Detroit Hockey Now’s Bob Duff wonders aloud which number the Red Wings might retire next, and he offers a very good representative list with Pavel Datsyuk’s #13, Henrik Zetterberg’s #40, Chris Osgood’s #30, and the concept of officially retiring Larry Aurie’s #6, which has not been in circulation for some time.
Who’s Larry Aurie? Duff explains:
Is It Time To Make Aurie (No. 6) Official?
Only the most ardent of Red Wings fans know the story of Larry Aurie. Joining the team in 1927, Aurie played 11 seasons with the team, winning two Stanley Cups. He was on his way to an NHL scoring title in 1936-37 when a late-season leg fracture derailed his chance. He still wound up with an NHL-leading 23 goals.
Red Wings coach-GM Jack Adams held the 5-foot-6 winger in the highest regard. “Pound for pound, he has more courage than any player hockey has ever known,” Adams told the Associated Press in 1937. When Aurie played his final game for the Wings, Adams deemed that no other player would ever wear his No. 6 jersey.
“It wouldn’t seem right for anyone else to wear it,” Adams said.
Since that day, Cummy Burton, Aurie’s nephew, is the only Detroit player to don No. 6, at the request of his uncle. However, the digit was never officially retired.
“The papers were never filed with the league,” former Red Wings director of media relations Bill Jamieson once explained. In the 1990s, the Red Wings considered returning No. 6 to circulation, but thought better of it.
“We decided those were Jack’s wishes and decided not to do so,” Jamieson said.
Continued; I’d still love to see the Red Wings establish a Hall of Fame or “Ring of Honor” so that the Grind Line, Tomas Holmstrom, Vladimir Konstantinov and others could be honored despite not quite making it up to the rafters.
The Red Wings could of course hold “theme nights” to honor the players involved, and that would yield a fair amount of ticket sale $, too, so it’s a win-win proposition in my book.
