What If Mike Bullard Didn't Drive Drunk?

[Bunkerman535]

The Bullet was off to a great start in his career, then has a few beers and hits a couple people with his car. A few months later he's traded for Dan Quinn. Quinn was good here but decades later did the Pens do the right thing? Or would Bullard and Mario have been an awesome duo for a decade?

[BCG51585]

What if Bobby didn't fly?

[superconan]

What if Bobby didn't fly?

Boston was up 3-0 in the series. Fleury's photo is better.

[ville5]

Doubtful. Bullard was one of if not the most, selfish players i've ever seen pull on a Pens jersey. He was more worried about personal stats than team success. Besides, their production was very close-Quinn's time here vs. Bullard's career post Pittsburgh.

[mikey287]

Well, the timing is a little off here. The incident happened in January of 1985, he finished that season, played all of the next season and started the following season with us until he was traded in November of 1986. Dan Quinn played well here and had, by far, the best years of his career here. Quinn was traded quickly and unfortunately we have nothing to show for it (Rod Buskas was claimed in the waiver draft, Barry Pederson left as a free agent, and Tony Tanti was traded for Ken Priestlay, who just left...all in short order).

Seemed like a player that would be good on bad teams but less effective on good teams because his flaws would be criticized more because they would have more of a negative impact on the team as a whole. On those mid-80's Pittsburgh teams, who cares that he tried to skate through 3 players on any given rush and that he didn't play defense and that he generally didn't care (though he did play with an edge at times). To the point, that I started with, it explains why he didn't spend long on that very good Flames team and despite a 100-point season, they used him to upgrade their center position (Gilmour) and push the Flames over the top just before they won the 1989 Stanley Cup. Despite being a near point-per-game player in his career, he took himself to Europe (and didn't even seem to care to challenge himself, as he played in a tier-two Swiss league in his first year back over there after playing for Toronto; then played in the German league which was wasn't as good as it was today as it was transitioning from the Bundesliga) where he could play however he wanted.

Bullard wasn't cut out for being on a successful team, so no, him and Lemieux would not have been a dynamic duo AND be Stanley Cup champions.

As bad it sounds, but I mean it in purely a hockey way, it would have been better for us if Fogarty put down the bottle over Bullard...

Fun fact: Bullard scored 51 goals in 1984 and not a single one of them was a game winner.

[aoneil66]

Fun fact: Bullard scored 51 goals in 1984 and not a single one of them was a game winner.

That doesn't even seem possible, wow!

[jimjom]

Wasn't Bullard the captain before Mario? Still trying to wrap my mind around why a guy with over 700 points and 300 goals in the NHL would play part of his peak years in Germany. It's maybe the 9th best hockey country in europe.

Does anyone remember if Bullard was at that last Mellon game?

[Bunkerman535]

No he wasn't there. Seems like the Penguins just seem to want to forget the guy.

[Noise]

What if Michel Briere didn't die in a car accident?

[mikey287]

What if Michel Briere didn't die in a car accident?

His number would have been retired for a different reason.

[prez_usa]

What if Bobby didn't fly?

GIFSoup

[pugilist13]

Mikey has one hell of a memory. Couldn't agree more with the Bullard assessment. Thanks for the walk down memory lane...

[71Aj66ax87]

What if Bobby didn't fly?

GIFSoup

Isn't that what was being conveyed?

[ville5]

Mikey has one hell of a memory. Couldn't agree more with the Bullard assessment. Thanks for the walk down memory lane...

Give us some info on John Chabot and his triple Lutz-double toeloop.

[Sigwolf]

What if Bobby didn't fly?

Boston was up 3-0 in the series. Fleury's photo is better.

Not to mention the most important part... the puck was long gone well before he left his skates. It always bothered me that such a big deal was made about him 'flying'. That affected nothing, it's not like he made some great play while airborne, the shot was taken and then he lunged forward. I never saw it as an amazing goal from a technical standpoint, but it has always been treated as if it was. Call me a cynic.

[mikey287]

I mean, Orr's goal wasn't the greatest moment in hockey history. It was early in the first overtime of a series that was decided from game one, the big bad Bruins vs. the expansion Blues. Orr receives the pass from Derek Sanderson, scores past HHOF goalie Glenn Hall and then is tripped by resident bruiser Noel Picard and flies through the air - part trip, part celebration. It's awesome because a photographer caught that moment, that second in time, when the best player in the game, just scored on the biggest stage in the game, to win the biggest trophy in sports. That, in and of itself, makes it great.

But if you want to take away the frills. If Orr didn't score there (when was it, 46 seconds of overtime? or thereabouts?), he was just gonna score the next time. It was a matter of time, not a matter of "if".