Jack Walker: Hockey's Original Defensive Forward

Jack Walker, veteran center-ice player with Detroit Cougars during the past season, has been judged the most popular player on the Detroit team, which is not surprising.

Walker, like Frank Nighbor of the champion Senators, is a type of player that plays the puck and not the man. Like Nighbor, he is poke-check expert, and also like the famous Senator star, he is a clean-living athlete and a credit to the game in which he has been a prominent figure for fifteen years.

Hockey owes much to players like Jack Walker.

Those wonderful words were written about Jack Walker by the Ottawa Citizen back in 1927. By then Walker was in the twilight of his career. He was in just his second NHL season, but long before that he established himself as one the best hockey players in the world.

Walker's calling card was his defensive game. He was a great skater and the brainiest player of his day. In the days when forward passing was greatly restricted, Walker like to prey on attackers in the neutral zone. He is often cited as the creator of the poke-check, though in reality it was more of a sweeping hook. He essentially created a one man neutral zone trap. And it worked to near perfection.

There was no Frank Selke trophy for top defensive forward in hockey back then. But they should have created one in honour of "the Old Fox," Jack Walker. He sacrificed his own offensive totals to excel at the team game. He was rewarded with seven championships, including three Stanley Cups.

Frank Nighbor perfected Walker's defensive strategies, and perhaps got more credit but only because he plied his trade in the National Hockey League. Walker only played in 80 NHL games over 2 seasons, scoring just 5 goals.  But he was one of hockey's most valuable players and all stars in the NHA (Toronto Blue Shirts) and PCHA/WCHL (Seattle Metropolitans and Victoria Cougars) before that. Three times (with three different teams and in three different leagues) he was instrumental in winning the Stanley Cup.

In 1960 Jack Walker was rightfully included in the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Defensive Strategies Always Controversial

Neutral zone traps. Clutching, grabbing and other obstruction. Line matching and shadows.

These are forms of the modern defensive game that drawn the ire of hockey pundits and hockey fans over the years.

But complaining about defensive strategies clogging up the fastest game on ice is nothing new. Check out this 1932 article from the Calgary Daily Herald. Not only does author Jimmy Thompson pay homage to the early defensive forwards of hockey, but he argues their style of hockey should become extinct:

Not only are the real masters of the hookcheck passing from hockey but there are some critics who think that it should be abolished altogether from the game. While it may be one of the most devastating weapons for breaking up scoring plays yet, in the opinion of one writer, "it contributes to much centre-ice play which is far from entertaining for the spectator."

The point seems to be that long arms and longer sticks, rather than hockey intelligence and ability, are requisites for its success. Don't confuse the poke check with the hook check. The poke-check can be used effectively only against the puck carrier. The ice-sweeping hook check, first mastered by Frank "Dutch" Nighbor, present manager of the Buffalo Bisons, is a wide swing which often attains a radius of 18 feet. It harasses not only the puck carrier, but the wing men who may be in a position to receive a pass.

The hook check has been made of late years by players on their knees. It rather tends to slow up the game. Nighbor is through as an active player, so is Jack Walker who is credited with its invention. "Hooley" Smith is adept at the sweeping check, but the best in the business today is "Pit" Lepine of the Canadiens. When he sets himself out to play a straight defensive game, Lepine is almost impossible to pass.

Obviously this exact tactic no longer is in practice. Perhaps it is because of rules permitting forward passing or the increasingly common practice of the saucer pass. Essentially what the early stars such as Walker, Nighbor, Smith and Lepine did was their own version of the neutral zone trap.