The Art of Conversation at Peace a Cup of Joe
'He never runs out of them': The stories of Terry Well-baked, who brought hockey to life in Nashville
Nashville defensemen Roman Josi and Dante Fabbro fall to the water ice trying to deny a pass, with frontwards Nick Cousins defenseless backside the net. Calgary forward Andrew Mangiapane slides the tying goal into the net. Nashville and Calgary hockey legend Terry Crisp brings a clenched right fist swiftly to the desk in front of him and yells to no one in detail: "Jesus Tater! What are we doing? Can we at to the lowest degree make them earn their goals?"
Information technology'southward the third period of an eventual three-2 Nashville shootout win on April xix at Bridgestone Arena, the biggest outcome still in the Predators' push to make the playoffs and delay Crisp's retirement. Lyndsay Rowley, who hosts pregame and postgame coverage with Crisp on Bally Sports broadcasts of the Preds, hangs on every shift with Crisp at their desk in the concourse, as she'due south done for the past v seasons, lending some remainder to what she calls his "array of cuss words and poundings of the fist."
This is what Sheila Well-baked has coming in her near hereafter, in her 58th year of marriage to the man known by most as "Crispy." She tin watch a total season of hockey games with her hubby rather than support from distant every bit he plays, coaches or broadcasts them. Information technology'south an option, at least.
"He withal coaches," Sheila says. "He never stopped. The mode he is during these games? Poor Lyndsay sitting with him, I'd go nuts. I wouldn't sit there."
But Rowley savors the entertainment. And hockey insight. And friendship. Unremarkably when Crisp gets talking, the infinite around him disappears quickly. That's the effect one of the game'southward not bad storytellers, maybe the greatest, can have on a oversupply. The booming vocalisation, the wide grin, the easy laugh, the knack for crafting a narrative with a strong kicker, the seemingly endless supply of fascinating experiences and anecdotes — Crisp has it all in his armory.
"Information technology'due south not the same six or 7 stories like some people — he but never runs out of them," says Willy Daunic, the Preds' TV play-past-play journalist and a Crisp protégé since Crisp arrived in Nashville in 1998 to provide color on simulcasts adjacent to Pete Weber.
"Total passion, every time," says Hal Gill, a former Predator who at present does color on the radio broadcasts with Weber. "I've never seen Crispy have a bad day. And every time I meet him, it'south 'Saddle up. I've got another one for you.'"
Now Crisp, one of 14 men to win the Stanley Cup every bit a thespian and motorcoach, is hanging it upward — broadcasting, non spinning yarns — at historic period 78.
Well-baked'south story is one of opportunity seized. Yeah, he's the 1989 Loving cup-winning coach of the Flames. He's a two-fourth dimension Cup winner as a (very busy) penalty killer with the famed Broad Street Bullies Philadelphia Flyers teams of 1974-75. He'south an original New York Islander and St. Louis Blue and a coaching protégé of Scotty Bowman, Fred Shero and Al Arbour. But all of that would accept been moot if Sheila hadn't talked him into sticking with hockey rather than pursuing his original plan of education in his hometown of Parry Sound, Ontario.
"I just kept playing hockey because I could," says Well-baked, who started dating Sheila when both were 16 in her hometown of St. Mary's, Ontario, where he was staying with some other family while playing juniors.
"Basically," she says, "we've been together since the cradle."
This is a hockey historian'south dream. Crisp only missed being "posterized," as he called it, in the famous photo of Bobby Orr's airborne, 1970 Stanley Loving cup-winning goal against St. Louis because he got off the ice seconds earlier information technology happened. Four years later, Crisp was playing for Shero in Philly and was stunned to hear the coach's game programme for neutralizing Orr inbound the 1974 Stanley Cup Final: The Flyers were going to dump the puck into Orr's corner and invite him to initiate things all series long.
"I'1000 like 'Come up on, Freddie, this like giving a child a stick of dynamite and asking him to go play in traffic,'" Crisp says. "Merely by the 6th game, Bobby Orr was wore out."
Not that Well-baked and the Flyers were comfortable belatedly in that clincher, up 1-0, waiting for Orr to emerge from the penalisation box with less than a infinitesimal to play. Shero gave Well-baked simple instructions on the bench: "Bobby Orr is yours."
