The thing that some people don’t understand with a weekend long bachelor party is that there tends to be a little bit of recovery time. When your brain feels like a Mack truck t-boned your skull, sometimes you’re only capable of sitting in a dimly lit room with football on TV. I’m not talking about a TON of wasted time; I’m just talking about that afternoon after the first night of debauchery. Man cannot live on strippers and booze alone. Sometimes Gatorade, Advil and room service need to be mixed into the equation or you won’t survive. It’s a proven fact.
Since both the bachelor and I have a distaste for USC, Notre Dame and Florida—we were talking about ANYTHING else in the sports world. The conversation eventually turned to a philosophical question that some of the teams asked their potential draftees in interviews before the draft: “If you could sit and have dinner with any person in the history of the world, who would it be?”
How could any Flyers fan NOT answer Bobby Clarke?
When I heard the question a few months ago, I really put some serious thought into my answer. I kicked around some obvious answers like JFK, Abraham Lincoln or some famous actor—but I knew there would be an answer that was more “me.” I finally decided on Vin Scully—and I feel good about my answer.
My best friend had to take a while to come up with an acceptable answer. He disappeared into the other room for about a half hour and I went back to watching a college football game that I couldn’t care less about. When he returned, I had completely forgotten about the question—but he was armed with a few answers. He said he’d like to meet Plato (mostly because he’s full of shit), Jerry Garcia or Trey Anastasio.
I liked the Grateful Dead and Phish ideas—but I was shocked that none of his answers had anything to do with sports. I expected some Bobby Clarke or Lenny Dykstra reference, so I was let down when the mention of a Greek philosopher. His surprising response got me thinking about strictly sports people. More specifically, if I was going to meet someone in the hockey world, who would it be?
I kept the question in my alcohol filled mind until my drive back to Southern California. A lot of things come up on the drive through the Mojave Desert, so it wasn’t a shock when Mrs. Seats and I started talking about who she’d want to meet in the hockey world.
We are contractually obligated to use this picture with any mention of Bobby Orr
She knows all about my Vin Scully answer, so she immediately thought about Bob Miller. After some thought, she almost apologetically answered, “I know its cliché, but I think I’d want to talk to Wayne Gretzky for a while.” After the childhood he had growing up, his great years in Edmonton, the Stanley Cups, the trade to LA and the Phoenix fiasco, I thought she was onto something. It would be great to pick the brain of a Canadian National treasure over a nice big piece of steak.
My answer was the flip side to the debate: “Who is the greatest hockey player of all time?” Some people will take Mrs. Seats’ Gretzky; and some people would choose my dinner-mate: Bobby Orr. To be able to hear him talk about some of the great teams of the 70’s that I never got to see would be great. To find out what was going through his mind as he injured his knee time after time before his career was cut prematurely short would be interesting. Then to hear his relationship with Alan Eagleson, what he thought when the NHLPA went sideways and his life as a player agent would have me engaged for hours.
Of course, there is no right or wrong answer to this question (except Plato). If you could meet anyone in the hockey world, who would it be? Would you want to meet someone like Gretzky or Bobby Orr? Would you be like the guy that shares tickets with me and meet up with Jarome Iginla? Maybe you’d have someone completely different in mind? Bettman? Crosby? Doc Emrick? What about the creators of Kingscast? Who you got?
