Playing the San Jose Sharks this week brought back some memories for Terry Murray, who was a defenseman for the Oakland-based California Golden Seals in the early 1970s. Murray shared his memories of how the Seals players were close with the pro baseball and football players in town. Murray played for the Seals when they were owned by then-Oakland A’s owner Charlie O. Finley — an eccentric man who once tried to introduce orange baseballs into the game — and the hockey players would get free tickets to baseball playoff games.
Murray shared one of his favorite stories from those times…
MURRAY: “It was a playoff game, but not the World Series. There was a TV timeout, and they had the usher walking down, and they had the Oakland A’s banner on a stick, and they passed it out to all of us. Charlie Finley stood up and turned around to all of us, and he said, `So, you see that TV (camera) down there? When that light comes on, on that TV, I want everybody standing up and waving that Oakland A’s banner.’ So we did. Some didn’t. I was a kid, so I was the first one up, but a bunch of the veteran guys said, `Shove it.’ The funny part about it was, now play starts, the camera turns and the usher came back and made us pass them all back.”
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