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[crowd cheering]
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You've got to win.
That's the only-- that's the only thing I know.
-[Adrienne] At any cost? -At any cost.
-[Adrienne] Kill the other guy? -Why not?
Get him out of the road,
you'll never have to compete with him again.
[Adrienne] There'll be somebody else
come up in his place.
Well, I'll take a shot at him, too.
[narrator] In 1967, Canada celebrated
its 100th birthday.
For many Canadians, it was a time of hope.
People were confident in looking ahead
to a future even brighter than the past.
From coast to coast to coast,
people were brimming with optimism.
And in Toronto, there was no reason
to believe the Maple Leafs'’ Stanley Cup victory
that year would be their last.
[commentator] Fantastic.
[crowd cheering]
[narrator] The Toronto Maple Leafs,
a beloved and historic hockey franchise,
continue to enjoy support of fans around the world,
despite the fact that hockey's highest honor,
the Stanley Cup,
has eluded them for generations.
But it wasn't always that way.
It's hard to overstate
just how good the Leafs once were.
[man] The hockey capital of the world!
[narrator] And how beloved they were.
We have the world champions, the Maple Leafs.
[narrator] But by the early '70s,
a new boss took control of this storied franchise
and nothing would ever be the same.
Who told you that I interfered with the team?
Never interfered with the team in my life.
[announcer] Now, there's all sorts of debris
being thrown onto the ice.
[man] I had to sit through an entire winter
of this garbage with the Maple Leafs.
[Ballard] We haven't played very well.
Matter of fact, we played lousy.
This team is never going to get any better.
[reporter] Spring is the time of year the Leafs fall.
[Ballard] I honestly feel that I have never done
-anything that is wrong. -[interviewer] Why don't you
like Harold Ballard? -[woman] Oh, because
of what he had to say about women.
[reporter] The Toronto Maple Leafs won in 1967.
But since then,
there's been no show for Harold and his boys.
He's interested only in making his money,
-and that's about it. -[narrator] Harold Ballard
may have turned Maple Leaf Gardens
into the cash box on Carlton Street,
but he did so at the expense of its greatest asset.
Ballard turned the Leafs from perennial cup favorites
to perennial cellar dwellers.
His meddling and combative behavior
ruined the team for a generation and beyond.
♪ I'll see your face inside a cloud ♪
♪ See your smile inside a window ♪
Do I have one word to describe him?
-Entertaining. -A blowhard, a loudmouth.
-Cantankerous. -Bombastic as hell.
-Destructive. -Entitled.
-Misunderstood. -Tough.
-Vindictive. -Interesting.
-Buffoon. -Enigma.
["One Fine Morning" by Lighthouse plays]
♪ Yeah, we'll fly, we'll fly
♪ Yeah, we'll fly
♪
[music stops]
[narrator] Harold Ballard, who came to own the Leafs
and the Cathedral of Hockey at 60 Carlton Street
in Toronto, was the custodian
of a piece of Canadian history.
A hockey club, founded in 1917 as the Arenas,
and renamed the St. Pats two years later.
In 1927, the team was purchased
and renamed the Maple Leafs
by Toronto Gravel Baron, Conn Smythe.
And in 1931, he embarked on construction
of Maple Leaf Gardens:
a miracle of architecture
that was finished in five short months.
For years, the Leafs flourished and won
under the tutelage of their proud owner.
Conn Smythe was a winner
in almost everything he touched.
Whether as a prosperous businessman,
owner of thoroughbred horses,
or as the man who made the Toronto Maple Leafs
synonymous with success.
His legacy was hard for anyone to follow,
let alone Harold Ballard,
whom Smythe once referred to as a pirate.
[Brunt] Conn Smythe, hero of two wars.
The guy who built the Gardens in the Depression.
The guy who won all those Stanley Cups.
The Smythe name is on the Stanley Cup 11 times.
Nobody else is going to meet that boy.
Conny was the type of person
who could be very, very tough.
He was not an admirer of Harold and made that clear.
[narrator] No one saw Harold Edwin Ballard
as the natural successor to Conn Smythe,
except Harold himself.
Since the day he was born in Toronto,
July 30th, 1903,
he was an ambitious, restless, free spirit
who learned the business world at his father's knee.
Sidney Eustace Ballard was a successful manufacturer
of sewing machines and ice skates,
and before long, his son, Hal,
had dropped out of Upper Canada College,
eventually opening up a manufacturing business
of his own and invented a machine to cut hotdog rolls
for Shopsy's Delicatessen, a Toronto landmark.
But Harold Ballard was never cut out to just be successful.
He needed excitement.
He starts out life as a rich man's son.
He doesn't have a care in the world.
He was too young for World War One.
He was too old for World War Two.
During the Great Depression, he had a Playboy lifestyle.
He'd dance the night away, you know.
He-- he never had a worry in his life.
[narrator] Among other passions,
Ballard raised miniature speed boats
known as sea fleas, and was even the flag-bearer
for Canada's 1928 Winter Olympic team.
In 1930, Ballard was the manager
and coach of a minor league hockey team
named the National Sea Fleas.
And by 1940, Ballard found success
as the president of the Toronto Marlboros,
the Maple Leafs Farm Club,
where he would forge a lifelong bond
with Conn's son, Stafford Smythe.
In 1957, an aging Conn Smythe
turned over control of his beloved hockey team
and building to a seven-person committee
headed by his son Stafford, known as the Silver Seven.
Newspaper owner, John Bassett,
was also a member of the committee,
and despite Conn's disapproval,
they were soon joined by Ballard,
who was appointed to fill a vacancy.
I think there were originally seven owners
because they were called the Silver Seven,
but it really became a three-man operation
with Bassett, Ballard, and, uh, Smythe.
We used to quake in our boots with John Bassett.
He was always a stern kind of guy or had this image of that.
And Stafford was another guy that seemed like a stern guy,
and Harold was more of the fun-loving guy.
They all tolerated each other to be part of this troika
that took over from Conn Smythe.
[Parrish] The Bassetts were the elite of Toronto,
and the Smythes weren't far behind.
And Harold Ballard wasn't very high on that list.
He had been the third fiddle, the seventh fiddle,
for a lot of years at that point.
And I think he wanted to prove that he could do the job,
that he could get it all done.
-[crowd cheering] -[upbeat music plays]
[reporter] Executive Vice President, Harold Ballard.
How are you, Harold? Do you feel good?
Oh, couldn't feel better.
That group ushered in a kind of a renewed era
of success in Leaf hockey.
When you look at what happened in,
you know, the three consecutive cups
between '62 and '64 and then after a couple of years,
you know, failing in the playoffs,
then winning again in '67,
you know, he was a part of that.
Well, he was around for four Stanley Cups.
So, you know, a little bit.
He was still a part owner, remember, in the good years.
He loved seeing his team win.
I was there when they won
in the three Stanley Cups in a row.
And there was nobody happier than Harold.
This is our centennial year
and we have our centennial project finished.
-You got it, eh? -Yes, sir.
-This is the one you want. -This is something.
And I want to thank the supporters
of the Toronto Maple Leafs,
and I want to sympathize with the, uh,
with our opponents. [chuckles]
[announcer] The final score of tonight's game.
Toronto Maple Leafs, three.
The Montreal Canadiens, one.
[Iaboni] Being there as a kid at that grade
and seeing the Leafs come out one by one
and seeing Terry Sawchuk and Dave Keon
and all the players wave and all that kind of stuff
was something that I-- I hope
that the future, and the current generation
of Leafs fans and the ones that are old enough to remember
the championship of '67 experience again.
[Bennett] When I think of the Maple Leafs,
I think of my grandfather.
My grandfather emigrated to Canada in 1967.
Last year the Leafs won the Cup.
Leafs win, craze of the city.
You know, he went to the parade and it really showed him that,
"Yeah, as much as I may feel different
from any of the people in this new country,
I am more alike than I am different."
And he's been a diehard Leafs fan ever since.
[narrator] Although Ballard wasn't a huge factor
in the team's Cup wins in the '60s,
he definitely made himself useful
at Maple Leaf Gardens.
His main job, and true passion,
was to keep Maple Leaf Gardens full.
And it was a job he was born to do.
By 1969, profits had tripled
to just under $1 million.
He was not a great hockey man by any stretch.
He really was at his best in the '60s as a promoter.
He brought Muhammad Ali to the fight.
Conn Smythe didn't want
the Black draft-dodger in Toronto.
There is one hell of a lot of difference
in fighting in the ring and going to war in Vietnam.
You know, and that's what caused
Conn Smythe to give up his directorship
was when Muhammad Ali could not find
a fight in the United States.
They looked at Canada.
[Eagleson] Conn Smythe, he was the one that said,
"I'm-- I'’m off the board
if you're bringing in Cassius Clay."
He did not like what happened when they let
Cassius Clay fight George Chuvalo in the Gardens.
He didn't like a lot of things that Ballard did.
[narrator] Conn Smythe, in protest,
sells his remaining 5,100 shares
of Maple Leaf Gardens LTD and resigns from the board.
You think of Muhammad Ali,
uh, not allowed to box, but there is a time
he was able to get out of the country
and Harold Ballard facilitated that.
People here in Canada are nice
and it's a lot different from where I come from.
[narrator] With Conn Smythe completely out of the picture,
there wasn't much to constrain Harold Ballard.
First on the agenda, removing the portrait
of Queen Elizabeth to install more seats.
[Stellick] When the mezzanines came in,
the Queen was up there.
But he didn't even think about that.
But of course, he threw the great quip out.
"She doesn't pay admission,
so why would I let her in the game?"
So, everybody went on that.
What he was doing was taking this building that
had been overbuilt.
