When I was growing up, my mother would take notes about what sports we kids played, how tall we were at certain ages, and what we wanted to be “when we grew up.” My entries say things like: Mike wants to be: an astronaut, a fireman, a baseball player. And variations of those would recur. The one that was always there was the idea of playing in the “big leagues” or as the hockey world call it, “the show.”
I never got remotely close, though I captained my team one year in house league, and was always a strong skater. My brothers dabbled in some all-star hockey. Being a stats man I looked it up one time – if you crunch the numbers it is a long shot – something like 1 in 1500 registered minor hockey players will make the NHL. (500,000 kids are registered in Canada in any given year, and about 50% of the NHL, or approximately 300+ players are Canadian).
One classmate from public school who turned into a “phenom” – was Craig Fisher. I watched his career from afar. He grew up not far from me and we played “foot hockey” with a tennis ball in the school yard. I suppose as far back as I can remember he played in elite all-star leagues, and then moved to the next town to play in the “Triple A” league. He ended up playing for an American college and being drafted by the Philadelphia Flyers 56th overall in 1988.
Craig wasn;’t the only kid I knew who grew up to play pro sports. I saw Nigel Wilson, another schoolmate, astound locals on the ball-field, and then go on to a major league baseball career with time spent in both the U.S. and Japan. Craig’s story was more special to me though. I guess hockey is closer to the heart. I’m a slightly fair-weather fan, and though I watch most Leaf games, I save my true enthusiasm these days for cheering Canada in international hockey. I do have a weakness not many might guess, for the interesting stories that go along with the long-road and grind that athletes endure in pursuit of professional careers. thus, I followed Craig from afar, googling him every few years to see where he was at.
Over the years in a handful of searches, I found interesting stats, articles and quotes about Craig. Craig played 12 NHL games for three different teams (Philly, Winnipeg, Florida), and spent his pro career otherwise playing on NHL farm teams in cities like Cape Breton, Indianapolis, Hershey, and Rochester (plus a stint in Germany in Cologne). A coach called him one of the best hockey players to play in the minors in the 1990s. In 1995-96 he scored an astounding 74 goals in 82 games with the IHL Orlando Solar Bears. In 1999, the year a concussion knocked him from the game, he had 23 points in the first 17 games and was pencilled in to be on the Team Canada squad at the All-Star Game. Just before Christmas that year I recall talking with my mother about his accomplishments and then hearing that a concussion had side-lined him. He retired not long after that, and it took him years to fully recover.
Just killing time a few days ago, I decided to google Craig and see what I could find. Not much has been out there for the last 10 years, aside from Rochester Americans fans lamenting the loss of “Fish,” and they called him. I stumbled upon an entry written in an upper NY State paper that discussed a hockey reunion in Rochester that featured the return of “Goal-machine Craig Fisher.” Wow! Really cool! Even nicer was to read that he sounds like he completely recovered and he is still involved in hockey, posted as a an assistant coach with a local Southern Ontario university team.
Craig had a very successful hockey career and I wish him luck in his coaching career. All the best!
Links:
Craig’s stats at the Hockey Database:
http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/pdisplay.php?pid=1686
Newspaper article about Rochester Americans alumni reunion
http://blogs.democratandchronicle.com/kevino/2011/10/11/goal-machine-craig-fisher-joining-alumni-reunion/
If you click “Sports” in the categories you will find other related posts, plus I have written a book review about Canadian coach Dave King ‘s “King of Russia” (links at top).
