his “hose” in hand, urinating on my leg. I was now fully vested into the officiating fraternity! In that moment, I learned it is much better to be pissed
on
than pissed off. I knew that if I succeeded in my quest to make it to the NHL as a referee, I would join an elite group of about a dozen men in the world. And I knew I still had an awful long way to go.

After training camp I was assigned a number of pre-season games as a linesman. The first game I worked was with Neil Armstrong, who is in the Hockey Hall of Fame as a linesman and is a fellow Sarnia resident. Once the season began, Frank Udvari placed me in the American Hockey League as a part-time linesman. There, I would gain experience and be exposed to the highest level of professional hockey below the NHL. The AHL paid me $85 per game, plus expenses—but no benefits. I got another part-time job, in the display department at Sears, dressing mannequins and hanging decorations. The guy I worked for, Bill Foubister, was fantastic. He allowed me the flexibility to get away whenever I had games.

There wasn’t a city I could drive to from Sarnia, so I experienced air travel for the first time. Usually, I’d fly out of Detroit, unless I was assigned to a game in Halifax, Montreal’s farm team, in which case I’d fly from home. I worked 58 games that season, so you do the math! Clearly, I was a long way from “The Show.” One of the benefits, however, was that I got see how the referees under NHL supervision called and controlled the games. Of course, that was part of Frank Udvari’s educational
plan for me. I was learning the ropes from guys like John McCauley, Bryan Lewis, Ron Hoggarth, Alf LeJeune, Greg Madill, Dave Shewchyk (the father of current NHL linesman Mark Shewchyk), and Bob Kilger. Some of them became successful NHL referees; others found success elsewhere. Kilger, for example, went on to bigger and better things as a member of Parliament, moving quickly up through the ranks to become chief government whip and deputy speaker when Jean Chrétien was prime minister. Bob’s son Chad played more than 700 games in the NHL, with Anaheim, Winnipeg/Phoenix, Chicago, Edmonton, Montreal, and Toronto. Bob was a wonderful guy and an excellent role model. Before our pre-game lunches, he would take me on a walk that would inevitably lead us to a Catholic church in time for noon Mass or just to stop in and say a few prayers, as he put it. I wasn’t a Catholic, or even particularly spiritual at the time, but I always went in with him. It might have been an early “call” to me from above, which I finally answered in 1995.

John McCauley and Bryan Lewis (after John’s unfortunate passing in 1989) both held the position as NHL referee-in-chief, thereby becoming my boss. I truly loved John. He was such a great guy to travel with during that first year, and with his relaxed demeanour he instantly became a wonderful mentor to me right up until his death. I have had the pleasure of working with John’s son, Wes, many times since he joined the NHL officiating staff. (I’ll speak more about the McCauley family a bit later.)

In September of 1973, I returned to training camp, and Scotty offered me my first NHL contract, to work as a minor-league referee. I quickly signed and returned the contract before he could change his mind! My base salary was $6,500 with a $1,000 bonus for working a prescribed number of games (which I achieved) in
the American and Central Professional leagues. The NHL also had a working relationship with the International Hockey League, the Western Canada Hockey League (now the WHL), and the Midwest Junior Hockey League based out of Minneapolis (Paul Holmgren played for the St. Paul Vulcans of that league). All I can say is that the $7,500 sure beat the $85 a game from the previous year. I even had health care and pension benefits to boot! I thought I was really on my way up—that is, until I got my first assignment after the pre-season games had concluded.

I was sent to the WCHL for eight games in 10 days. The first was in Flin Flon, Manitoba. No offence to Bobby Clarke, Reggie Leach, and all the other great players who have come out of that “rock pile,” but when the little 12-passenger plane I took from Winnipeg landed, I thought I had touched down on the moon! The terminal looked like a shack without the tar paper. “Old Joe,” the baggage handler, took the luggage off the plane, put it on a cart, and wheeled it inside the shack. Taking my bags off the cart, I noticed that Joe had hung his baggage handler’s cap on a hook and immediately replaced it with one bearing a limousine company logo. Then he loudly inquired, “Anyone for transportation into town?” (I was the only passenger that remained. Everyone else had been picked up by family or friends!)