I mean, the building was really, really well-- well-constructed.
He shrunk the seats to get more people in.
You know, if there was money to be made,
he didn't care who played Maple Leaf Gardens.
You know, it was not a closed shop
for anyone or no one.
There was money to be made on a-- on a Muhammad Ali fight.
I don't think he did it because he had
a great moral compass or anything like that.
It was like, "Wow, this is great."
I mean, the Beatles famous,
you know, supposedly that urban legend, the myth.
He sold the second show without a contract.
So he had the Beatles down for two shows.
And Brian Epstein, the manager, fortunately, fortuitously,
agreed to play a second show like four hours later.
[Vaive] I heard the story about when the Beatles came over.
They did a concert at the Gardens
and it was in the summer.
Folklore goes that Ballard turned off
the air conditioning, which didn't exist.
He delayed the concert by an hour and a half.
Turned the heat on in the building
and turned the water off.
Where is the water fountain at Maple Leaf Gardens?
I wouldn't-- I wouldn'’t take a drink from one.
I don't even know where one was.
So, people had to go to the concessions
to get something to drink.
And it was probably 110 degrees
in the building at point. [laughs]
So, I mean, from that standpoint,
things like that, yeah, that was crazy like a fox.
He loved that.
He was, like, decades later, he loved that.
Like, that was his reputation, that he was such a promoter
that he did all these kind of things,
like his business savviness.
I remember once when Billy Joel was playing
and he was doing his sound check.
Billy Joel, I guess,
can be quite irascible too, right?
And he sort of accosts Mr. Ballard,
says something like,
"Hey, what are you doing in here, buddy," or something,
and Mr. Ballard turns to him and goes-- Says,
"I own the fucking building."
And Billy Joel goes, "Okay, great."
You know? [laughs]
That's a pretty solid answer back then.
I own it. [laughs]
In a time when there was no other venue
except the CNE that hosted over 5,000 people in Toronto.
You know, if you were Springsteen
and you weren't playing the CNE in--
in August, you had to play us.
[narrator] For all his rough edges,
Ballard did have someone that kept him grounded.
His beloved wife, Dorothy, the dignified daughter
of a preacher who patiently endured
her husband's antics for 45 years.
Dorothy's passing in 1969 due to cancer
forever left a vacancy in Ballard's life.
[Iaboni] Harold Ballard losing his wife, Dorothy,
in 1969 was a huge turning point in his life.
She meant everything to him, and from the people
that I spoke to as I got to know Harold Ballard
along the way, they told me that he was a different persona
uh, while she was alive.
I think it had a massive impact on him.
Uh, I think he choose a life partner
and when that partner's gone, life changes.
I think that shadow hung over him.
But I think any man at that age has known grief, has known loss.
He was a human being. He wasn't entirely a clown.
When his wife left us, he kind of became...
I know-- More inward and more an executive.
And he thought being an executive
was to have everybody afraid of him.
If you relate to today's world like Trump does.
You know, everybody's scared of him,
everybody'’s scared of him.
And that-- that doesn't make a great executive.
He's certainly looked after his wife
every day of his life.
You know, he, uh,
he took flowers there, uh, every day.
Every day.
[narrator] While in mourning, things got worse
when law enforcement became aware
that money was being skimmed from the cash box on Carlton.
An RCMP raid at Maple Leaf Gardens
led to a long investigation.
The result was Stafford Smythe charged with income tax evasion
and accused, along with Ballard,
of illegally taking money from Maple Leaf Gardens
to pay for home renovations and other personal expenses.
It was something to the effect.
It was a public company
and they had appropriated money from the company.
[narrator] June 1969,
John Bassett, chairman of the board,
held a vote to decide
if Staff Smythe and Harold Ballard,
despite neither yet being convicted of anything,
should be removed from their post
as president and executive vice president.
The board voted eight to seven to oust Ballard and Smythe,
with Bassett casting the deciding vote.
Strangely, in a strategic blunder
that would haunt Bassett for years to come,
he allowed Smythe and Ballard to hold on to their shares
and remain on the board.
I think Bassett was in a position
that-- that he couldn't win.
He was a head of a major television network
and also a member of the board of Maple Leaf Gardens.
He felt in conscience that he should force
the resignation of Smythe and Ballard.
Ballard never forgave him
and the first opportunity he had,
they were out of here.
Gone. Period. No debate.
He's a great, uh, glad hander.
And, uh, you know, the drama, that ivory smile.
He looks like a [indistinct] smile
when he tries to win you over with all that.
But when you know Bassett and know him the way I know him,
it's a different story.
[narrator] A mere 18 months later,
at the organization's annual meeting,
Smythe and Ballard exacted their revenge.
As the two largest shareholders,
Ballard and Smythe managed to persuade
the other shareholders to support them.
They regained control of the board,
reinstalling themselves as president
and executive vice president.
Now, in an untenable situation,
Bassett and his loyalists resign.
September 1st, 1971,
he sold his shares to Ballard and Smythe
for almost six million dollars.
Ballard and Smythe had achieved their dream,
complete control of the Toronto Maple Leafs,
but they had no control of their destiny
because it was time to go to trial.
But Stafford never made it to the stand.
He died unexpectedly from complications
due to a bleeding ulcer,
a mere 12 days before the trial.
Only 50 years old,
he had told anyone who'd listen that he would never go to jail.
And he was correct.
Stafford Smythe predeceases Ballard quite suddenly.
When they got rid of Bassett and Stafford died,
then it became for-- for Harold Ballard
to take over and get rid of the Smythe's altogether.
He wanted to make it his team.
[narrator] A 68-year-old Ballard
bought his shares, giving him a 71% controllinginterest
in the building and the team.
He then installed himself as president and chairman
of Maple Leaf Gardens LTD.
I think there was a second childhood element
to it, like, "Oh, my God,
I-- The Toronto Maple Leafs fell in my lap.
And you know what? I'm going to have fun.
And I'm going to take it and run with it.
And I'm going to be-- I'’m going to be a somebody
and people are going to know
that I own the Toronto Maple Leafs."
[narrator] To buy Bassett and Smythe's shares,
Ballard went nearly $14 million in debt.
He may have told the world
he owned the Toronto Maple Leafs,
but fact was, the banks did.
He owns this much of the Maple Leaf Gardens LTD,
Ballard does, and he's got a chance to buy this much.
Okay? So Don Giffin, who became later on
a prominent director, takes him to the TD Bank
and arranges a loan for this much.
So, he's in over his head
like somebody that's bought a house,
uh, you know, way beyond their means.
[narrator] 1972 was an eventful year in hockey,
with the NHL'’s continued expansion to 16 teams
and the emergence of a rival league,
the World Hockey Association.
Life was difficult for Harold Ballard,
who was guilty of having a bad hockey team
and guilty in a court of law.
[interviewer] Mr. Ballard, what are your thoughts
now that the trial is finally over
and you've been found guilty?
I-- actually I don't feel guilty.
But, however, the-- Judge Damon is-- is--
uh, considers that I am guilty.
Uh, and it'’s entirely up to him.
I've never, uh, given a jail sentence any--
any thought, it's the furthest from my mind.
But, however, if there's a jail sentence,
there'’s a jail sentence, let's face it.
[narrator] Ballard's prison sentencing conflicted
with the upcoming Summit series.
For the first time, the best professional players
from hockey's two superpowers,
Canada and the USSR, went head to head.
Proud Canadian that he was,
Ballard let Team Canada train at Maple Leaf Gardens.
Together with agent/union boss, Alan Eagleson,
he bought the ad rights to the eight-game event
and raked in millions.
[interviewer] Now, what are your plans in terms
of the, uh, Russia-Canada Hockey series?
[Harold] I would like, if it was possible,
if there was any way that they could extend
their decision until after the series is over,
well, I'd be very grateful because I've spent
a tremendous amount of time
on Hockey Canada since its conception.
[narrator] Ballard got his wish.
His sentencing was delayed until after this summit series,
infuriating his critics.
And he was in Moscow to witness possibly
the most famous goal in Canadian hockey history.
But for Ballard, national pride quickly turned
to personal embarrassment.
Upon his return from the Soviet Union,
justice was served.
In October 1972,
he entered Millhaven Penitentiary
to serve a three year sentence after being convicted
of 47 white collar crimes.
I don't actually recall
the first time I met him because,
unfortunately, when I first signed my first contract,
Harold was in jail at that time.
When he was sentenced to prison, I think he was shocked.
I didn't think he felt he would go
because he was this, you know, big, important guy in sports
and owned the Toronto Maple Leafs.
How could they do this to him?
But he went and spent, uh, about a year in Millhaven.
[Donald] The time in prison, you know,
he decided that, "Bleep you,"
you know, "people can say you're a con, you can whatever.
"I'm going to have fun about it, okay?
And all the shots at me, I'm going to fire them back."
He says, "Hey there,
I want to show you what our Canadian prisons--"
And he's got a stack of pictures on his desk.
And he hands them to me, all right?
And I started going through them
and that's Harold in the guards' uniform
with his feet up on the desk.
Got a bottle of beer, a cigar, and color TV.
This is what our Canadian prisons are like, right?
[Harold] Outside the humiliation and disgrace,
it wasn't bad because I had-- I had
a very good time down there at Millhaven,
I had my own room.
It was a high class motel as far as I was concerned.
[Adrienne] You weren't getting tenderloin
three times a week, come on.
[Harold] You think I wasn't, eh?
-[Adrienne] No. -[Harold] Well,
you just keep on thinking, baby,
because you're not right. [cackling]
While he was in Millhaven,
Billy, his son, who was a young lawyer,
who articled in our firm for a while,
had taken over the entire operations,
ran it without any hitches or any big problems.
