It happens to almost every kid.
In the early days of your playing career, whether your sport of choice was hockey, football, baseball or basketball, there was a moment when you first saw a professional star off the ice, field or court.
In that moment, your eyes probably widened and you found yourself awestruck. There you were, just a kid hoping one day you would be in a position to break records and win championships like your favorite athletes. Then a real-life sports hero appeared right in front of you.
It was likely a memory you’ll never forget. You’ve probably even told the story a thousand times to friends and families.
For me, my moment occurred in 1997 when my dad took me to a brand-new ice hockey rink in Aston, Pennsylvania. Growing up in Delaware County, I played several sports but nothing beat lacing up my skates, grabbing my stick and hitting the ice.
So when IceWorks Skating Complex, which at the time was a dual-rink facility, opened to the public, my dad was quick to sign me up for in-house leagues and camps.
When we showed up for my first game, the first thing I remembered seeing was a tall man on skates wearing sweats and a windbreaker emerge from the front office with a bucket of pucks and stick in hand.
NHL
“Do you know who that is?” my dad asked me. “That’s Jimmy Watson, one of the best defensemen to ever play for the Flyers. He won two Stanley Cups, ya know.”
Just like that, I was hooked. Hockey was life for me from that moment on.
***
I would see Jimmy running around the rink all the time the next eight years or so, always smiling cheek to cheek. From early-morning tournaments to clinics at night, I was convinced he never went home.
When I was old enough, I got a job at IceWorks. I did anything I could. I scorekept games, worked as a skate guard during public skating hours and eventually found myself working next to Jimmy in the front office as a cashier. That’s when I had the opportunity to really get to know the man who spent parts of 10 years as a Flyer.
Ask anybody who knows him and they’ll tell you his personality is infectious. He preaches positivity and imparts the same passion in coaching that he brought to his contemporaries in the Flyers' golden age. If you played for him, you know all about posture. Jimmy would inspect every single one of his players’ sticks and take them to the pro shop himself to make sure they were cut down to the appropriate height.
And if you were a kid acting up around the rink, you were probably on the wrong end of a stern lecture from Jimmy at some point. He would often pull kids aside and tell them to behave like they would at home in front of their parents. He’d also straighten their hats and instruct them to wear them either frontward or backward because those are “the only two ways a hat should be worn.”
He never hesitated to strike up conversations, either. Oftentimes, he’d go out and watch another team practice so he can pick the brain of a fellow coach or offer advice.
Heck, Jimmy once sat on the bench and watched my team practice for 90 minutes. After we got off the ice, he approached my dad, who was my coach, and told him what a great job he was doing with our team.
As for IceWorks, it now has four rinks and has grown into one of the premier facilities in the state. It hosts college and junior games, major figure skating tournaments and many more events.
Jimmy and his Hockey Academy are a big reason why.
"I'm still very active over at IceWorks,” Watson said Friday of last week. “I have a picture of Ed Snider between Joe (his older brother) and I, and I look at that every day. I just thank God for Ed Snider bringing that franchise to Philadelphia. For me being able to come play here and then from there, I end up with some great partners building an ice rink over in Aston.
“Now we’re out here in the hockey business and we're providing an opportunity for kids and parents and people to come and play hockey, figure skate there, and we're just helping the game grow. It's enabled me to stay in the great game of hockey which I love.”
***
After a long wait, Watson will finally be inducted into the Flyers’ Hall of Fame before Monday night’s game against the Calgary Flames.
The two-time Barry Ashbee Trophy winner and five-time NHL All-Star amassed 38 goals, 148 assists and a plus-295 rating in 613 career games, all with the Flyers. He was just as steady in the postseason, recording five goals and 34 assists in 101 games.
A bad back, however, cut his career short. He was forced to retire at the age of 29 before the 1982-83 season began.
Watson considers himself lucky, though. He was part of the magical back-to-back Stanley Cup championships in 1974 and 1975 and takes great pride in what he was able to accomplish with the Flyers.
"That's all I wanted to do, to play in the NHL and win a Stanley Cup,” he said. “And for goodness sakes, as a rookie I win the Stanley Cup. I'll never forget sitting in the locker room after winning the Stanley Cup, and I could hardly believe what had occurred. I never forgot that and I never will. It was like, ‘What did we just accomplish here, what did I just do?’ I've got to grasp all this.
“As time evolved I grasped more of it, but it was like my God, a dream came true. Not only making the NHL, but then winning a Stanley Cup. What does that mean to me? It means everything to me, fellas. That's what I strive to do. This is what I wanted to do. And I was able to attain two of my goals within a year's time. An anecdote to that — I went home that summer and people said, ‘Oh my goodness, Jim, you made the NHL and won a Stanley Cup in your rookie year. What are you going to do for an encore?’ And I said, 'We're going to do it again.' And lo and behold, we won it again."
***
Watson gives a lot of credit to his older brother, Joe, who was inducted into the Flyers' Hall of Fame in 1996, for his success.
The brothers, who grew up together in Smithers, British Columbia, were fortunate enough to play together in Philadelphia and helped solidify a formidable back end under Fred Shero.
Joe was in your face. Jimmy was more finesse.
"When you think about it when we were just young kids playing hockey in northern British Columbia in a small little town playing on the ponds, the rinks in the back yard and the lakes," Jimmy said. "Playing street hockey with tin cans, we didn't even have balls back then, we just had tin cans. All that stuff we did, taking tin cans in the face, getting stitches just because we’re playing street hockey with a piece of gravel hitting me from the blacktop and just playing together.
“I used to tag along with Joe as a kid, just at his bootstraps and just said, ‘Joe, I wanna go with you. Where ya going now?’ As we got older, we got to be men and we played together, and to see this happen, all those memories come flooding back to you. Joe has been a big, big part of my life, of course my older brother and just a real leader in my life. It’s kind of like everything coming together, if you will, at the very end for us."
Watson admitted the support from the community over the last few months has been a bit overwhelming.
He was already a celebrity of sorts at IceWorks. But when you get to add Flyers Hall of Famer to your résumé, a little extra attention is probably worthy for a man with many pupils.
"People have been coming up to me constantly congratulating me," he said. "My typical response to them is that when this occurred, I was overwhelmed with it, and still am somewhat. ... Overall it's just an absolute wonderful honor and I'm deeply appreciative of all of the support."