 Mickey Renaud dons the Calgary Flames jersey just after being picked 144th overall in the 2007 NHL entry draft. (QMI Agency Files) |
CALGARY - The boots, big as they were, couldn’t compare to the footprint Mickey Renaud left on the hockey community.
About a week before his sudden death on Feb. 18, 2008, Windsor Spitfires captain Mickey Renaud asked Tom Webster — a scout for the Calgary Flames, the NHL team that drafted him about eight months earlier — for ideas on how to reward his teammates for plucky performances.
“I told him, ‘Well, in Calgary, they have the hard hat. Why don’t you think of getting a pair of work boots so at the end of a game, you can present them?’ ” Webster recalled.
“He said, ‘Whoa, what a great idea,’ but unfortunately, he died before we could go get them. But I proceeded to go get them for him, and I presented them to the team and, for the remainder of the season, there was a pair of —
I think, they must have been at least size 16 — work boots that the Columbia Store donated and the player of the game was presented them.
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“They were the biggest, ugliest boo