"I didn't even watch the puck drop," Crisp says. "I didn't know where the puck was. I'chiliad watching the penalty box door. I'm thinking, 'When that mother bleeping thing opens, I'm gonna be right where he is, and wherever he goes, as much equally I can, I'll be in that location.' And so, the play'south going on, I take no idea, don't give a shit. Out comes Bobby and nosotros dump the puck along the boards into his end. So he comes out of the box, I'chiliad right on him. Just trying to stay shut, tiresome him, bug him. Clock is going. Bobby comes down, he hits a petty over center ice and drills information technology in behind the net. (Goaltender Bernie) Parent stops it, clock goes downward, we win. But my minute of terror, I wasn't fifty-fifty thinking about the Stanley Cup. I was thinking well-nigh No. four."
Terry Well-baked during his Flyers years. (Steve Babineau / NHLI via Getty Images)
Dave "The Hammer" Schultz, Andre "Moose" Dupont and the residuum of those bruising, brawling bullies even so stand for the stage of Crisp's career he hears most about from fans, he says. The toughness required as a 5-8, 180-pound forward who killed penalties translated to his coaching career. (Crisp said he didn't fight much, but "would sooner get my ass kicked by an opponent than go back to my own dressing room and hear almost how I allow my human get loose to sucker dial i of my teammates.")
But there'south and so much more. Crisp has stories of Bowman practices exhaustively and solely devoted to line changes. Bowman once brought in a figure skater who skated circles around the Blues at commencement, so helped turn them into a fiercely fast team. When Calgary GM Cliff Fletcher gave Well-baked his showtime NHL shot (and a Loving cup-or-bust mandate) with a loaded Flames team, Crisp delivered. And 1 of Crisp'due south great joys was coaching Tampa Bay to its start postseason in 1996.
"Crispy was a histrion who had to scratch and claw for his minutes, he wasn't super talented, merely he was crafty, smart, tough," says Tim Hunter, a penalty-killing forrard on those Calgary teams who went on to passenger vehicle. "And that'south the kind of jitney Crispy was."
This is a story of hockey expansion success, too. Crisp was on the commencement Dejection and Islanders teams. The 1973-74 Flyers were the first modern expansion team to win the Cup. Crisp was the offset coach of the Lightning, starting in 1992, after his abrupt firing from Calgary. He helped sell hockey in Florida.
And the roars he and Sheila received at Bridgestone Arena during an April 17 ceremony for them speaks about more than than 24 years of dissemination in Nashville. They complemented the scene before, during and subsequently intermissions of the Preds-Flames game ii days later. Hundreds of fans stopped by the desk to greet and get pictures with Well-baked, ane asking him to sign his ticket stubs and saying: "I've never known the Preds without you, Crispy. Y'all made me a fan."
"He's the greatest administrator you could have hoped for, he and Pete, and I don't call up we would have made information technology without him," Daunic says.
"You should never underestimate what Pete and Terry have done for this club," says Preds GM David Poile, who has been with the society the whole manner. "That influence, you can't even measure information technology really. Information technology's that impactful."
Terry Crisp, left, shares the berth with Pete Weber for the telephone call of the Predators-Blackhawks game on April 16. (John Russell / NHLI via Getty Images)
Rowley will never forget her outset meeting with Crisp, shortly after she got the job (then with Trick Sports Tennessee) in 2015. She knew of his achievements. She sensed his warmth immediately. She recalled his first words to her:
Well-baked: "Welcome to Nashville, you're from the Midwest originally, right?"
Rowley: "Yes, Columbus, Ohio."
Crisp: "OK, living in the South, in that location's one thing you lot need to know. When people say, 'Bless your heart,' they aren't actually being nice. They're saying, 'Fuck you lot.'"
"So yeah, my first conversation with Crispy involved the word 'Fuck,'" Rowley says. "I'm like, 'OK, cool. Then he'southward a piece of work.'"
Another legendary bit of dialog, this one between Weber and Crisp, goes back to the broadcast of a 2001 Preds game at San Jose. The two were doing the simulcast then, broadcasts on Telly and radio at the same time. Preds defenseman Cale Hulse used a soccer boot to go a puck away from the Nashville net. Crisp mistakenly transposed the consonants every bit he started to describe the play — turning "soccer kick" to "koccer sick" – and, well, here'due south how information technology went:
Crisp: "Prissy play by Cale Hulse, he couldn't go his stick loose, all tied up, so he just just took a dainty cock … soccer kick … (now laughing out the words) got that thing upwardly to Greg Johnson, and he just puts it all the style down ice."
