Jim Roberts obit

Jimmy Roberts, the original Blue, dies at 75

He was not on the list.

It's hard to explain what men like these have meant to a franchise, to a city's sports culture.

A generation has grown up without hearing their names, without experiencing what hockey was like in St. Louis, when it was dressed to the nines, infused with Norm Kramer's organ and choreographed by Scotty Bowman's band of castoffs and characters.

The Blues went to the Stanley Cup Finals in each of their first three seasons, from 1968 to 1970. When they came marching in, you not only wanted “to be in that number,” you had to be in that number. Nights on Oakland Avenue were covered in goose bumps and sprinkled with magic.

A generation never saw it, never saw what those men put in place, never saw Jimmy Roberts play.

Friday morning, Roberts, 75, died, a Blues official confirmed.

The Blues had been hoping Roberts might make one last appearance, might step  onto the frozen canvass of his remarkable life one more time and hear cheers from the hockey community he helped create. He was scheduled to be at Scottrade Center on Saturday night to drop the ceremonial puck for Hockey Fights Cancer Night.

Roberts found out he had cancer running through his body just weeks ago. So often it happens like that, in a way that devastates people and those who love them. One moment there is plenty of time. The next moment, time is borrowed.

Roberts was the original Blue, the first player taken by St. Louis in the main segment of the 1967 expansion draft. He was handed No. 6 and became hockey's original “sixth man,” alternating between defense and forward, sometimes between shifts.

He was an original part of the Blues alumni population, marrying a local girl and embracing this town as his own. Above all else, “Jumbo” Roberts was an original piece of work.

As a coach, he conducted practices in a knit hat with a pompon on top. He wore old knit gloves, covering the worn areas with adhesive tape. His Antiques Road Show skates featured Velcro straps. If he had been any more old school he would have been pre-school.

“I remember when he was with Montreal, and we'd play them,” Bob Plager recalled. “I'd be dead serious, you know, wanting to beat the Canadiens. We'd go into the corners and I'd run Jimmy into the boards with a heavy check. Then he'd turn to me and say, “Aww now Bobby, why do you want to go and hit me like that?'

“The next time, I'd chop him across the ankles or give him a crosscheck and he'd say, “Aww, come on now Bob, why do you want to do that? I thought we were friends?' Then later in the game, he's in front of the goal and knocks in a rebound. He turns and smiles at me and says, 'Oh, now I see why you're doing that, Bob … Because I keep doing that.' ”

Roberts played at opposite ends of the franchise spectrum — 10 seasons in Montreal, six in St. Louis. On April 4, 1967, he scored the first playoff goal for the Blues, a goal that got everything started toward a postseason thrill ride. His goal with 6 minutes 47 seconds remaining secured a 1-0 Game 1 win at Philadelphia, a dramatic quarterfinal series the Blues won in seven.

History illuminates Ron Schock's Game 7 goal that decided the next series against Minnesota, a second-overtime jolt that sent the Blues to the Stanley Cup dance. It skips over Roberts disrupting Wayne Connelly's breakaway in the first overtime to make the heroics possible.

At 5-foot-10, 185 pounds, Roberts was never imposing, never a gifted scorer, never a textbook skater. His best offensive season came with the Blues in 1967-68, 14 goals and 23 assists. But he out-worked, out-checked and out-foxed opposing players into submission.

He carried a skill that has no calibration, packed in his lunch pail, embedded in his constitution. He could win.

“He was a self-made player,” said Bowman. “He came out of Port Hope (Ontario), a small town near Peterborough, and he wasn't rated as an NHL player. Then he found his way to make pro, then made minor pro with the (Montreal) Royals.

“The people that ran the Canadiens knew how important that kind of player was on a good team. He came with his work boots on every day, and that's a big asset for a player on a team that's got a lot of stars.”

In 2008, in association with Montreal's centennial celebration, Ken Campbell published “Habs Heroes: The Definitive List of the 100 Greatest Canadiens Ever.” Roberts was on it. For the hockey-uninitiated, that's kin to having a plaque in Monument Park at Yankee Stadium.

No one appreciated Roberts' intangibles more than Bowman. When he came to St. Louis to help Lynn Patrick build a team, he made sure Roberts came as well. He made sure he had men who would not back down.

Three seasons in, the Blues faced the Boston Bruins in the 1970 Stanley Cup Finals. Bowman gave Roberts the job of checking 21-year old Bobby Orr.

“I want you to stick with that guy everywhere he goes,” Bowman told Roberts. “I want you right next to him, in his face, so close you can tell me what kind of gum he's chewing.”

Toward the end of the first game, Roberts returned to the bench, exhausted from shadowing the mercurial Orr. He looked at Bowman, eager to tell him something, trying to catch his breath. Bowman looked back, impatient for the vital piece of information Roberts was about to share.

