dalredane Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 One of my favorite Canucks of all time not only for how he played with a heart seldom seen since, but for all the work he does to help First Nations on and off the ice. A true Canuck http://www.theprovince.com/sports/hockey/canucks-hockey/Canucks+player+Gino+Odjick+rebound+battles/10777690/story.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BanTSN Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 Saw dat. GINOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coastal.view Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 wow that is great wonderful news i hope he has another mentor in place now telling him to stick with the program and who will stay in regular contact with him should he be released from hospital Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tbone909 Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 So very glad to hear this and a wonderful thing that Pat did by not telling Gino that he had cancer. The more stories I hear about things that Quinn did out human kindness the more respect I have for the man everyday. Good luck Gino RIP Pat Quinn. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghostsof1915 Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 A true warrior, on and off the ice. Inspiration to others, and a quality guy. GIIIIIINOOOOOOOOOOO! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-DLC- Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 He is an inspiration, as was Quinn. We've been gifted over the years with some wonderful Canucks to cheer for. And rallying behind Gino at his low point was an absolute honour...so glad to hear that he's beating this battle. As always. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Industrious1 Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 So happy that he is overcoming the odds. One of my favorite Canucks of all time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rounoush Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr.DirtyDangles Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 Love you GINO :D So glad he is on the path to recovery. Quinner was so unselfish and hearing he left strict instruction that GINO did not know what he himself was fighting shows some deep love and respect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nux4lyfe Posted February 1, 2015 Share Posted February 1, 2015 Gino could never do no wrong!, Watching him and Bure play together was a treat...great memories..and him coming out to Bure's Jersey retirement was icing on the cake, He looked like he came straight from the Roxy! haha, Love the dude.....GINO! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-DLC- Posted February 5, 2015 Share Posted February 5, 2015 A bit more on Gino: VANCOUVER - To understand how Gino Odjick felt about Pat Quinn, you need to know only the old tale about Mike Keenan berating Odjick in the coach’s office, a couple of months after Quinn was fired in 1997 by the Vancouver Canucks. Keenan’s energetic criticism was interrupted by a phone call. Odjick didn’t know who was on the line, but Keenan began to speak very badly of Quinn. So Gino walked over to Iron Mike’s desk, hung up the coach’s phone and told Keenan he could say whatever he wanted about Odjick, call him any name he liked, but he had better never, ever speak that way about Pat Quinn. Of course, maybe it was only an arena legend. “Yeah, the good old days,” Odjick says, confirming the story with a nod and a smile. “I can’t remember exactly what I said to Mike. But now we all get along. I see Mike sometimes.” It is good to see Odjick smile, even if it will never be quite as broad after Quinn’s death in November. There was a chance last summer that Odjick might not be with us in 2015. The 44-year-old former Canucks enforcer suffers from cardiac amyloidosis, a rare condition in which proteins form deposits on the heart and eventually stop the organ. The disease is terminal and the average life expectancy after diagnosis is one year. Odjick was diagnosed last spring. After declining rapidly in Vancouver, Odjick, an Algonquin native from the Maniwaki reserve outside Ottawa, went home to spend time with his eight children and to begin chemotherapy in the capital. Odjick’s heart function has improved to 58 per cent capacity, from a low of 28 per cent, and he says his disease is in “remission.” Wednesday night, at the Hyatt Regency in Vancouver, he accepts the prestigious Jack Diamond Award from the Jewish Community Centre and Odjick, no doubt, will mention Quinn. One of the people there to see him will be Peter Leech. Just as Quinn was no ordinary coach, Leech is no ordinary friend. “Is the worst over? For right now it is,” Leech says of Odjick’s fight. “The doctors have given him more time, which is great. The opportunity for us now is to take advantage of that time and find ways to create even more time. There’s no reason we can’t do that. We turned six months into a year, now to two or three years. I think we can turn two or three years into six or eight years.” Leech, a First Nations entrepreneur from the T’it’q’et community near Lillooet, says “we” a lot when he talks about Odjick and the disease. Introduced two decades ago by Canucks scout Ron Delorme, Leech and Odjick have done many workshops for First Nations kids, preaching education and self-belief. Lately, the friends have been inseparable. Some people will visit a close friend in hospital, run errands for them, maybe look after their pet. Leech bought a bigger house in Burnaby so Odjick could move in with him and his wife and their three kids. “We moved so he could live with us and my son wouldn’t have to sleep on the couch,” Leech says. “My kids call him Uncle Gino. People give me kudos for things I’ve done since he got nailed with this disease, but he’s always been a big help to me and my family. But he asked me if I could help him. Of course I would.” The 46-year-old Leech, who has an MBA and does consulting work with First Nations groups on a variety of issues, makes sure Odjick rests and eats properly and gets where he needs to go. Leech visited Ottawa several times during the fall when Odjick was undergoing chemo. “I’ve known Peter for over 20 years,” Odjick says. “He’s from Lillooet but his mom’s from Musqueam. It just surprises you the love people show you when you get sick, and who’s there. He has meant a lot to me.” So, Gino says, have the innumerable messages of support since his illness became public. “Amazing, surprising, overwhelming,” Odjick says. “I knew I was popular, but didn’t think I was that popular.” Quinn told us last year that besides Pavel Bure, Odjick was the one player from the powerful Canucks teams of the early ’90s who got fans out of their seats. Leech has been answering Odjick’s emails and Facebook messages. “People keep quoting him saying he’s ‘the little old Indian boy from the rez.’ That was my quote,” Leech says. “I told him ‘you better keep it now.’ We’re two little old Indian boys from the rez.” “I don’t feel like I’m sick at all,” Odjick says. “I’m low on energy sometimes, but I’ve had nothing but good news since (I began treatment) in Ottawa. It was touch-and-go here before I went, but things have straightened out and I’m pretty happy about that. The doctors were surprised and happy at the same time.” Leech says he gets at least as much as Odjick out of their relationship. “I lean on him for the same things he leans on me for,” Leech says. “People always ask us: ‘Are you guys family?’ Yes, we are brothers.” imacintyre@vancouversun.comTwitter.com/imacvansun © Copyright © The Vancouver Sun Read more: http://www.vancouversun.com/sports/Gino+Odjick+finds+reasons+smile+brother+helps+battle/10785074/story.html#ixzz3QqrF8W3E Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blackpluto96 Posted February 5, 2015 Share Posted February 5, 2015 This is awesome and heart-warming. Things like this reminds me how proud I should be as a Canucks fan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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