The St. Louis Blues retired Brett Hull’s #16 tonight, we had tickets but we’re both sick as all get out. So we didn’t go, but we did watch it on TV.
For a long time, Brett Hull was the face for the St. Louis Blues. Towards the end of his career in St. Louis, many fans started to question his performance. It seemed lack luster, fans were wondering why he commanded such a high salary. The simple answer to Brett’s performance is Mike Keenan. That lousy excuse for a coach dessimated the St. Louis Blues team by trading off all the “stars” on the team.
At any rate, Brett Hull and many of his old team mates came back tonight to see his number get retired – and it was awesome. Not only did he get his number retired, but the city is actually going to name a street after him.
I remember going to a game several hours early, as normal back then, before most of the fans were there. It was just after Halloween, my friend and I ran down to ice level. I had one of those miniature Crunch bars in my pocket. Jokingly, I put the Crunch bar in my hand and through one of the holes for the cameras and quoted one of the lame commercials from back then (the 80’s) as he and the others were practicing. He skated up to me seemingly to get a practice puck from the corner. Picked up the puck with his stick and told me to move my hand, which I did. He put his stick through the camera hole and flipped it over, dropping the puck right at my feet. I was stunned. It took me what seemed like minutes to make my legs collapse and fall on the puck, I was so excited. I still have that puck today, somewhere.
Good times, good times.