And then Harold came back
and instead of patting him on the back and saying,
"Son, you got a great future
when I'm gone running this organization."
He said, "Get out of here,
I'm back in charge, so bugger off."
I mean, it was that blunt.
I couldn't-- I couldn'’t believe it.
And there was always that ill feeling
uh, between father and son as a result.
[Adrienne] You're unrepentant. Totally unrepentant.
Absolutely.
And as far as old Diefenbaker goes,
he got up in the house and said,
"There's a law for the rich and one for the poor."
Uh, you know, I got the tape on that.
That old sucker would steal your eyes out
and put a grape in and tell you, you look better.
God damn. How are you?
[narrator] Ballard was out of prison
after only a year,
and his first order of business was to foolishly ignore
the World Hockey Association.
The WHA, what good can they do for us?
I mean to say we don't need them. They need us.
[narrator] And for Leaf fans, turning his back
on the greatest Leaf of all time was the deepest cut of all.
♪
[Sittler] He was a guy that won the Conn Smythe.
You know, he's the greatest Leaf ever.
Yeah, he was kind of born out of town,
so to speak, with Harold and,
you know, the WHA and a number of other guys had left
because Harold didn't want to acknowledge that
there was another league there.
And, uh, rather than do what was right
to build a hockey club, he let a number of guys go
and Keon was one of them.
[Parrish] And the WHA came
and took many of their best young players.
And then Dave Keon,
who had never been a Ballard fan,
going back to the '60s, left in '75.
And then that deteriorated into what went on for 20 or 25 years.
[Eagleson] And Keon was, uh, he was one of the pillars
of the Leafs dynasty,
and that was very sad to see him go.
But he went to Minnesota for twice as much money.
It was a sad end because I think that
David, and rightfully so, deserved more money.
He deserved more respect.
But at the end of the day, it was time for him to sort of
go elsewhere as well, because it wasn't going to work
with the-- with the ownership that was-- was there.
I'll tell you something, uh, Mr. Ballard
is my type of guy.
I know I'm going against the grain saying this.
I've always liked him and, uh, he says what he thinks
and he's good for hockey.
He didn't like the idea of giving money to the players.
I don't know what he was thinking of,
but he could see the other teams were doing it.
If he didn't think the guy was worth
so much money, he wouldn't pay them
and that's why he lost them all.
[McKenny] Yeah, it decimated the whole franchise.
Because they-- they had nothing to work with.
Nothing-- nothing to offer other teams to--
to bring in players that could help them win.
We would have won four or five Stanley Cups
in the mid, uh, the mid '’70s for sure.
We would have had as good a team as Montreal had.
No problem.
It soured so many players,
uh, on, uh, thinking
they were a part of this Maple Leaf team
and tradition that should have been
way stronger at that time.
But I think Harold underestimated
the World Hockey Association's power.
[Eagleson] He decided that the WHA wasn't going to last
and he wasn't going to pay the blood money.
That was his position and it hurt the team.
[narrator] Ballard had a talent for making money,
but he refused to spend it on anything.
You combine his cheapness which,
you know, showed up in, you know,
significant hockey ways,
but also in kind of penny ante ways.
He nickeled and dimed like crazy.
But, you know, remember, there's no salary cap
in that era, right?
There's no salary cap at all.
And the Toronto Maple Leafs drove more revenue
by some multiple
than any other team in the National Hockey League,
other than the New York Rangers.
They had an enormous financial advantage
up until the cap.
All through the '80s when they were terrible,
they still had that enormous financial advantage
over everybody else in the NHL.
There was no reason why they couldn't have spent money
where you could spend money.
He wanted to keep things on the cheap
and make sure that there was plenty of money
for himself and-- and the company.
You must have 15 scouts.
[interviewer] Most people around the league say
-Leafs don't have enough. -Well, that's all right.
Uh, who's got more?
[interviewer] Uh, Calgary, Edmonton.
-What have they done? -They're in first place.
That's all right.
Well, they can stay in first place.
Some of their scouts, I wouldn't want.
Our typical hockey office would have
20 times the number of people of that today,
or 15 times the number of people that today.
So it was-- People would always come up and say,
"You're, like, smaller than some junior A operations."
Well, that's kind of the-- You know,
Mr. Ballard ran lean, to say the least.
The reason he felt that he could sell programs
was because there was no name on the back of the sweater.
And he refused to have a name on the back of Leafs sweaters
because he claimed to the league that
that would hurt program sales.
So when the league mandated that all do,
he made sure that the lettering would be there,
but it would be the same color as the jersey.
So you'd never see it.
Harold believed you have to pay 2.50
to buy that program to make it all worth for him.
You know, Guy Kinnear.
You know, we had Guy Kinnear, his boat mechanic
became the trainer of the team because he liked him.
Yeah. He used to give guys NeoCitran.
like, a player would come in with some kind of
a-- a nagging injury or something
and he would give them a NeoCitran.
Uh, because he was a boat mechanic, right?
He didn't know, he was-- he was Ballard's boat mechanic
up at his cottage.
And he liked him, so he made him the trainer.
He gave him the gig.
He became the trainer of the Toronto Maple Leafs
and he had zero, zero medical knowledge.
None.
And he became the trainer
because Harold wanted to look after his guy.
[narrator] His wife gone,
his prison sentence behind him,
he made the peculiar decision
to move into an apartment inside Maple Leaf Gardens.
Along with his unconventional new living quarters
came an unexpected new friend,
legendary Maple Leaf, King Clancy.
[Iaboni] So now you've got him without his wife.
Uh, King becomes the sidekick.
Uh, he moves to Maple Leaf Gardens,
lives there all the time.
His wife had passed and in a--
I think, a seemingly sentimental way,
just said, I'm going to move lock, stock, and barrel,
and I'm going to go a thousand miles an hour
running the Toronto Maple Leafs.
[McKenny] Like, he lived at the Gardens.
He lived, ate, and slept with the Leafs in the gardens.
One-- Once he took it over, he moved from Montgomery Road
out in the West End,
right into the gardens and-- and never left.
[Brunt] He literally was there all the time.
Yeah, he lived in his apartment,
you know, he was either in his apartment
or in his little bunker watching the game
or somewhere within,
walking the halls of that building.
Well, no light.
And one window that was-- Gave some natural light.
But other than that, dark.
Certainly not a comfortable place
from my point of view.
But he seemed to like it.
He didn't have far to go after work.
Like, can you imagine owning a sports franchise
and you live in it?
[Clark] Harold get up and go down to Hot Stove
and grab a bowl of ice cream
in the middle of-- The only one in the building.
I can go up and play the organ in my house,
and his-- his house is Maple Leaf Gardens,
or I'm sitting in the reds eating a bowl cereal.
To me, as a hockey bird, I think that'd be awesome.
This is my house.
And that was basically how we treated it.
And because he lived there, he was the security guard.
He was the night watchman.
He could appear at any point in time,
anywhere in the building.
You know, it's funny, he, uh,
had about four different exits or entrances,
so you never really knew where he was.
I never had a brother. Or sisters.
And consequently, I had to latch on to somebody
and thank God I latched onto King.
But he had to be special to put up with you.
Well, I would say that's probably the reason
that I thought so much of him, because, you know what?
That kind of a son of a bitch I am.
And it takes a--
it takes a pretty good person to put up with me.
[narrator] King Clancy was beloved
by players and fans alike,
but his role with the Leafs wasn't well-defined.
Public relations, interim coach, team mascot.
He did it all.
But Clancy's main responsibility
was to be Harold Ballard's best friend.
[Brunt] King was a delightful guy.
Distracted Harold.
He was kind of, to me, he was more like the,
you know, court jester kind of guy, right?
That kept Harold occupied so he didn't cut off
more people's heads.
And kind of distracted him, made him-- made him smile.
That's kind of-- I always thought
that was kind of King's role.
[King] You know, a lot of people say,
uh, Mr. Ballard is tough.
Mr. Ballard is this. Mr. Ballard is that.
Mr. Ballard, to my way of thinking,
is one of the greatest people that I ever met.
He's a class individual.
He says things at times
that he doesn't-- It just-- it just comes out.
[Harold] We look like a couple of those
God damn missionaries, don't we?
Both of them had lost their wives,
so they really didn't have any responsibilities to anybody.
So he replaced his wife with King Clancy
and the two of them, they were just like brothers
who were born at the hip.
[narrator] Ballard had his problems
for a good part of the '70s,
but in 1977, seemingly out of nowhere,
the best Leaf team in a decade emerged.
That unexpectedly remarkable club featured
two of the top goal scorers in the NHL.
A couple of blue-liners who could stack up
against anyone, a hotshot kid in goal,
Dave "Tiger" Williams, and an innovative coach
nicknamed "Captain Video" behind the bench.
He's a very intelligent fella, as far as hockey goes.
Matter of fact, he's an intelligent fella, period.
He's a schoolteacher and he's a great man for detail
and he's a great man for discipline.
And I think he's a great man for everything
that a young fella needs today
and that's the reason I hired him.
They had a really good thing going in the late '70s.
The Leafs were a contender against the Islanders
when they beat the Islanders out.
[announcer] Turnbull clears ahead to McDonald.
McDonald, he scores!
McDonald wins it!
Lanny McDonald and the Leafs win it
two to one in a goal by Lanny McDonald.
[Parrish] The greatest moment in Leaf history,
really, over the last-- Probably going back to 1967.
[McDonald] Unbelievable series.
But our team was so beat up, lost to Montreal
in four straight and we still were close in those games.
[Ralph] They should'’ve beat Montreal,
but Boörje got hurt.
