Buffalo Boy's Blog

The Dominator retired last week from professional hockey. He had 16 great and at times turbulent seasons filled with miraculous saves, fueds with the media, phony retirements, questionable injuries and many other moments we will never forget here in Buffalo.

Despite the tendency for the dramatic with Hasek, he was besides Gilbert Perreault, the single greatest player to wear a Buffalo Sabres jersey.

He's not my favorite player ever to play for the Sabres, that honor belongs to Danny Gare. But the saves and the incredible moments he gave us belong in the rafters at HSBC Arena, love him or hate him, the number 39 belongs there.

My favorite moments with Dominik involved him trying to hit a home run out of his end of the rink by throwing the puck in the air and swatting it with his stick. The most memorable game? Easily the 4 overtime 1-0 win against New Jersey in the playoffs.

Dominik made saves we never thought possible and with every part of his anatomy. I remember back in the 1997/1998 season Dominik had 13 shutouts, an incredible campaign by anyones standards. I was in Aiken, South Carolina at the time on my first clinical affiliation for physical therapy school. Three weeks went by with hardly a word down there about anything close to hockey, they simply didn't talk about it down there.

So, three weeks, I came back and Hasek had posted some 5 or 6 shutouts in the month of December. He simply amazed us. Off the ice he frequently had us questioning hwhat the hell he was thinking, which I suppose matches what he did on the ice, always had us guessing what he was going to do next.

So, does his jersey belong in the rafters? I say it does.