Brucie Baseball: Vancouver Canucks Coach Boudreau was an ‘Unbelievable’ Player

A great friend and a former literary agent was the first to mention what an ‘unbelievable’ softball player Vancouver Canucks Head Coach Bruce Boudreau had been, having seen the multi-sport ‘Gabby’ playing softball in the late 1970’s in Niagara Falls. Prior to that, Boudreau played baseball.

“He was unreal,” Blake Corosky told us, “he was fast, he could hit, and he was an amazing player.”

Corosky would know even upon reflection, as he presently represents a variety of professional baseball players, including major leaguers at his firm True Gravity Baseball.

“I played it as much as I did hockey in my teenage years, it was a great passion, it was something I loved, and I was pretty good at it,” Boudreau said while underselling. “In the summers, baseball teams used to come in and have try-out camps (in Toronto) and I went to one, and I went to two, kept being invited by Pittsburgh (Pirates) to come out, and at the end of one they asked me to go down and play rookie ball in Florida, and I said ‘no, I’m a hockey player.’

Boudreau was developing a career on ice that would include 30 professional games in the old World Hockey Association (WHA) and another 141 in the NHL.

“It was just after we won the Memorial Cup and I was determined to be a hockey player,” Boudreau said.

He actually won two Memorial Cups with the Toronto Marlboros, in 1973 and 1975. The young forward tallied 365 regular season points over three seasons. Not too shabby, Gabby.

And believe it or not, the future head coach of the Vancouver Canucks was arguably just as good at baseball.

“I played on a about three or four baseball teams every summer,” Boudreau said. “I had just turned 18, I had never been out of Canada, I just thought I was going to be a hockey player. It wasn’t until years later, you see Bo Jackson playing two sports, and guys like that, and I thought ‘man I should have tried that, that would have been great!’ I look at it now and I wish I would have done it.”

Boudreau was a left-handed centerfielder.

“I could run believe it or not, and I could hit,” Gabby said.

Once he moved on to softball, despite being a lefty, if he wasn’t pitching, he played shortstop. He joined an incredible group of multi-sport hockey players called the Pro Stars, sponsored by Molson Brewing at the time, who took on other less accomplished softball playing hockey stars. Over four seasons the games raised tens of thousands of dollars for charity.

A Boudreau snapshot of an old softball program, with an ample number of Hockey Hall of Famers.

Some games featured an array of future Hockey Hall of Famers including Bobby Orr, Wayne Gretzky, and Mike Gartner.

“It was the highest level of softball you could get into in Ontario,” Boudreau said. “I was playing in the men’s leagues from the time I was 14 and being successful with it. Got a chance to play against some of the greats, a guy called Eddie Feigner, ‘the King and his Court’, played against them a few times, and got a chance to hit off him.”

I saw Feigner play an exhibition with just two or three fielders behind him at the Pontiac Silverdome around that same time. Arguably the greatest softball player of all time, Feigner would strike out opposing batters while pitching from second base. Few hitters would make contact if he pitched from the mound.

“He never struck me out,” Boudreau stated happily. “I’m pretty sure he only had a catcher, shortstop and first baseman. He travelled all over North America challenging teams.”

While Feigner drew big crowds while barnstorming, Boudreau’s teams didn’t do too bad either. They’d draw as many as 1,000 fans while playing in what was called the Ontario Fastball (Softball) League, which was essentially the sport’s version of a pro’ league.

Vancouver Canucks Head Coach Bruce Boudreau playing shortstop in the 1970’s.

“We’d get hundreds and hundreds of people at the games,” Boudreau said. “It was a pretty big deal in Toronto and all over Ontario. I loved the sport, I played it even when I went to the minors and played (hockey) in St. Catharines, and I continued to play it until I was thirty years old, so it was a real passion of mine.”