Howe about that? Former Flyer Mark joins his dad Gordie in hallowed hall

IT'S ONE thing to achieve greatness in life. But to watch your child walk among legends must be a whole other story.

When former Flyers defenseman Mark Howe steps onto the Hall of Fame stage in Toronto on Monday, he will have his dad by his side. The 975 professional goals Gordie Howe scored never made him beam this much.

"I am thrilled beyond belief. I am so proud of him," Gordie Howe said before joking, "but like Eddie Shore once said, 'What took him so long?' "

Mark Howe played 22 professional seasons, including 10 with the Flyers from 1982-92. He becomes the fourth player to go into hockey's mecca as a Flyer. His classmates are goaltender Eddie Belfour and forwards Doug Gilmour and Joe Nieuwendyk.

"It's the greatest honor that can be put upon one person," Mark Howe said. "There was a lot of help from a lot of people. Just to be recognized is a tremendous honor."

Howe, who ended his career in 1995, is also being inducted tonight into the Philadelphia Sports Hall of Fame with a mammoth class that includes Moses Malone, Wilbert Montgomery and Dawn Staley.

Gordie Howe went into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1972 and retired as the NHL's all-time leader in just about every significant category.

"He has a lot of class," Gordie said proudly. "He earned it in his own right. The name didn't help, except that it was easy to spell."

Mark Howe began his pro career as a pretty good winger in Houston in the WHA, averaging nearly 38 goals over his first three seasons. He got to play on the same line as his brother, Marty, with their dad in the middle.

Mark Howe signed as a free agent with New England, which eventually became the Hartford Whalers when some of the WHA teams folded into the NHL in 1979-80.

The final three seasons Howe played with the Whalers were miserable. He was beginning the switch over to defense where his skills were better suited, and had never lost so much. In his first season, the Whalers finished eighth in the 10-team Prince of Wales Conference. The following year, they were ninth. By his third year they were at the bottom of the barrel.

Flyers chairman Ed Snider got wind that Whalers' owner Howard Baldwin was shaking up the team and one of the pieces on the block was Howe, who had requested a trade to either the Bruins, Rangers, Islanders or Flyers. But the asking price was heavy.

"I said [to Baldwin] don't trade him to anybody else. We want him," Snider recalled. "I went to Keith Allen, our general manager, and we started working on a deal. They wanted a third- or fourth-line forward thrown into the deal and Keith said that was too much."

Allen, according to Snider, admitted that Howe could "probably be the best defenseman we've ever had."

On Aug. 19, 1982, the Flyers traded Ken Linseman, who had been their leading scorer the previous year, young forward Greg Adams (the near deal-breaker) and two draft picks that never panned out (David Jensen, Leif Karlsson) for Howe.

"I'll tell you," Snider said, "it's one of the best deals we've ever made."

Howe, at 27, was joining a club that had several young pieces that would contend for the Stanley Cup in the coming years. Guys like Tim Kerr, Brian Propp, Ilkka Sinisalo and Pelle Lindbergh represented a transition from the Broad Street Bullies days to a more grinding and more skilled club.

"I was glad to be on a team that was going to be a competitive hockey club," Howe said. "Winning is the name of the game."

The Flyers reached the Stanley Cup Finals in 1985 only to lose to the high-flying Oilers in five games. Goaltender Lindbergh was killed in a one-car accident that November and the cloud that was cast over the 1985-86 Flyers lingered until a disappointing first-round loss against the Rangers.

Howe was playing alongside Brad McCrimmon and had the best season of his career in '85-86. The two formed the greatest defense pairing in team history. Howe finished the season at plus-85. McCrimmon, who died in that Russian hockey team plane crash in September, was plus-83. For perspective, Zdeno Chara led the NHL last season at plus-33.

"For me, there was a 4-year stretch that Mark Howe was the best defenseman in the league," said former teammate Rick Tocchet. "No disrespect to guys like Ray Bourque and Paul Coffey and guys like that, they were fabulous hockey players. But Howie was terrific."

"The way we played, [Howe] couldn't really cheat, he had to play a defensive game and he still got his points. I can imagine if he played with more offensive talent, he'd have scored more. Our best scorer was Timmy Kerr and the rest of us were bunch of pluggers. Mark Howe was such an anchor for us back there."

Rookie goalie Ron Hextall was the last line of that stellar defense and led the Flyers to Game 7 of the 1986-87 Stanley Cup Finals, which they lost to Edmonton. The signature moment of that series was an unlikely goal in Game 6 by reserve defenseman J.J. Daigneault, who was on the ice only because Howe took a rare breather.

"I've always said that was the best line change I've ever had," Howe laughed. "I came to the bench, J.J. flew on and he just walked right into the puck. I thought the roof was going to cave in on the Spectrum."

Tocchet was on the bench and had a clear view of the events.

"J.J. jumped [onto the ice] and Mike yelled at him to come back and then said '[Bleep] it! Stay!' He stayed on the ice and scored the goal," Tocchet said. "It was kind of comical the way it all went down."

Daigneault's goal, with 5:32 left, held up as the winner in the 3-2 Flyers' victory.

"I played in some big games, but that's the loudest I've ever heard a building," said Tocchet, who won the Stanley Cup with the Penguins in 1992. "I remember flying to Edmonton and Howie wasn't even celebrating. He was just focused on the next game. He never got too high or too low. Sometimes you couldn't even tell if he'd won or lost."

Those Oilers teams of the mid-80s had six Hall of Famers, led by Wayne Gretzky and Mark Messier. Howe is the first, and possibly only, from the Flyers. Tocchet deserves consideration for his career work. Lindbergh looked like he was on his way until his tragedy.

Gordie Howe is to hockey what Muhammad Ali is to boxing and Babe Ruth is to baseball. Legendary. Iconic. Transcending the sport. All apply. Being a son of one of the Mount Rushmore faces of professional sports had advantages and pitfalls.

"For every door that it closed, it opened 20-25," said Mark Howe, now the director of pro scouting for the Red Wings.

"You just had to respect it. Growing up the son of Gordie Howe, my brother Marty and I had to deal with a lot of extra attention. There was a lot of negativity from parents of the teams we were playing. And then you get into the comparisons. If, you know, you try to compare yourself to the best player ever, you're always going to come up short."

"It had to be difficult, but his personality is such that he doesn't let anything bother him," said Snider. "He's got this solid way about him and that helped him tremendously."

Howe's bloodlines enabled him to train with the Red Wings during preseason camps as a teenager and work as a stick boy when opponents visited Detroit's Olympia Stadium. That same surname also kept him on the right path.

"We all knew that if we were in the wrong place at the wrong time or doing the wrong thing, it was going to be our father's name in the paper," Mark Howe said. "It put a little more onus on all of us to do the right thing."

Teammates always got a charge when Gordie would stop by the locker room. But when the legend left, the kid stayed behind and blended in as conspicuously as possible.

"Yeah, he was Gordie Howe's son, but I never felt that he carried himself that way," Tocchet said. "He never looked like he had that burden. I mean, if it was 6 o'clock and we were going to dinner, Mark Howe was with us having a beer. If we were on a losing streak, he'd grab some of the guys, grab a beer and said 'let's talk it out.' To us, he wasn't Gordie Howe's son. He was Mark Howe."

Now, he's Mark Howe, Hall of Famer.

"Whenever I went to see him play, he'd always make a play or come up with something in order to make himself better," Gordie Howe said. "I'm proud of him as a hockey player, but just as proud of him as a man."