And once he was done, they were pretty well cooked.
[Cherry] Now, when they beat out the Islanders,
they were only about a player away
from a Stanley Cup. They were a good club.
We knew we were on the right track.
And yet within 365 days of that, it had all fallen apart.
That team could have gone the distance.
And then the next year, of course,
everything was broken up.
And then I think things went south from there.
They just let everybody go and they got nothing.
I'm not paying that guy that money.
I'm not pay-- And the WHA was paying them.
That's when they lost the club.
[narrator] The following season,
the decimated team struggled.
We're not improving the way I thought we would.
[narrator] And Ballard knew exactly
who to blame for the team's woes.
The coach.
[Sittler] Roger Neilson.
Quality man, quality coach.
We loved playing for the guy. Had us prepared.
Neilson was a very different man from Harold Ballard.
He was an intellectual. He read books with no pictures.
He had interests outside hockey.
He tried to bring the 1970s
to Maple Leaf Gardens, which had a fence around it,
concealing the 1930s within.
[Ormsby] And his nickname was "Captain Video" because,
at least for Leafs' purposes, he was using video
to show players, "Here's where you broke down,
here's where you did a great job."
This was all very new to the Toronto Maple Leafs.
So I think, you know, there was some hope
at that point, the late '70s,
that maybe, "Oh, we are going to go on to,
you know, the next century trying to
move ahead of the game a little bit."
The team the year before had gone
to the semifinals and knocked off the Islanders.
And then the next year,
they were struggling to be a 500 team.
So he was anticipating them to get better.
Instead of getting better, they were--
they were hanging on and hanging on.
The style that Roger played was always
a defensive style and it was boring.
And a lot of the people in the media would influence
Harold Ballard's thinking.
"Is this it? Are you going to get rid of them now?"
And whether Ballard said, "Yeah, he's as good as gone,"
you know, I could just see him saying,
"Oh, yeah, he's as good as gone."
Or, "Yeah, there'll be somebody else
behind the bench on Saturday night."
And that-- that's all he needed.
He just needed somebody to fuel that--
You know, to spark the-- the match.
[Cherry] He's one of the best coaches
in the National Hockey, Captain Video.
He works at it night and day, but I don't like his style.
You got to put on a show.
The game is entertainment and he plays
that defensive hockey, defensive hockey,
although they're not doing so well this year.
And it's deadly dull.
Right up to game time, it wasn't clear
who would replace Roger Neilson,
the man fired yesterday as coach of the Maple Leafs.
Now, we're out of a coach.
So, I ran practices along with Lanny and Tiger
for a few days while they're scrambling around.
And again, the media is making a circus of this.
A number of us went to Jim Gregory and said,
"Listen, the best guy for the job for the rest
of the season for sure is Roger Neilson."
The players begged him not to let him go.
Then he says,
"Why don't you come back Saturday and we'll put
a paper bag over your head
and then we'll unveil it after the warm-ups."
So, he wanted Roger to wear this bag.
I remember getting ready to go out on the ice.
The media didn't know, they were gonna just
go behind the bench when the national anthem started.
And there's the coach, Roger Neilson, back.
I remember standing inside the dressing room
waiting for the signal to go, for the start of the game,
and Ballard's there with a bag,
"Yeah, put it on, put it on."
Roger's kinda sheepish looking and we're kind of there--
"Just for real, you know, wear the frigging bag and stand
at the national anthem, then pop it up."
And I remember standing out there
because I was near the dressing room area
and it was just so crowded, you know, media and whatever,
just waiting to see Roger come out.
But that was insane.
They were talking about sending me out first.
[laughs]
And I was-- I was mortified.
But it was almost like a clown act...
to send him out with a bag over his head.
Come on, you don't do those things.
[announcer] Here comes Roger Neilson.
And the crowd is aware of it now.
The crowd did not know that Roger Neilson
would be back on the bench until this very moment.
And they are standing.
Have you ever seen anything like this
in all the years of hockey?
This is like a soap opera here.
[Roger] The same fans have been, uh...
demanding my scalp, all of a sudden
just looking the other way and cheering me like we, uh...
just won the Stanley Cup, so it was quite a thing.
It was really embarrassing.
Uh, But again, to Harold that was the great show.
I can do something and, you know,
then everybody's going to be talking about me.
And I'm going to be sitting in that little box
in the corner of the garden with a big smile on my face
and laughing my butt off.
[Ballard] Those guys don't worry about promotion
or anything like that anyway.
You know, maybe, there's been a lot of fun.
You know, life's not so serious as all that
you can make a few fun things out of it.
It was obviously destructive, and it was obviously cruel,
and it was obviously done on a whim.
It wasn't like there was a plan. [laughs]
You know? There wasn't a plan ever.
He just did whatever the hell he felt like.
It's, you know, it's a toy, right?
[announcer] Roger Neilson back on the Leaf bench once again.
Leaf owner Harold Ballard said he hadn't really fired Neilson.
He just wanted to shake up the team,
which had been in a slump.
Now, listen.
Who told you that I interfered with the team?
[interviewer] Anyone knows that!
No, never interfered with the team in my life.
[interviewer] You've never interfered?
Never interfered.
Never got in the dressing room,
except once when I had the trouble with Neilson.
I went in there and straightened the guys out
for five games, then they went back
to the same old lullaby.
[narrator] After being swept in the playoffs
by Montreal for the second straight year,
Roger Neilsen is fired,
along with highly respected hockey man, Jim Gregory,
the Leafs' general manager.
Jim Gregory was a great hockey man
and a great person, you know, and Harold was fortunate,
in my mind, to have a guy like that running it.
Now, if he just let him do that
and do his things and give him the authority
to spend the money that you might have to spend
to keep an extra player rather than,
you know, cut into it,
uh, we probably would have had more success.
He had the best hockey mind going in Jim Gregory.
He had the most underrated Maple Leafs general manager,
executive, most-- As beloved a guy as there would be
in the National Hockey League in him.
Jim Gregory started working there when he was 21 years old
and Harold Ballard saw him as a kid.
That's the worst thing I ever saw him do.
When he fired Jim Gregory.
We were on our way.
But somehow or other he got enamored with Imlach,
and brought him in.
[narrator] After cleaning house,
Ballard tried to resurrect the Leafs' glory days
by bringing back the man who coached them
to four Stanley Cups in the '60s.
George "Punch" Imlach,
was named the new general manager.
Mr. Ballard knows me, and as I pointed out to him,
my success in the hockey business
with the Maple Leafs and with Buffalo
was that I ran the show.
And so if you want me to have the same success,
then I have to run it.
Certainly, there's no sense of paying me a lot of money
and not letting me do the job
that I'm supposed to be able to do.
Harold got involved, brought Punch back
and then everything just went to shit after that.
Harold went for the bright lights of Punch.
Punch convinced him on a quick fix.
[Vaive] Just when things started to get good,
Harold would step in and do something stupid
and-- and turn it upside down.
[reporter] So you're telling us right here and now
that Imlach will run the hockey team
without any interference at all from you?
They won't have any interference,
as far as I'm concerned.
We will have talks and suggestions
to one another, but that's not interference.
It's a business deal.
Punch is smart enough and knows enough about hockey
that he's not going to try and take it all on himself.
Imlach's hired in September.
I get a call from the secretary at Maple Leaf Gardens
that Mr. Imlach would like to see you in his office,
and I walk into Punch's office.
And this is the first time I met him, right?
And this is kind of how the meeting went.
Um, you go in and there's a board table there,
and I'm sitting at one end and he's standing up,
and he goes, "Just who do you think you are?"
And then he said to me, he says,
"My captains have always been management,
and they do what management says."
And I said, "Well, I believe a captain is
a go-between between management.
We're all in this together to work to achieve
the same common goals," and all that sort of stuff.
And then the next thing he said, he said,
"And Alan Eagleson," he says, "he's your player agent."
He said, uh, "You know, when Eagleson says it's black,"
he says, "I say it's white."
And he says, "You're going to be stuck in the middle.
"There's no gray area here, so I would suggest
you might want to look at getting another agent.
And he sayas, "Furthermore, you've got a no-trade contract.
And I don't believe in no-trade contracts,
and I'm going to test you in court."
Some people raised the question
about whether or not you have lost track
of the new generation, that you don't relate to them
as well as you did to the players
in the '50s and '60s.
It can't be, uh, funny people doing it their way,
it'’s got to be a team way of doing it,
and the coaches and the managers,
they call which way that's got to be done
and the player has to adjust himself to the team,
not the team or the rest of the players
adjusting to the-- the ways one certain person plays.
You never win that way.
That's just a fallacy to think you could.
I think it was clear that Punch Imlach
in 1979 did not understand the young hockey player of 1979.
I don't think that's my brilliant observation.
I think the game had passed him by.
[Sittler] I'm sure he saw me as a bit of a threat,
popular guy, a little bit of power,
and that he wanted to bring his own players in
and make his own team so that it was Punch'’s team.
[McDonald] Punch did things to upset the guys.
He would have us come down for two practices.
You'd come very first thing in the morning,
in rush hour, and then you'd have to stay downtown
'til a late afternoon practice
so he could send you home in rush hour.
And it was just to tick the guys off.
He was just a bad person.
He was just that snake that lived in the sewer hole.
It was a circus
where it didn't need to be a circus.
He was a ringmaster.
He was a carnival barker, but the tent was already full.
All he needed to do was hire competent people
and let them run the hockey club.
But he couldn't do that.
[narrator] Selected eighth overall
in the 1970 NHL draft,
Sittler was the face of the team.
Despite his popularity, or because of it,
Sittler'’s relationship with Imlach was rocky,
which meant his relationship with Ballard was rocky.