“Well?” the anxious coach finally asked. “What?”

“Juicy Fruit,” Roberts said.

Bowman departed for Montreal in 1971. That December, he traded promising forward Phil Roberto to the Blues in exchange for Roberts. Bowman wasn't about style, he was about substance.

“You could make the case in those years with the Blues, with all the things he did, playing defense and forward, killing penalties and everything,” Bowman said, “he was our most valuable player.”

Roberts played on two Stanley Cup winners in Montreal before he came to St. Louis. He got three more rings with the Canadiens before returning for a final season in 1977-78. The winning Karvorka never left him.

He won two AHL championships coaching in Springfield, Mass. He coached Hartford Whalers to within a missed Yvon Corriveau breakaway of upsetting Montreal in the 1992 Adams Division semifinals.

Roberts joined the Blues as an associate coach in 1996, became interim coach when Mike Keenan was fired and stayed as an assistant to Joel Quenneville. Roberts retired at the end of 1999-2000, a season the Blues collected 51 wins and 114 points.

His personal life was much like his playing life. Never one to make excuses, nor to fish for compliments, nor to suffer fools. He didn't always say what you wanted to hear, but he'd darn sure say what you needed to hear.

Roberts handled his illness with the kind of resolve and dignity one would expect.

He once said, “I was just happy to be in the league, that's how most of us felt on those first teams here. I was lucky, I played a long time, played on some great teams and played with some great players.”

After his retirement as a player, Roberts was an interim coach of the Buffalo Sabres under his old mentor Bowman before coaching the Springfield Indians of the American Hockey League to back-to-back Calder Cup championships in 1990 and 1991, after which he was named the head coach of the Hartford Whalers. He went on to be the coach and general manager of the Worcester IceCats of the AHL for two seasons before moving on to be an assistant coach with the St. Louis parent club between 1996 and 2000, including a short stint as the interim head coach in 1997. He also coached the Buffalo Sabres.

Roberts played in 1,006 NHL games, scoring 126 goals and 194 assists for 320 points, and playing in three All-Star Games in 1965, 1969 and 1970. "Jimmy Roberts" was engraved on the Stanley Cup in 1965, 1966, 1973, 1976, 1977 (all with Montreal).

 

Career statistics

                         Regular season              Playoffs

Season Team            League            GP            G            A            Pts            PIM            GP            G            A            Pts            PIM

1958–59            Peterborough Petes            OHA-Jr.        54            2            8            10            34            19            0            0            0            2

1958–59            Peterborough Petes            M-Cup            —            —            —            —            —            12            2            1            3            2

1959–60            Peterborough Petes            OHA-Jr.        48            6            21            27            55            12            2            7            9            18

1959–60            Montreal Royals            EPHL            —            —            —            —            —            4            0            0            0            4

1960–61            Montreal Royals            EPHL            51            7            18            25            55            —            —            —            —            —

1961–62            Hull-Ottawa Canadiens            EPHL            67            11            28            39            42            13            3            0            3            18

1962–63            Hull-Ottawa Canadiens            EPHL            72            2            27            29            78            3            0            0            0            10

1962–63            Cleveland Barons            AHL            —            —            —            —            —            1            0            0            0            2

1963–64            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            15            0            1            1            2            7            0            1            1            14

1963–64            Omaha Knights CPHL            46            18            19            37            47            —            —            —            —            —

1963–64            Cleveland Barons            AHL            9            1            3            4            4            —            —            —            —            —

1963–64            Quebec Aces    AHL            2            0            0            0            2            —            —            —            —            —

1964–65            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            70            3            10            13            40            13            0            0            0            30

1965–66            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            70            5            5            10            20            10            1            1            2            10

1966–67            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            63            3            0            3            16            4            1            0            1            0

1967–68            St. Louis Blues            NHL            74            14            23            37            66            18            4            1            5            20

1968–69            St. Louis Blues            NHL            72            14            19            33            81            12            1            4            5            10

1969–70            St. Louis Blues            NHL            76            13            17            30            51            16            2            3            5            29

1970–71            St. Louis Blues            NHL            72            13            18            31            77            6            2            1            3            11

1971–72            St. Louis Blues            NHL            26            5            7            12            4            —            —            —            —            —

1971–72            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            51            7            15            22            53            6            1            0            1            0

1972–73            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            77            14            18            32            28            17            0            2            2            22

1973–74            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            67            8            16            24            39            6            0            0            0            4

1974–75            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            79            5            13            18            52            11            2            2            4            2

1975–76            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            74            13            8            21            35            13            3            1            4            2

1976–77            Montreal Canadiens            NHL            45            5            14            19            18            14            3            0            3            6

1977–78            St. Louis Blues            NHL            75            4            10            14            39            —            —            —            —            —

NHL totals            1,006            126            194            320            621            153            20            16            36            160