Kevin Dineen is battling cancer

NHL players grow mustaches, or add to them, in November. It's part of a cancer-awareness effort. The nose whiskers go along the NHL's and NHLPA's Hockey Fights Cancer month.

That line about how we've all been touched by this disease is true – we know someone who has been through the battle, or someone whose family has experienced the fight. Cancer claimed my mother in 2007. Cancer claimed my lawyer, Randy Kilbride, my best friend, earlier this year.

Now, among other people, cancer is after Kevin Dineen.

I am filled with expletives right now. Brimming, coursing, bursting. Gottdamn cancer. Dineen is who you want to raise your kids to become. He is strong, curious, unafraid and honest. If he is your friend, you have one of the best.

I first met Dineen in a Hartford Whalers locker room in the late 1980s. He was already a legend in my hometown. As the Whalers beat writer at the Hartford Courant from 1995 through 1997, , I saw him almost every day.

I was there to write about this:

We're about the same age. That beautiful woman in the picture on the bottom right of Dineen's tweet? That's Kevin's wife, Annie. Annie and I went to the same high school. Her brother Paul was a friend of mine way back when. RIP, Paulie.

I moved to Columbus to be the Dispatch's first Blue Jackets beat writer in 1999. The Jackets selected Dineen in the expansion draft in the summer of 2000. Of course they did. Perfect.

I was in St. Louis when Dineen had his knee destroyed on a knee-on-knee hit delivered by Keith Tkachuk on April 5, 2001. Rather than be carried off, Dineen crawled 45 feet to the bench. It should have been the end of his career, but he didn't allow it. Of course he didn't.

Dineen had reconstructive surgery. His new knee was held together with a tendon taken from a cadaver. Dineen made contact with the family of the donor to let them know that a part of their child's life would live on with him. He gave thanks. That's Dino.

Dineen came back to play four more games, and to go out standing up.

In his 1,188th and final NHL game, Dineen dragged the Jackets to a 3-2, come-from-behind victory over the Buffalo Sabres in Nationwide Arena. He didn't announce it would be his last game. He just made it his last game.

The last two minutes of Dineen's career were spent in the penalty box – he got 2 minutes for unsportsmanlike conduct – but Chris Gratton got 4 minutes. Gratton got the extra penalty. Perfect. Dineen sat and bled and grinned in the sin bin as time ran out on his professional life as a player. He was the No. 1 star that night. His contribution to the box score was 6 PIMs. That's Dino.

Dineen captained three different teams – the Whale, the Philadelphia Flyers and the Carolina Hurricanes. Think about that. He captained three different NHL teams. He had 355-405--760 and 2,229 PIMs. Who scores 35o goals and racks cup 2,000 PIMs? It's an exclusive club. It's pure hockey.

Behind the scenes, he took young players under his wing and taught them how to be pros. There was Geoff Sanderson in Hartford, Eric Lindros in Philadelphia, Jeff O'Neal in Carolina and Jody Shelley in Columbus. Among others. That's Dino.

He brings people together.

Dineen's father, Bill "Foxy" Dineen, played for the great Detroit Red Wings teams of the 1950s. Bill played with Gordie Howe in Detroit, and much later coached him with the Houston Aeros of the WHA. Crazy.

In the early 1990s, Bill coached Kevin in Philadelphia. Crazy.

Dineen, like his father, had a vagabond career as a coach. It began in Columbus, where he (along with his brother, Pete) served as a scout. Dineen went on to be a development coach and an assistant GM here. He went on to test his coaching chops in the AHL, and he found success.

I made his case to coach the Jackets. But Dineen's big-league shot came with the Florida Panthers, where he stood behind the bench from 2011-13. In his first season in Sunrise, he led the Panthers to their first divisional title in 12 years. Thanks for coming and see ya later. After a slow start to the next season, he got axed. He never again got another shot to coach an NHL team.

Yet, he was always busy. Always. Almost compulsively. He was like Dave King, if King had a 19-year career with 300 goals and 2,000 penalty minutes, which King did not, and instead of running every day, which King did, he went hard on deer (and turkey) season with a bow and arrow, which King did not.