I jumped aboard Joe’s stagecoach—actually, a Suburban—and we bounced into town over what seemed like an old-fashioned corduroy road. I checked into the Flin Flon Hotel on Main Street—complete with wooden sidewalks. Heading down to the dining room, “Miss Kitty” served me a wonderful home-cooked meal, after which I walked along Main Street to get a feel for what the entire town had to offer—after all, I had two games here, with a day off sandwiched between them. Five minutes later, I was back at the hotel and in bed for a pre-game nap prior to being picked up by the local linesman for the game that night.

As I sat in the lobby, waiting for my ride and feeling pretty
detached from the rest of the world, let alone the NHL, a little old lady with bluish-white hair shouted from the octopus-like phone switchboard beside the front desk, “Is there a Kerry Freezer here?”

I raised my hand and said, “Right here, madam.”

“You got a call from New York City. I’ll patch it through to the house phone.” It was Frank Udvari. He was almost apologetic for sending me to Flin Flon and seemed to read my mind when he said, “I know it must seem like you’re a long way from the NHL, but I just wanted you to know that I’m behind you and want to wish you luck in your first game.”

I can’t tell you how much that call lifted my spirits. What I didn’t know at the time was that Frank had also called Ed Chynoweth, president of the WCHL, to say he was sending him a kid who was really green and asking him to hang in there with me because he thought I could be a good one over time.

The Saskatoon Blades were the visiting team, and Pat Price, a highly touted defenceman, was their star player. I didn’t realize that visiting teams often developed the “Flin Flon flu” in epidemic proportions at the very thought of the physical abuse they would endure at the hands of both the players and their fans. I would soon find out if I was immune to the dreaded disease. In that first game, I threw out the coach, the legendary Patty Ginnell; their captain and tough guy, Cam Connor (who played for Montreal, Edmonton, and the Rangers); and two other monsters, Jerry Rollins and Kim Clackson (who went on to play for Pittsburgh and Quebec). Throughout the third period, I was skating up and down the middle of the ice to maintain a safe distance from the fans. And if that weren’t enough, not only would I have to do this all over again in two nights, but I would get to spend a Saturday night in Flin Flon, hangin’ out with the locals! Needless to say, Saskatoon won that first game and their players felt somewhat protected as they entered the game on Sunday.

The writer from the Saskatoon Star Phoenix who covered the team wrote an article the next day about this little referee who had been the star of the game by taking control of it and not being intimidated by the “goonery” of Ginnell and his gladiators. Ed Chynoweth told me later that he called Frank Udvari immediately after reading the newspaper report and said, “Frank, what did you send me?” Frank started to apologize and reminded Ed that he had cautioned him to be patient with me. “No, Frank,” Chynoweth said, “you didn’t tell me you were sending me a superstar!”

Years later the three of us had a laugh together about my debut in the WCHL. It sure was a great training ground, and if something didn’t happen at that level, you wouldn’t have to worry about it because it would never happen anywhere else.

I spent so much time alone on the road in the minors. That’s because I would most often work with part-time linesmen who went home to their families after the game. And very seldom did we have supervision at that level. You had to try and figure everything out as you went along. I quickly learned that if I was going to get better, I needed to be my strongest critic. After each game, I would reflect on what I did and didn’t do right. I tried to be blatantly honest with myself and think of ways I could have achieved a better end result. Not only was I a student of the game; more important, I was a student of officiating.

Every chance I got in the minors, I would observe the unique styles and personalities that each NHL referee brought to his game. If I had a night off, I would ride a bus or stay in an NHL city to take in a game and hang with the crew of officials to listen and learn. I had so much respect for each of them; they were where I wanted to be. I recall watching Art Skov work in Boston one night. Afterward, “Popsy” invited me to join him and the linesmen for a beer at Sansones, across the street from the old Madison Hotel, where we stayed. The Madison was attached to North Station and Boston Garden. The rooms were so small you had to
back out, and it often felt as if the trains passed right through on the way to NY Penn Station!