RIP Petr Klima

A brilliant young player for the Red Wings whose time in Detroit was derailed by alcohol abuse. He was only 58.

He also was remembered for a playoff overtime goal for the Oilers.

https://www.freep.com/story/sports/...d-wing-petr-klima-passes-away-58/70183772007/

https://www.detroitnews.com/story/s...wings-goal-scorer-dies-at-age-58/70183159007/

 

This sucks
Really fun player to watch
I hope his demons didn’t catch up with him

 

I was at that one. Klima had like 12 seconds of ice time in the first 100 minutes. When he came on to score this goal, every other Oiler and Bruin was totally gassed. He was skating about twice as fast as everyone else. Not a happy life, though. RIP.

 

I know a guy who was playing for Cleveland in the IHL when Klima was sent down for a conditioning stint by the Penguins. The stories he had about him were unreal, both in the IHL and what Klima told him he got up to in Detroit. He said he was light years better than anyone else on the ice - when he felt like it.

 

Klima was Probert’s drinking buddy
The story of how the Wings got him out of what was then Czechoslovakia is something out of a spy novel

 

RIP.

 

He said they'd drink at the airport so nobody would recognize them since the Wings were always on the watch for them. He was either in the car ahead or behind Probert when he got busted at the US-Canada border.

 

Remember that story from Jimmy D and Roger Lajoie's book. Didn't it involve Nick Polano and Jim Lites?
The funniest was the Wings paying off some Russians to claim Vladimir Konstantinov had cancer so he could be released from the Red Army.

 

Yes

 

Mainly remember the guy for two things: the goal in 1990 and his helmet.

 

I loved Klima. He was the best when he wanted to be. His passing makes me sad. But that commercial made my week.