Weber (five seconds later, through laughter): "Back out across the line to middle (another interruption of 8 seconds as they both stifle laughter) … dumped behind the net (another suspension of 12 seconds as they both stifle laughter) …"
Crisp finally got some other word out after a minute and 36 seconds to compose himself. Weber's wife, Claudia, turned on the radio broadcast around that time and called his cell phone to ask why he wasn't talking at all. A few years later, at a Predators reunion, Weber played this sacred chip of audio for Hulse'due south wife, onetime "Baywatch" star Gena Lee Nolin.
"She was howling," Weber says.
That's a reaction Weber and Crisp — Bubba and Crispy, as they call each other — have inspired many times over the years. Preds fans used to play a drinking game, in fact, tied to how many times Well-baked said "Bubba" on a circulate. Weber once got a text from a friend reading: "Tell him to terminate, I'yard already hammered!"
They welcomed thousands of Preds fans at free Hockey 101 sessions at Bridgestone earlier habitation games in the showtime few years of the team'southward existence, getting the Hanson brothers to bosom in on ane of them. Weber once pretended to be choking just as a broadcast was starting, forcing Crisp to think fast and take command (anybody else was in on the joke, fake starting the circulate when it was actually a couple minutes from go time).
They were, and are, inseparable. Crisp would mistakenly transpose former Pred Dan Hamhuis into "Damn Hanhuis" and Weber would quip: "Actually, Terry, I think he's playing pretty well tonight."
That chemistry was instant, and it was as credible every bit ever during the April sixteen-17 Crisp tribute when they did a radio circulate together ane day, and so a TV circulate the next. Putting them together initially was the idea of Gerry Helper, who did communications for the Buffalo Sabres when Weber chosen their games, then did the same for the brand-new Lightning.He had heard the stories of Crisp's legendary temper when Crisp was named Tampa Bay'due south first motorcoach in 1992, but establish him to be a natural, jovial salesman of the game.
"I told him to please non take this as a commentary on his coaching but that if he ever got out, he could be similar the Dick Vitale or John Madden of hockey," says Helper, who recently retired from the Preds front office and who lured Crisp to Nashville to endeavor dissemination later on the Lightning fired him in 1997. "The guy everyone wants to sit down side by side to at the bar and talk hockey."
Or tell jokes. Well-baked has an endless supply. Just some of the stories are fifty-fifty funnier than the jokes, like the time Shero had his Flyers turn their sticks upside down in a practice. After a while, Bobby Clarke skated over to Shero to say information technology was the dumbest thing he'd e'er seen. Shero said: "Yep, and it took i of yous geniuses 14 minutes to figure that out."
Former Russian star Sergei Makarov, playing for Crisp in Calgary, once responded to a Well-baked chalkboard session past shaking his caput and referring to his Russian coach, Viktor Tikhonov.
"Tikhonov, bad guy, good coach," Makarov said. "Yous? Skillful guy, bad coach."
Perhaps the most well-known comedy moment of Crisp's career came in the exuberant seconds after his 1989 Flames beat Chicago to attain the Stanley Cup Terminal. He climbed to the top of the plexiglass behind his bench looking for Sheila and ended up giving Norma MacNeil — married woman of Calgary assistant GM Al MacNeil — an impromptu buss instead.
"Nosotros're over at that place killing ourselves laughing, like, 'Holy shit, Crispy, you can't even go that right?'" says Lanny McDonald, a star forward on that team.
Crisp still hears nearly it. Sheila, though, did not give him much crap.
"Eh, it was funny," she says. "Life'due south too short."
Terry Well-baked (lesser right) and the 1989 Calgary Flames. (Bruce Bennett Studios / Getty Images)
Crisp coached for 19 directly seasons (two as a Flyers assistant, viii in the minors, nine in the NHL) before deciding a one-game trial as a Nashville broadcaster could become a career. But the charabanc in him still surfaces. Onetime Preds goalie Chris Mason, now Daunic's sidekick on Tv, recalls his first appearance years ago on the pregame show. He was to join Crisp and Rowley'southward predecessor as host, Mark Howard, and talk nigh the goalie matchup that night. Mason wrote down and recited everything he would say for hours before the live broadcast.