Yes, Ronald, it has really been 25 years -- 26, if you count the lockout

A few Original Jackets look back, and ahead

The DisrespectedMichael Arace

In 2014, Dineen coached the Canadian national women's team to victory at the Sochi Olympics. In the gold-medal game, they beat the U.S. in OT. Dineen's wife and two daughters wanted him to understand girl power and, in the end, he did. Like he didn't already. That's Dino.

Dineen then served as an assistant for his great friend and former Whalers teammate, Joel Quenneville, in Chicago. He finally got a ring in 2015, at the end of the Blackhawks' mini-dynasty. Thus, Bill and Kevin Dineen joined a very exclusive group of fathers and sons to have their name etched on the Stanley Cup. Bill died a year later.

Covid changed sports in a way that most fans don't realize. It taught professional and college PR people how to control media access: Here you go, three players and the coach and a scrum. Zoom! That's about the extent of access now. Wait, you want to talk to this guy? He's not on the list.

I am fortunate to be from another era, before there were ante-rooms and back doors to locker-room facilities. It was an era when real people like Dineen would make every single player sit down in his locker stall to face the media after a blowout loss. The word "accountability" had greater heft. then. It has been bastardized since.

It used to be like this: When I covered the NBA, you could sit in the visitors' locker room before a game – there was an open-door policy until 45 minutes before tip-off – and you could wait for Michael Jordan to come in and, as he pulled off his tie he'd say, "OK, what do you need?" And you had questions ready and you asked what you had, with follow-ups, and you said, "Thank you" and moved on to Dennis Rodman. You did your homework, asked your questions and tipped your cap.

It was an era when a player could not escape to a different set of lockers, and then slink out through a hidden egress. It was an era when, over the course of a season, a reporter who showed up every day could establish relationships and build trust and respect. You could talk like people.

I remember car-pooling with Dineen to the airport in Columbus. I remember him and his family showing up at one of my child's christenings. I remember running into him after a game and sipping Buds at a German Village dive, and talking about anything other than hockey.

I remember calling Dineen after he was busted for a DUI when he was at one of his minor-league stops, and he took my questions and answered them honestly and owned it. That's Dino.

John Wayne in short pants is now in the battle of his life. His opponent is extraordinarily formidable. It doesn't look good for him.

When it comes to cancer, generally, and to cancer and Dineen, specifically, I've little else to say that isn't an expletive.

I know that he has dropped the gloves. I love this man.

Donate if you can.

Movember

Movember, the month formerly known as November, is a moustache growing charity event held during November each year that raises funds and awareness for men’s health.

Movember

Unbelievable

The word has been used like a rented mule, to the point where it's unusable. But this is unbelievable: New York Islanders center Kyle Palmieri tore the ACL in his left knee while delivering a check in a game against the Philadelphia Flyers. Palmieri got up and assisted on a goal before being helped down the tunnel. It happened on the Isles' home ice in Elmont, N.Y., Friday night.

Hockey players, eh?

The Palmieri play was part of the chit-chat in locker rooms throughout the league over the weekend. Certainly, the Jackets were talking about it.

"It's just crappy news that he's done for so long, but it was a special play. It was pretty cool," said captain Boone Jenner, who was back practicing with the team Sunday after a three-week absence due to an upper-body injury.

Jenner did not travel to New Jersey for the game against the Devils Monday night, but he may be back Thursday, when the Detroit Red Wings visit Nationwide Arena.

Palmieri is headed for the surgeon's table. He will be out 6-8 months, according to the team.

You won't find Palmieri, 34, on lists of the best U.S.-born players of all time, but he's certainly in the top 100, maybe in the top 75, maybe higher. We'll have to think about it. He has had a stellar career with 276-269--545. Given how he's wired, it's a good bet he'll be back to finish his career on his own terms. Like Dineen. Upright.

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The Disrespected

Michael Arace covers pro sports in flyover country. Welcome to Columbus, the Blue Jackets and the Crew.

The DisrespectedMichael Arace