I think, honestly, he respected me as a person.
He said that publicly a number of times.
I was a hard working guy, a loyal employee,
a dedicated Maple Leaf.
I think Darryl, when he came here from London
as a first round pick, he did everything
he possibly could to carry the Leaf colors.
Once he was named captain, he took it up to the next level
that he was the team spokesman and it was his job.
So, he weathered the storm constantly in the media.
He was always up front, always talking to reporters,
regardless of what was going on behind the scenes.
And he rarely let it out.
Everybody really worked hard tonight,
really gave it everything they had.
And we finally beat the Flyers.
It's good-- it'’s good to see, but that's only one game.
They make it a seven game series that you have to win four in,
so there'’s three more tough ones yet.
You're the captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs
in 1976, you have a 10-point night,
you have a five-goal playoff game.
You scored the winning goal in the Canada Cup.
I mean, he's a hero.
[narrator] The tension between Sittler and Imlach exploded.
Imlach wanted to show the world who was boss,
so he convinced Ballard to do the unthinkable.
[Eagleson] I got a call from Ballard, says--
said, "You're going to Philly."
And I said, "Harold, we've got a deal.
And you signed it."
So, it's no trade, and he's not going anywhere.
Lanny McDonald is exceptional, I would say.
Two days later...
they traded Lanny McDonald.
Darryl and I, we acted for Lanny too,
figured it was a way to teach me and Darryl
that he'll get me some way or the other or get Darryl.
[rock music playing]
[McDonald] Friends in Toronto would phone up and say,
"Oh, my gosh, thank goodness you got traded.
You're out of the madhouse."
But that first moment when you get traded, it's devastating.
I felt things were deteriorating in Toronto.
I didn't feel that, uh,
uh, what they were doing to the hockey club was helping.
I felt they were tearing down the players
and any time you start tearing down the players, uh,
you're tearing the heart and soul
out of your hockey club.
It's not as if I-- I'm just talking about sour grapes,
but the fans, uh, are very dissatisfied
and I can't blame them because, uh,
that is a hockey dynasty
and if that goes downhill, the whole league's hurting.
It was completely out of spite.
That was Punch when he came back from Buffalo.
Uh, basically, letting everyone know
that he was in charge.
And the best way that he was going to show the world
that he was in charge, well,
it was going to break up the two best friends,
Lanny and Darryl.
So, if you can't move Darryl,
then you-- you piss off Darryl by trading Lanny.
That was the great line by Frank Gore in the Toronto Star,
that Sittler was caught between the devil and the deep blue C.
The deep blue letter C on his chest,
where they couldn't work for this man anymore.
Sittler understood how to succeed
in the National Hockey League.
He understood what it took and the sacrifice
and the work that all of them did
to get to be one of the Toronto Maple Leafs.
And then to see that C and that Leaf
become an object of ridicule...
that's got to be not only demoralizing,
it's gotta be very destabilizing.
To think I wanted so badly,
I dreamed so hard to wear this sweater,
and now it's a joke.
And what happened there was,
I'd gone through all these months
of this crap that was going on behind the scenes.
And I remember specifically saying to myself,
as I'm driving...
home, the morning of the morning skate,
it's a Saturday morning, and Lanny had been traded.
"Why am I here?
I'm here to play hockey. That's my job.
Punch doesn't respect me.
There's no communication as a captain.
So, I'm just going to remove the captain
and go to my job.
I'm going to show you,
make sure that I use this terminology,
the fat guy upstairs and the rest of Canada...
that I'm a hockey player, I'm going to play hockey.
That's what I'm paid to do.
Went back on the ice and played.
[McDonald] I love him, I respect him,
and that was his decision.
So, I back him completely.
Darryl did everything.
In spite of a bunch making life miserable for him.
Up until the trade of Lanny...
Darryl's position was impeccable
and nobody had any complaints whatsoever.
The only thing that hurt him with the public
was when he took off the C, but I don't blame him for it,
I commend him for it.
[Cherry] Oh, yeah. Harold, he was a vindictive guy.
You crossed him, you-- you paid the price
and, uh, Sittler paid the price.
[narrator] Harold Ballard was a man of convictions.
And not just the legal kind.
His blind faith in Punch Imlach cost him dearly,
and his refusal to pay players what they were worth
compounded an already terrible situation.
By 1982, Darryl Sittler's fate was sealed,
but he was the last to know.
I was making, well, maybe,
160, 170 grand a year, whatever it was,
and other guys were making 250, right?
So I went to Mr. Ballard and I said,
"Listen, uh, things have changed somewhat.
Would you consider, uh, moving forward, um,
signing me a new contract, and, kind of,
bringing my status up with these other guys?"
And I remember him saying to me, "Darryl,
leave it with me, I'll do whatever I can, right?"
The secretary calls and she says,
"Mr. Ballard wants to talk to you."
"Darryl."
he says, "I've decided what we're going to do."
We'll trade you to any city you want to go to.
Come and see me." Like that.
Yeah, I traded him.
And it was a tough thing to do.
But Darryl wanted another contract.
And Mr. Ballard wouldn't give it to him.
He wanted to play out the contract that he had.
And that's what started the brouhaha.
And that's why Darryl came and asked for a trade.
[Sittler] And then through the grapevine, so to speak,
that Harold's saying, "Ah, we're not trading him,
we're keeping him, we're just--
we're just gotta motivate him a little bit."
or something to that effect, which fueled me more, right?
Like, okay, if you say you're going to trade me,
we're going to do a deal
and don't play these games, right?
Darryl is, you know, starting to get up in age.
He's still a good player.
But to try to get equal value
when you have to trade somebody and you have...
a certain amount of clubs to trade,
you can't trade to everybody because he won't go.
He's got no trade clause.
Because of my no trade contracts
I gave them five teams that they could, uh,
you know, have the opportunity to negotiate with.
One was Buffalo, Minnesota, Philadelphia,
or whatever, right?
And then they finally came to a deal
with Philadelphia, and that's how I left town.
My sense was always that the chaos
that Harold inspired, incited, created,
led to just a whirlwind of happenstance
and things going wrong and people blaming other people.
To me, the promise of the '70s
ended with Sittler's trade to Philadelphia
in January of '82.
[McDonald] Darryl was the one guy
that, from start to finish,
should have worn the Maple Leaf jersey forever
and never gone anywhere.
[Brunt] They were on the verge of being very, very good.
They should have been a contender
in a playoff team for a long time.
And instead, you know,
he attacked the foundation players.
He, you know, he singled guys out.
He humiliated them. And to what end?
Like, there's no-- there's no hockey argument
for what he did.
There's absolutely no hockey argument.
I don't think there's any marketing argument
for what he did.
There's not any argument for what he does.
It was kind of, you know...
cruelty, right?
Like, it was just kind of done out of cruelty and spite.
Harold didn't care about winning necessarily.
He said he wanted to win, but he cared more about the fact
that he was not the star of that team.
It was Roger Neilson,
it was Darryl Sittler, it was Mike Palmateer,
it was, like, the players and the team
became above him and he didn't like that one bit.
[energetic music playing]
[narrator] Rick Vaive came to Toronto in 1980
as part of the trade
that saw fan favorite Tiger Williams go to Vancouver.
Vaive became the first Leaf to score 50 goals in a season.
A feat he achieved in three consecutive years.
Logic suggested that Vaive deserved a raise.
But logic and Harold Ballard's wallet were at odds.
Ricky had just scored 50 for the third time,
and in one of the papers it said,
"Vaive scores 50 for the third year,"
or something like that.
And his contract was up, and underneath it, it said,
"Looks like Ballard's going to have to loosen
his purse strings.
He turned to Ricky, who was right here.
My head-- My chin was basically on Rick's shoulder.
So, you know, Harold was right here and he says,
"If you think you're getting another
f'ing dime out of me, you're crazy."
And sits down. And he was dead serious.
So, as a young guy, I'm like, "Oof, you know,
this is the owner talking to the captain
and it's like, well, it's--
this stuff's, uh, this stuff's real."
I don't think he gave a shit about the team.
I-- I honestly don't.
I think all he cared about was having people in the seats
and making money.
And I-- I don't think he cared
if we won a Stanley Cup or not, I-- I honestly don't.
[McKenny] I really feel sorry for the players.
I know they come to the rink
and they work as hard as they can
but you can't get that extra work out of yourself
unless you know you're gonna get some respect
for the job that you do, so you gotta have it.
And if that's not going to be there,
this team is never going to get any better.
[Ricky] Dan Maloney was kind of--
you know, he started out a little bit rough as a coach,
but he was coming around and-- and-- you know,
we had a couple of good years under him.
And then he wanted a two-year contract.
Harold wouldn't give him any more than one.
So, he left and went to Winnipeg.
So, you know, we lost the one guy
that was kind of sort of starting to get it
and what it took, talking to the players
and communicating.
And then all of a sudden he's gone.
It was one thing after another.
It was, like, nonstop nonsense, uh, you know, by Harold.
It was always hard to countenance that
because Maple Leaf Gardens
was such a juggernaut financially.
It was in the '60s
when he was part of the Silver Seven.
It was in the '70s when he became the sole owner,
and it certainly was through the '80s
when there wasn't a seat to be had at Maple Leaf Gardens
and the TV contracts for the time were very lucrative.
And yet he didn't go out
and invest that money back in the team.
[Orr] Waiting for the Leafs to win at this point in time,
is like leaving on the porch light for Jimmy Hoffa.
[narrator] The turmoil of the '80s
made the Stanley Cup of 1967 seem like ancient history.
