FanShot

Arbour: Ahead of his time and man of the people

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He pretended to be hard-boiled, but the truth is he had a heart as soft as a jelly doughnut. He peeled the paint off the locker-room walls with his thunderous voice and a slam of his fist when the team needed a kick in the pants, but he cared about his players and loved most of them. When he was told that Jean Potvin, a pet defenseman, had been traded, he wept.

Former Islanders beat writerPat Calabria writes about the Al Arbour he watched and knew off-the-knew