I remember Mike Dodd. He was Orillia’s omnipresence, unless, of course, one looked for him.
After an event, when the crowd thinned out, you’d invariably spot him. Mike Dodd was just always there, folding his notepad into a pocket after recording a detail, adding an insight, getting his quote.
His ambling-shuffle, a little bit stooped, while ever-adjusting that strap on his camera bag seemingly sewn into the shoulder of his coat. He’d be muttering to himself, never in a rush, always on his way to the next event.
It wasn’t really an event unless Mike Dodd was there. Not that the circumstance needed to be noteworthy, just simply of interest, with a bit more beneath the surface. And, if he was there, somehow you were too, even if you weren’t.
One might recall Mike covering long-ago contests at Penetang and Patrick – Lions Oval’s Majors in the summer, the Community Centre’s Terriers in the winter. Sometimes, just a conversation with a firefighter about a cat in a tree.
Mike put it best in a farewell column to Orillians in 2016, brushing aside his interviews of Orr and Gretzky, even of Ali, emphasizing instead, “I always loved telling people about people.” You see, it never was about him; it was always about you, whether you realized it then, or only just now.
For me, it will always be Legion baseball and its early Saturday morning, opening day parade, up Colborne to McKinnell, with kids in a kaleidoscope of coloured shirts, too small for many, but in ballcaps and gloves too big for them all. When the colours dispersed, Mike would suddenly appear. He’d be sunlit in the outfield, interviewing a coach, then the convener.
Twenty-plus years ago, I began submitting the odd column to The Packet. On one such occasion there was a strained moment between us. A slight complication, you see, with my NHL playoff preview’s round two, owing to a late-running, Friday night game-seven, not cooperating with Mike’s deadline for submission.
I dug-in on the critical matter that that game’s outcome would determine Toronto’s second-round opponent. Mike countered sternly, “The Saturday Packet doesn’t land on Sunday. We’re going to press!” delivered in that baritone boom of his that could have earned him a berth in any broadcast booth.
Aggravated though I was, the moment was not without mirth. I pictured Mike triumphantly pressing a large black button, the size of a small pizza, with extra assertion.
Truth be told, he addressed my dilemma rather adeptly. I recall something to the effect of, “Match-ups uncertain, game late due to OT. If the Devils won, Toronto gets Boston. If the Penguins won, Toronto faces Pittsburgh. No matter, either way the Leafs will be swept.”
Further back still, the World Cup of ’96. Our boys, Eric (8) and Adam (6), were attending the Kiwanis Club of Orillia’s hockey school, the highlight of which was a contest sponsored by The Packet for a pair of tickets to a Toronto hockey game at Maple Leaf Gardens. This prize, to the kid at the camp who was to correctly predict the tournament winner and its MVP.
Well, as anyone with a modicum of hockey acumen and/or, Canadian citizenship, might surmise, there was a preponderance of, “Canada-Gretzky,” “Canada-Messier,” “Canada-Lindros,” prognostications from the peewee pundits.
In fact, in anticipation of an onslaught of such selections, the prescient Packet added the caveat of a prediction of the championship game’s final score. A tie-breaking mechanism was definitely in order for the seemingly certain dozen or so winners.
Mike arrived at the Brian Orser Arena, circled the dressing room, collecting 50 or more ballots. As he approached us, Adam declared, “United States-Tkachuk”; foolhardy for sure, but with commendable conviction.
Now, I’m not the most patient of sorts, and I’m forever running late. So, in addition to getting two hockey-schoolers home, and me back to work, I’ve now got to delicately undo Adam’s inept prediction. A hint of humour failed horribly. I played the ‘Gretzky-card’. I tried the patriotic-play. Each to no avail, “Adam” being short for “Adamant”.
With mounting exasperation and my eyebrows raised in a plea for intervention, I turned to Mike. He shrugged while responding, “I think we have a story here,” ignoring me altogether.
The U.S. won, rendering that tie-breaking tweak irrelevant. Adam got the tickets, met Tkachuk at the game.
Mike got the story.
He was a fixture in the local media, revered as the kind-hearted, community chronicler. In some way, shape, or form, he featured every Orillian, whether at age-four, 44, or four-score.
From here on in, when that parading ballplayers’ rainbow wanes, I’ll remember Mike Dodd.