"My hands were shaking, I was short of breath, trying to compose myself," Mason says. "Crispy puts his hand on my shoulder and says, 'Don't worry about it, son. Just bring the passion. It will be fine.'"
Then Crisp went off script, on the air, and asked Mason something totally unplanned.
"Inside, I'm like 'Oh boy, here we become,'" Stonemason says. "Just then information technology was like some peace came over me, and I merely started talking hockey. That was such a huge moment for me. Crispy, he'south one of the most influential people in the history of this organization, merely more than than that, to me and a lot of people, he's a mentor."
He was different things to dissimilar players on those Calgary teams. Clearly, some did not enjoy his tactics, as his broadcast friends were reminded often in visits with former Flames during an early-season tribute to Crisp in Calgary.
"He was a yeller and a screamer behind the bench, merely what that does is kind of galvanizes a team," says McDonald, a scratch during part of that 1989 Cup run and the hero of the Game vi clincher at Montreal. "You kind of bond over that, and whether Crispy meant to practice that or not, it worked. What's the saying, 'Dumb similar a fox?' But we pulled it all together, and plain Crispy was a big function of that. I mean, await at Bowman's career. Almost of his players absolutely hated him."
The Crisps have 3 grown children and 10 grandchildren — the grandkids telephone call Crisp "Coach" — and his time in the league could exist hard on the kids as teens and young adults. Sheila, grateful that social media didn't be then, simply told her children to never contend with anyone.
"And they'd say, 'Yeah, well, you lot try to go to schoolhouse and listen to what a horseshit charabanc your dad is,'" Crisp says with a express mirth.
If there's a regret, it's sarcasm. Well-baked was taught to be tough by legendary coaches and believes in a demanding, brutally honest approach. But he says if he could go back, he'd eliminate the cheeky barbs about players for all to hear on the bench. He as well still doesn't know exactly why Calgary fired him after 3 successful seasons featuring ii Presidents' Trophies and a Cup.
"Nobody always gave me a straight reply, nobody ever stepped up and said, 'This is why,'" Crisp says.
"It was an obvious mistake," Sheila says. "They had a lot of years of missing the playoffs after that."
And the Crisps went on to help spread the skillful discussion of hockey to 2 new markets, finding a permanent dwelling in the second one and expanding their family unit of sorts. They're the people Rowley turned to when she went through a bad breakup. And when Preds sideline reporter Kara Hammer broke her arm a few years ago, the Crisps were the first to ship a intendance package. These stories are abundant, too.
"They're pretty much my favorite people," Hammer says.
"Doesn't matter where I go in my travels," says Jeff Well-baked, the couple's eye son and a sentinel for the Seattle Kraken. "I ever hear unsolicited most 'Terry and Sheila' and how they impacted lives."
Adds Rowley: "If something really bad happened, or God foreclose, I concluded upwardly in jail? They're who I'd call. They're simply incredible."
"We beloved you Crispy!" must have been yelled toward Crisp 100 times on Apr 19 equally he and Rowley took the broadcast through the three-two win over Calgary. This is every nighttime, for as long every bit it lasts. Sheila happily sat in her seats in the loonshit during the game rather than heed to Crisp'southward griping. Simply she was at that place after, hugging fans and taking some of the pictures of her husband with them.
"Sheila will get mad at me," Crisp says, "merely when people enquire, 'What was the secret to your success in hockey?' I always say the same thing. 'Discover a good lady, marry her and keep her.'"
Sheila looks at him, rolls her eyes and says: "Oh, God."
Terry Well-baked and his married woman, Sheila, driblet the puck between Nashville'southward Roman Josi, left, and the Dejection' Ryan O'Reilly at Bridgestone Arena on April 17. (John Russell / NHLI via Getty Images)
(Illustration: John Bradford / The Athletic. Photos: Frederick Breedon IV, Bruce Bennett / Getty)
Source: https://theathletic.com/3262536/2022/04/29/nashville-predators-terry-crisp-nhl/
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