But Ballard carried on, confident and cocky,
more worried about the bottom line
than the blue line.
The Leafs of the '80s were a woe be gotten group.
It was pretty crazy, I mean, over those years
we drafted some pretty good players,
but Harold, he ran it.
First of all,
he wouldn't pay anybody good money.
He wouldn't pay for a good general manager
that could make good decisions.
So those players that we drafted,
that were good hockey players,
they were forced into action at 18 years old
when most of them weren't physically
or mentally ready to play in the National Hockey League.
[Leeman] As a young person, you go...
"Well, you know, it's not so secure here."
You-- you want to have the feeling of security
in your-- in your job.
You know, you don't want people to be afraid for their job,
if they make one mistake, like, you know, people are--
Should be allowed to make mistakes
and they should be allowed to grow.
And that was never--
that was never given to...
any teams in the '80s.
[Clark] And being a rookie at 18 in the NHL,
you're just so happy to be there.
And half our team was 20 and under at that stage.
And the other half team, you know, the Ricky Vaives
and Boörje Salmings, they would understand it.
They were ten years in the league,
15 years in the league and lived it.
So they're going, "Oh, here we go again."
For us, first year guys, we're like,
"This is awesome, we're playing in the NHL."
And I was 18 years old. I was just happy to be there.
[rock music playing]
[Joshi] So many talented people
that could have got that team, perennially competitive,
maybe not Stanley Cup every year,
but certainly not a laughingstock
as they were through the '80s,
were cast aside and it was a mess
and it just became worse and worse and worse.
[announcer] For the second time in three years,
the seats at Maple Leaf Gardens will be empty at playoff time.
Right now, the organization just doesn't have it.
[reporter] Are you disappointed in the Leafs?
-Not really. -[reporter] Why is that?
I didn't have great expectations for them
in the first place.
[reporter] You're a hockey fan?
Not really.
[reporter] You don't follow the Leafs at all?
-Not this year anyway. -[reporter] Why is that?
Uh, well, they're at the bottom, aren't they?
Going through those years was very difficult because
losing really gets to you after a while.
And it almost becomes a job.
And it was a job obviously.
And I got paid pretty good to do it.
But, you know, at the end of the day,
you got to have fun, too, I mean, when you go to work,
you want to have fun and you want to enjoy it.
And obviously we weren't having a whole lot of fun
because we weren't winning.
It's just unfortunate if you come along
as a young athlete at that time
and you've worked your whole life
to be a pro hockey player and you run into this.
It makes for a-- a rocky road.
You want to learn how to be a pro,
you want to see it from, you know,
the guys that are ahead of you, but, you know,
when things are happening to them like that,
how is it that they can pass on their experience?
It got to the point where the-- Even the fans were so disgusted
with what they were seeing.
There was one moment when...
the fans did something very un-Toronto like.
[announcer] Now there's all sorts of debris
being thrown onto the ice.
[Ormsby] I don't think it was directed
at the players so much,
but it was just the whole awful mess
that the Leafs had become.
[announcer] We've got a streaker on the ice.
[Eagleson] There's no question about that.
Harold was asked to take blame for that
because he was the owner.
So he didn't hire the right people.
And he didn't draft the right players
and they didn't run the organization.
So, they had a flow through from their minor team
up to the big leagues.
So, there's no question
that Harold has to take the hit for that.
[Parrish] I think for a lot of those years...
there was always the hope that sanity would prevail.
There was always the hope that
Harold would bring in someone who was qualified.
[Joshi] He didn't espouse to the business theory that,
you know, you need to spend money to make money.
To him, it was like, "Why?
Why do I have to do that? The building's full.
I've got program sales. I've got this. I got that.
Why do I need to go and pay the hockey executive
a couple hundred thousand dollars,
then give him all the control?"
That was the biggest thing.
He never gave anybody total autonomy or total control.
Everything had to go through him.
[reporter] How comfortable are you with your image
with Toronto hockey fans?
A lot of people think you're the problem here.
[Harold] Well, maybe I am.
If they want to buy the place, it's open for sale.
All they have to do is bring money.
[narrator] Ballard loved chaos
and reveled in sparring with the press
or anyone who questioned
his increasingly inappropriate behavior.
Now, don't start that fucking camera going.
Couple of swell looking broads in here.
Holy Christ, you ought to see the one in the front.
Talk about a linebacker. Jesus Christ, eh?
As we have been sucking the hind tit long enough
and with a few of these kind of guys coming in with--
We are-- We're-- But don't laugh.
Goddammit, you can't--
you can't ignore these kind of things.
And we've tried, whether you think we have or not,
with the bullshit that you put in the paper
telling us how rotten we've been.
Through his ownership years, he was on the record a lot
with comments that were misogynistic,
with comments that were homophobic,
with comments that were racist.
I don't think you can,
even though the times were different than they are today,
even in those times,
he was outrageous for those times.
Get out of here.
Or you'll get a good kick in the balls.
If Harold Ballard existed in 2022,
he would've been canceled, like, very quickly.
And essentially, this is someone who's incredibly powerful.
Pick what equity-deserving group he decided to offend.
And-- You-- And let's just do the bingo.
He decided to offend them all at different points
and was not apologetic about it.
[Khamisa] I don't know if Harold Ballard
would have been around very long in a present-day lens.
I don't think he would have had enough leeway
to have people forgive that
and allow him to stay in the role that he did.
You say something like some of the things
Harold Ballard said back then, you're out of there.
He was abusive to his players,
he was abusive to his general managers
and his coaches.
And he had this platform that really went unchallenged.
And he had an incredible interview
with CBC and Barbara Frum.
-[Barbara] Hi, Mr. Ballard. -[Harold] Hi.
-[Barbara] How are you? -[Harold] Well, I'm all right.
[Barbara] You won a hockey game?
[Harold] We won two. What's the matter with your addition?
Why don't you get somebody on there
that can handle this job, Dick?
Females on the radio, they're a joke.
-They're a joke. -[Dick] Hang on.
[Harold] You know where they're at their best, don't you?
[Dick] I probably should stay.
[Harold] Well, lock them up once in a while,
[indistinct] once in a while.
-[Barbara] Mr. Ballard-- -[Harold] Would you keep quiet?
[Barbara] No. This is still my show.
[Harold] Well--
[Barbara] I have another question for you.
[Harold] I'm not talking to you, I'm talking to Dick,
so when you learn to mind your own business,
and let me talk to Dick, it'll be fine. Goodbye.
He basically tells her to shut up on her own show.
This was him.
You're renowned for the outrageous things
you say about women, about racial groups.
Why do you say things like that?
Well, that's the way I think.
And as I said before, I tell people what I think.
I don't think one way
and then tell somebody else another way.
And to follow that up,
there was a CBC Fifth Estate story done on him in 1980.
And they had mics hanging around him.
When he is using the N-word around athletes
or about athletes, you know?
[man] Kelly.
And he's a hell of a-- he's a hell of a player too.
[Harold] [bleep]
No. Really? No, wait.
You don't think that being a [bleep] called Kelly, do you?
[indistinct].
[Harold] No. Surely not.
This was not all for show.
I believe that's-- that's the man talking like that.
That's-- that's what he was all about.
Although, it's not tolerated in today's times,
I think he's grown up with people,
or it was a familiar comment and a familiar description.
And I don't think anybody is going to change him now.
And if he offends people, he just says,
"I don't care, I don't give a damn.
That's the way I feel, and that's the way I think,
and that's the way I talk.
If they don't like it, they don't have to do this."
[interviewer] Does it occur to you
that they might be deeply offended
-by your referring-- -Oh, I don't think so.
You want to get offended at that? That's stupid.
You couldn't get through a two sentence conversation
with Harold without it being full of invective
and, uh, obscenity.
The first time a female reporter was allowed in the Leaf room.
And he'd been fighting that with the league
for a little while, he didn't want any females
in-- in the-- Reporters in the room.
So after the game, the guys were gearing down
and she's standing over here and Harold walks in
and he sees her
and it was kind of a calculated move,
as soon as he's walking past her,
he turns to the room and he yells out,
"Look out, boys, we got a lizard watcher in here."
and keeps walking, and it was like, oh. [chuckles]
[McKenny] Rosie Dimanno or Christie Blatchford.
They weren't hockey fans.
They were just in there doing the job.
They had to go down and get some interviews
and to get the interviews,
they had to go into the dressing room and--
and Harold said he didn't want to let them in there.
They come in there, get players half dressed,
want to bring a broad in, that's the worst thing.
If the broad comes in while I'm naked,
I'm going to tell you, it'll take you a lot longer
to get out than it does to get in.
And I told her, those are the conditions.
Take your clothes off and go on in
because we got guys there with cocks as long as your arm.
[reporter] We've got to do some bleeping here, guys.
[reporter] I can't use that, Harold.
Why? What's the matter with it?
-[reporter] Harold, it's-- -It's the truth.
Maybe it'll get him a little more ass somewhere.
I laughed out loud then, but today...
you know, there's no chance anybody would air that clip
or even use it as a quote.
Legally, they couldn't even put the stuff on TV
that he was saying. [laughing]
You take it back to your producers.
"You want to run this?" "Uh, no, I don't think so."
[laughing]
It's never been a correct stance to have, obviously.
And, uh, it comes with being entitled.
It comes with being insecure and it comes with,
you know, being challenged by someone who you feel
shouldn't have the right voice to challenge you.
I think, to a certain extent...
Ballard was smarter than the media
because he ultimately could play the long game.
He knew that he was going to be in that position of power
for years, for generations.
So that pressure, I think, caused a lot of people
to go along with Harold
instead of pushing up against him.
Harold had decided this is the time
to make a stand against women in the-- in the locker room.
