You know it's October when the Leafs are in first place and people in Toronto dream of the Cup The collapse usually happens around Christmas time which works well since you get to Grinch all over their dreams of finally ending the curse.
The aftermath of that victory was a vindictive demolition of the champion by Imlach that has not been healed to this day. His treatment of Larry Hillman, the outstanding defenseman of the playoffs, was so bad that the player put a hex on the Leafs. During contract renewals that spring, Imlach refused Hillman’s request, low-balled him on the counter-offer, and fined him $2,400 for refusing the contract offer. Hillman declared that the team would not win another Cup until they reimbursed him the fine plus interest. After 45 years of frustration, the curse seems intact.
The Hillman Hex.
Didn’t know about that one? Well, while Keon chose to just stay away, Larry Hillman chose to burden the Leafs with a curse. Maybe you believe in such things, maybe you don’t. Maybe you believe the Curse of the Billy Goat keeps Chicago’s Cubs from winning the World Series, maybe you don’t.
“Yes, it’s still there,” said Hillman on Friday. “It seems to have worked.”
Along with Jimmy Pappin, Hillman was one of the unsung heroes of that golden hockey spring in Toronto. He and defence partner Marcel Pronovost were a key reason why the Leafs were able to upset the powerful Chicago Blackhawks in the first round and then knock off the Habs for the Cup. During 12 post-season games, that tandem was only on the ice for one even-strength goal.
Hillman, the son of a miner from Kirkland Lake, Ont., came up through the Detroit chain and landed with the Leafs in 1960. He spent the next eight years bouncing between the NHL and the AHL Rochester Americans, something teams could do with veterans in those days. He turned 30 during that 1966-67 season, and played the best hockey of his career in the playoffs alongside Pronovost.
After that season, he hoped to parlay that into an increase on his $15,000 salary. In his own mind, he set a bottom line of $20,000. Hillman knew others were making a lot more, and knew Bobby Baun, who hadn’t played much in the ’67 final, had signed with the expansion Oakland outfit for $35,000 a season.
GM Punch Imlach, however, offered $19,000. Captain George Armstrong suggested that he sign for that amount and other players would chip in $100 each. But Hillman stood fast on principle, even after Imlach increased his offer to $19,500.
That offer, however, also came with the promise to reduce Hillman’s salary by $100 for every day he didn’t sign. Imlach even called up Al Arbour and Duane Rupp from the minors to put extra pressure on the stubborn blueliner. For 24 days the stalemate went on, costing Hillman $2,400 before he agreed to re-join the team.
It was a frustrating, humbling experience. He played 55 games for the Leafs that season before moving on to the Minnesota North Stars the next summer, but not before he laid down the Hillman Hex, vowing the team wouldn’t win another Cup after the way they’d treated him.
“I’ve left it on because they didn’t pay me the $2,400, with interest,” he said. “It would have been a lot cheaper to pay that than signing all those million-dollar players.”
It’s really more whimsy now for Hillman, who won six Stanley Cups, three Avco Cups and one Calder Cup over 25 years in pro hockey. He’s not angry any more, feels Shanahan is leading the Leafs in the right direction, and is pleased that Keon and Horton, former teammates, are being honored on Legends Row.
On the 35th anniversary of the Hex, he was asked if it was time to lift the curse, and he decided then 50 years would be a nice, round number.
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