Mark Spector

Mark Spector is a columnist for sportsnet.ca

PHILADELPHIA — It was 1991, maybe ’92 and I was still young in the business. A kid from the prairies, making his first hockey trip down the Eastern seaboard.

It was my first time inside the old Philadelphia Spectrum and as I gawked at the history, to the veteran New York scribe seated beside me, I must have had "ROOKIE" written all over my face.

And as we sat there, that scribe — Frank Brown was his name — looked around that classic old hockey barn and mused with a mixture of fondness and regret, "This used to be a very … angry … place."

He was referring to the days of the Broad Street Bullies. The early 70’s, a time that was at once the Flyers ‘ glory years with Stanley Cups in 1974 and ’75 and an era many would call the nadir of hockey on this continent.

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"I started in ’78 and it was a tough building," said Chicago coach Joel Quenneville, who played 803 NHL games. "They had a lot of guys who, some nights and depending on the score, it could get ugly. Back in the day, there were five-on-fives, bench-clearing brawls."

It was no fluke that the most heinous act in the ’72 Summit Series, the wicked slash that busted Valeri Kharlamov’s ankle, was executed by a young Flyer named Bobby Clarke.

Four years later, the Red Army team would cruise through their exhibition tour of NHL cities as if they were the Bolshoi Ballet. Predictably, the Flyers turned their visit to the Spectrum into an international incident, giving birth to Bob Cole’s legendary call, "They’re goin’ home. They’re goin’ home!"

"In ’72 in Moscow, we stayed and we took it all. Now, the Philadelphia Flyers goon around a little bit and they’re goin’ home!"

"To me," Bob (Mad Dog) Kelly said over the phone Tuesday morning, "we would be unemployed by today’s rules.

"We were built to combat the St. Louis Blues, the Boston Bruins and the other teams that were used to kicking the crap out of the Philadelphia Flyers. The Noel Picards — the sucker punchers of the world."

It was an era that coined the phrase "The Philly ‘Flu" — a timely illness that struck certain players about the time the plane hit the tarmac at Philadelphia International. Hockey Night in Philadelphia was the most punishing, intimidating date on the hockey calendar. The men who wore those uniforms — Kelly, Dave (The Hammer) Schultz, Don Saleski, Andre (Moose) Dupont, the Watson boys, Joe and Jim — were the meanest bastards in the game and damned proud of it.

They lived hard on off days and on game nights they would kick your butt literally. Once everyone agreed on that arrangement, they had a team that could do the same thing figuratively.

"In the old world, guys like Scott Gomez, Martin St. Louis and all these little twerps skating around chopping everyone, they wouldn’t be doing that," said Kelly, who forgot to mention Chicago’s Dave Bolland. "The whole psyche when we played was, it was 95 percent Canadian and five percent European. Now, you don’t have to fight. Everyone has got face shields. You can chop me, keep your gloves on and say, ‘I don’t have to fight.’"

It is impossible to be those Flyers anymore. The game has, thankfully, evolved.

But even when the life form cleans up, the DNA stays the same. There is and will always be, some element of anger in every Philadelphia Flyers hockey team.

"The game has changed," said Dave Brown, a fearsome Philly enforcer for 10 seasons and the Flyers’ personnel director today. " That was back in a time when they hadn’t won any championships and those teams in the ‘70s have set the pattern for how they played afterwards. I guess the reputation is still somewhat there. I don’t think the Philly fan has changed that much."

Visually, the home orange jerseys with those white name bars take you back to that era of the Broad Street Bullies. Spiritually, the Flyers have always strived to weave some overt level of intimidation into their lineup.

Like Dodge, which came up with a slightly less muscular new version of the old Challenger, Philly gave us Mike Richards, the 2010 remake of Clarke. One night he’ll score the game–winner, and the next he’ll hit you so hard they’ll be taking your gear off with hospital scissors.

"He plays so much in the image of Clarkie it’s been unbelievable," Kelly said. "Philadelphia is a blue collar town. A guy like (Danny) Carcillo, (Arron) Asham — guys who bring the toughness — they love ‘em here. And you still have to have talent: Richards, Carter, Briere, Giroux.

"We don’t quit. We don’t give up."

The Flyers fan is still, in many ways, stuck in 1974.

They still hold signs printed in big black stenciled letters, the way Dave Leonardi, The Sign Man, did 38 years ago.

And there isn’t a group in hockey, or a town in the league, that would more like to see this series devolve into one of those four-hour slugfests that Quenneville remembers. The kind of hockey gave comedian Don Rickles one of his lasting lines.

You used to go to a boxing match here and a hockey game would break out.

Alas, those days are gone. But Philly fans haven’t forgotten them.