And so, I remember the sports editors in Toronto
and the hockey writers leadership got together
at a little restaurant down on King Street
the night before the game, and we decided
that we were going to take Harold on.
And the only way to take Harold on was by,
first of all, by surprise,
and then two, by a show of force.
And so, we agreed that the next night
we would all descend on Maple Leaf Gardens.
[announcer] Last night, the Toronto chapter
of the Professional Hockey Writers Association
stormed the inner dressing room
to show their displeasure over what they considered
an unprofessional working environment.
[Parrish] As soon as the game ends,
or leading up to the end of the game,
more people troop out of-- out of the press box
at Maple Leaf Gardens than I've ever seen,
head down to the dressing room,
and ten minutes after the game ends,
the door is supposed to be open,
so whoever was the head of the line
just opens the door and we walk in
and it was a very tight and cramped
Leafs dressing room in those days.
But there's probably 35 of us strong, including women,
that just walk into the dressing room
while Harold is in there.
Harold hasn't come out of the dressing room yet.
He was standing there with his cane and waving it.
Get out of here! Get the fuck out of here!
Get out! Fuck!
And that will remain
one of my enduring images of Harold.
I mean, just ranting and raving with his cane
and waving it at everybody.
If I'd have been sensible,
I should have got one of the hockey sticks
and decapitated the bastards.
[reporter] Now, as the letter says,
"In light of last night's march,
the entire Leafs dressing room is off limits
to all female and male reporters."
[interviewer] Harold, the media in Toronto,
are they too tough on your hockey club these days?
Oh, no. They're a bunch of jerks.
Who worries about what they say?
Especially that Globe and Mailbunch, they, uh,
they should be writing, uh, kids books
or comics or something like that.
You're still after the guys from the Globe?
Why no-- why not?
They're, uh, I mean to say,
when you talk about halfwits, you have to talk about them.
[narrator] Ballard never held back his tongue
for anyone or anything,
but at that point in his life, the one constant he had
that kept him somewhat even keeled was King.
King passed away November 10th, 1986.
I don't think there's anybody that knew King
that, uh, won't think about him daily
or when there's a hockey game on
because there were so many facets of things that he did,
not only in hockey, but other things.
And I never realized how much of a loss
that's going to be to the building.
I don't think he will ever get this thing straightened out.
Harold was okay when King Clancy was alive,
and then when King passed away,
he started to go downhill pretty quickly
and I think he was senile before anybody believed he was
to be honest with you.
[Clark] I think that was his last real tie to hockey
because King Clancy was a lifer
as far as hockey player, referee, coach.
He did it all in the game and he'd drive in every morning,
have breakfast with Harold in the Hot Stove.
And when King passed, that--
I think that was the last real connection...
to hockey in his era of somebody he really trusted.
[Williams] They sat in that Muppet box there together
'til the day they both couldn't do it.
I think it was--
it was a movie, those two guys as far as I am concerned.
I love King.
I mean, I named my daughter after King.
[Parrish] He was a lonelier figure
because King humanized Harold.
King had a sense of humor and got along with everybody.
And, so, if Harold and he hung out
and he and Harold were friends, I thought,
"Well, maybe there is another side to Harold."
I've never seen it, but maybe there is another side.
[narrator] Ballard indeed had many different sides
to his persona,
but for all his bravado, bluster, and brouhaha,
something rarely talked about was his philanthropy.
[man 1] His Ontario game for the physically disabled.
[man 2] For physically disabled.
He was involved in swimming and he won three gold medals.
-Is that so? -Isn't that super?
Well, that's fine.
[narrator] Ballard never tried to hide
his animosity toward the media.
What he did try to keep secret
was the amount of money he gave to charity.
Harold would donate $25,000,
$50,000, uh, at a time,
and that was a lot of money back then...
to Special Olympics.
On one condition:
that no one could ever find out where that money came from.
And we begged Harold, like,
you need to let us tell this story.
And he said, "Nope.
They'll think I've gone soft."
But the money kept coming, uh, to Special Olympics.
[Stellick] I think he cared about charity.
I remember it around Christmas time,
he would call down to the-- to the vault,
and that's where the money was kept,
and they would bring up, like, $50,000 in cash
and you could see him back there doling it out
to different envelopes.
[announcer] A gentleman who's been a big, big help
to big brothers, Mr. Harold Ballard.
[Cherry] He did a lot of things for charity
that nobody knows about.
He didn't want anybody to think he was a good guy.
Don't ask me why.
[announcer] This is unbelievable.
[Cherry] I remember when the Junior Club
was over there and they had the big brawl.
The punch out in Piestany, I think they got--
He'd give them all gold medals.
[Joshi] To show his support for what had happened.
We were all upset, angry at the time,
but it was Harold Ballard, the owner of the Maple Leafs
who would make a gesture of that kind of magnitude to this kid.
Husky [indistinct]
[indistinct]
Tigers, eat 'em raw.
[narrator] After failed attempts to launch
a new CFL franchise in the early '70s,
Ballard bought the struggling Hamilton Tiger-Cats
on the cheap for $1.2 million in 1978.
During the '80s, they became
his most successful sports franchise.
The team made the Gray Cup in 1980,
'84, and '85
before finally winning it all in 1986.
[reporter] Hamilton loves its football team
and even loves Harold Ballard,
the man everybody loves to hate.
[Iaboni] When he won in 1986 with the Gray Cup,
it was also one of the saddest times
I've seen Harold Ballard because King Clancy died,
so his sidekick is gone.
So at the end of the game, he was there by himself.
He's finally won a championship
and he can't share it with anybody.
There's nobody there. You could tell he was on the--
on the decline health-wise.
He was walking very slowly.
He was having trouble with his feet.
And I took him downstairs.
And then, I watched him in the media conference.
And I'd seen this man since the early '70s,
until 1986.
And I'm watching him.
And I said to myself, "This is sad
because Harold Ballard can't be Harold Ballard."
He wasn't himself.
I mean, he would throw out the odd line.
But I think the fact that he was missing
King Clancy not being there
to see this ultimate championship
and the fact that he'd won something
was probably a total shock to him.
[narrator] Yes, King Clancy passed away that year,
but Ballard wasn't alone.
A few years earlier, a mystery woman
came into his life from out of the blue...
She showed up unannounced at Maple Leaf Gardens one day
and never left.
I remember the first day I saw her.
It was Mr. Ballard's birthday.
And she was out in the office with a birthday cake.
And I remember Stan Obodiac bringing her in
to see Mr. Ballard with the birthday cake.
And the rest is history.
They were perfectly matched.
Two peas in a pod because she was a con and so was he.
I tell you how weird it was,
she called herself Mrs. Ballard for years.
He never married her.
She kept him alive. Yolanda kept him alive.
She was more obvious than a $3 bill.
Okay, she came in like a bull in a china shop.
She targeted him, and, uh,
he wasn't fooled by it, but she was relentless.
And at the end, he needed, almost, a nursemaid that way.
Yolanda did a couple of smart things.
She, uh, bought him the dog, TC Puck.
He really loved the dog.
[Stellick] The challenge with that team photo was,
didn't matter how anyone looked in the photo,
we had to get TC Puck sitting down.
You'd set him on the ice
and his balls would get frozen and he'd jump off.
And she gave us a towel to put under as hind legs.
But his third year he sat down, no problem on the ice,
but because his balls weren't freezing.
So that was her greatest contribution.
Harold treated her harshly quite often.
Do this. Give me that.
Everybody says, "Oh, she's a gold digger. She did this."
Harold said, "Ah, what the hell?
Whatever I give her, I give her."
I don't know what he left her,
but I think she became King's replacement.
Just as King became Stafford's replacement.
Harold liked someone beside him all the time.
And she was that.
[McKenny] I see Yolanda walk across the street
'cause she lived on Granby Street, just--
just south of the gardens.
And she comes across the street.
I said, "Yolanda, how's it going?"
And she goes like that.
And she's got, like, five diamond rings on
with a great big smile on her face.
I found her to be an extremely imposing,
uh, individual who wanted to run his life.
So, I felt it was a bad thing in his life
for him to be with her. So, I--
I think that that was something that--
that at the end of the day, she was about Yolanda.
Uh, now, she cared for him.
I think she-- she did care for him.
But she also wanted to make sure that--
that when Harold was gone, that she was taken care of.
He probably liked all the confrontation
and all the arguing and all that stuff
because she never backed down from them.
She'd argue with him. She wasn't afraid of him at all.
Once she was official in the will...
she didn't take any shit off him,
I'll tell you that.
[laughing]
So, there was a general manager's office at the back
and one time, when I went back there,
there was Yolanda,
and she just was in her undergarments
and she'd snuck out of the apartment to use the phone.
And I thought, "I don't think this will be the GM's office."
And then it became a walk in closet for Yolanda
the next week.
She had fun early on.
She was a low-rent version
of the Kardashians or the Gabor sisters.
That's what she kind of was.
She needed money. She needed to get in somewhere.
The rumor was before she came to the lease
that she was running a limousine business,
but people thought it was an escort business.
They weren't sure.
But she had all kinds of financial problems.
You know, that's what made the kids
even edgier.
[narrator] As Yolanda and Ballard got closer,
Ballard's children,
Bill Harold Jr., and Mary Elizabeth,
grew increasingly concerned
about the nature of their relationship.
[Ormsby] He lived a life with so many cautionary tales
along the way.
And at the end, you know,
the family relationships were strained with his children.
Dragged out in the courts.
He's got Yolanda changing her name
to Ballard legally.
And then some accounts say she was also, you know,
thieving from him as well, you know,
some money was going to her that he didn't know about
and, you know, [sighs]
he was losing control of a lot of things,
not just his own health,
but maybe the ability to make very good decisions.
[narrator] Harold Ballard's mental and physical state
were both on the decline.
In 1988, Ballard suffered a heart attack
while vacationing in Florida with Yolanda.
[reporter] Harold Ballard is resting comfortably
here at the Miami Heart Institute,
one of the finest facilities
for heart attack patients in the U.S.
We have had presidents here, we've had heads of state,
we've had a lot of dignitaries and celebrities.
And I have to say that Mr. Ballard
has created more interest,
certainly more phone calls than anyone that I can recall.
He's doing just fine.
Just fine. He's, uh, he's up. He's walking around.
The doctors are-- are really quite surprised.
But I'm, you know,
I'm not surprised by anything Harold does.
[interviewer] What do you mean by that?
He's just-- He's a...
His body is as big a character as he is.
He just-- He comes through these things.
[narrator] Back in Toronto,
tension continued to grow within the Ballard clan.
[news anchor] A judge has declared him
mentally incompetent.
So Yolanda Ballard and Ballard's daughter,
Mary Elizabeth Flynn, went to court
to fight over who should be guardian
of Harold Ballard and his multimillion dollar empire.
Harold needs me.
Desperately needs me, as I need Harold.
They're well looked after.
There's no one eating out of the garbage cans.
They all have good educations.
And what they have left in the, uh,
grab bag when I go, that's up to them.
They'll fight like hell about it.
There'll be lawsuits and war, and everything else.
I don't worry about it.
I don't try to make favorites of anybody.
I want them to think I'm a miserable bastard.
And that's the-- that's the way to run it.
She was very manipulative and clever
but could civil heads prevail?
Could he have called them in and said,
"You know, let's just give you some money?"
But instead, it turned into an incredibly acrimonious.
It was a horrible, horrible time behind the scenes, I'm sure,
but the displays in public were even worse.
The Yolanda story,
where she ran through the Molson Cup press conference
in her bathrobe and, uh,
curlers with a strip sirloin stuck to her eye,
screaming that she'd just been punched in the eye.
Those of us, 15, 20 of us that were there,
we were like looking at each other going...
"Circus is still in town."
[reporter] Police are investigating
an alleged assault
upon Ballard's companion, Yolanda.
And police have questioned Harold's son, Bill Ballard.
Bill apparently cold cocked Yolanda, allegedly.
[reporter] Bill Ballard denied assaulting Yolanda Ballard.
When he and Yolanda got into a tussle
in Harold Ballard's office last fall,
Bill Ballard described Yolanda as being out of control.
He also said that when she accused him
of trying to assault her, he retorted...
Go on!
What the hell's the matter with you?
[reporter] It obviously bothers you
that people are talking about your personal life.
It's all right.
They-- they get a lot of fun out of talking about me.
Let them go ahead.
Have you ever seen me try and stop them?
[reporter] No, but it bothers you.
Well, have you ever see me try and stop them?
Why the hell don't you get some brains
and think for yourself?
[reporter] It's-- You used to say things--
Ah, get ou-- You guys make me sick.
[narrator] Bill was eventually convicted of assault
and fined $500.
However, for Harold Ballard, his time was coming to an end.
[Stellick] As far as his condition, it's stable.
He's a diabetic, and we have to be concerned.
[reporter] How are you feeling, Harold?
Not too good.
[narrator] Harold Ballard passed away on April 11th, 1990.
[sad piano music playing]
[news anchor] It was Harold Ballard's last visit
to Maple Leaf Gardens.
When the doors opened, Ballard's longtime companion,
Yolanda Ballard, was given an hour for a private visit.
[reporter] Yolanda, how are you this morning?
So sad.
He was very, very tough at times,
but, he was uh, he was soft inside too.
He had a lot of character and, um...
he had a lot of will and a lot of drive to do
whatever he wanted to do.
♪
[reporter] In life, he was an outrageous character.
In death, he'd suddenly become
one of Toronto's most generous philanthropists.
[Lawyer] And the beneficiary of this estate is charity.
[reporter] That was the announcement
from Harold Ballard's lawyer today.
And the three Ballard children said
they were expecting it and it's okay.
They were each millionaires long before their father died.
We can't spend what we have now.
So, I mean, how much-- how much is more?
And, you know, personally, I don't need the money.
I make a lot on my own. [chuckles] So...
[reporter] If there is to be a fight over Ballard's will,
it will come from his longtime companion, Yolanda,
who's to receive $50,000 a year for life
or until she marries.
You know, she got something, I think, in the world.
But Stavros bought her silence.
The rumor was that Steve Stavros
gave her five million dollars and a pair of golds
to never speak again,
and she never said a bad word about him.
Personally [indistinct] get less.
I think it's sort of, you know, fine--
A fine settlement.
[interviewer] Do you see her contesting it?
[Bill] I--
A, I don't ever want to see her again,
but B, there's nothing she does that amazes me anymore.
[Stellick] I thought for sure
she was going to burn through that money.
And you're going to see Yolanda
on the front page of the Toronto Sun,
you know, with a cup in her hand
on a street corner and a cane, you know, saying,
"The Ballard family screwed me out of everything."
[narrator] Harold Ballard owned
one of the most successful franchises
in the history of the NHL.
But under his stewardship, the Maple Leafs,
winners of 13 Stanley Cups,
but none since 1967,
endured ten losing seasons in a row.
From 1979 to 1989.
♪
[Brunt] It's amazing he didn't kill this thing.
He couldn't kill it and expansion couldn't kill it.
And, you know, millions of options on television
and online and all that stuff still couldn't kill it.
It's out there, it's in the genes somewhere still
that he, you know, he didn't manage to kill it.
But, you know, I just kind of-- you-- you wonder,
you know, you could have had some of that, right?
Like he-- There was-- He could have been that guy.
He could have been the beloved owner
of the Toronto Maple Leafs, you know,
who looked after his alumni and, you know,
built a strong team, and hired a good coach,
and let him do his job.
And, you know, and then miraculously, in 1982,
they won the Stanley Cup for the first time since 1967
and the streets filled
and he could have been that guy, right?
Wouldn't it have been better, you know?
Wouldn't that have been better than the story
we're telling here?
If the Leafs had won just one Stanley Cup
under his ownership, he'd be remembered now
as a funny, irascible old scamp.
[Vaive] He ran it like a goddamn circus.
It was-- [laughing]
Every single day,
something in a newspaper of some stupid thing
that he said, you know, was front and center.
And it wasn't about the hockey team.
It was just about Harold.
And that was Harold's goal, I believe,
was to get on the front page of the sports every single day.
And he-- and he pretty much managed that.
His championship was being the guy,
was being, uh, the face of the franchise,
which is why when, you know, members of the franchise,
whether it be famous and beloved captains
or really smart coaches, pushed up against him,
they were quickly removed from the franchise.
So, I think, no question, his motivations
were to be front and center at all times.
The last line of the obituary says...
"Harold Ballard was predeceased
by his wife, Dorothy, and his hockey team."
And, uh, maybe that says it best of all.
[Brunt] Harold was, you know, of a different class.
He came by his money a different way.
He didn't play by the rules,
and he didn't care about the decorum
expected of somebody in his position.
And I think he was flipping a middle finger
to people every day.
[McKenny] I don't think he ever took
any Dale Carnegie courses, you know.
It's my building, it's the only building in town,
if you don't like it, fuck off.
That was his idea of PR. [laughs]
It was his team. He owned it.
We don't have to like maybe how he did it,
but it was his.
[Parrish] When you look at the pantheon
of sports owners through history,
who are the greatest ones and who are the worst ones?
And Harold's name, even today, 30 years after his passing,
it does get included in that list
of the worst owners.
It's because of the combination.
He wasn't a strong hockey guy, didn't pay
and didn't hire strong hockey people,
and he wasn't a very nice man as well.
I viewed him probably
in the same level as a grandfather.
You know, what he wanted from you was--
was very basic.
Be willing to die for that crest.
And when you're bleeding, it better be blue and white.
Doesn't matter what he...
I loved him. I loved him.
I don't think he understood the modern game,
especially after the series of '72,
when training changes from what the Russians had taught
about off ice training,
when strategy in the game changes,
when videotape comes in.
International players, there's guys who speak Swedish
in the dressing room for crying out loud.
That's not easy to adapt when you're born in 1903
in a monocultural city.
But the people who did adapt won the Stanley Cup,
and Harold just sat in his booth with old King Clancy.
And they lost. And they lost, and they lost, and they lost.
And he's remembered as a loser.
[reporter] You remind me of the story
of the circus owner who goes to a small town
and takes a white horse and paints black stripes on it
because he said they've never seen a zebra.
So, this might as well be a zebra.
-You're right. -[reporter] You're a con artist.
Well, that's what they call me.
[interviewer] You don't deny it?
No, no, no.
[narrator] Since the demise of Harold Ballard,
the team has had a handful of ups
and plenty of downs.
So, as a millennial, you've certainly heard about
the Harold Ballard curse
and how his misgivings
and, you know, negative acts maybe haunt the franchise
the same way that the Curse of the Babe
would have been a thing in baseball.
I'm hopeful, um, but...
sometimes even the best of hopes are tested.
I think they have very smart people
running the organization, very different minded people
from a lot of different avenues coming together
to help build what they hope is a winning team.
I do feel like there is something
placed upon this team
that has prevented them from succeeding.
They've been so good.
[narrator] But through it all, Leafs fans the world over
continue to hope and dream that perhaps
this will be the season finally
that the Toronto Maple Leafs break the Ballard curse.
[rock music playing]
♪