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The consultant and facilitator, and former professional athlete Peter Leech discusses the new biography he’s co-written (with Patrick Johnston) Gino: The Fighting Spirit of Gino Odjick (Greystone, 2025) and the close personal friendship he had with Odjick, with Joseph Planta.
Gino: The Fighting Spirit of Gino Odjick by Patrick Johnston and Peter Leech (Greystone, 2025).
Click to buy this book from Amazon.ca: Gino
Text of the introduction by Joseph Planta:
I am Planta: On the Line, in Vancouver, British Columbia, at TheCommentary.ca.
One of the highlights of the fall season is the new biography of beloved NHL player Gino Odjick. Written by Patrick Johnston and Peter Leech, it’s a frank, revelatory, and entertaining book about the late Vancouver Canucks player, who when he emerged in the early 1990s was one of the few Indigenous players at the time. As you read in Gino: The Fighting Spirit of Gino Odjick, he was a larger-than-life figure on and off the ice, who was one of the league’s most feared enforcers, who was also revered by teammates. The book chronicles the on-ice career of Odjick, these remarkable friendships he develops on the team, chiefly Pavel Bure, as well as the reverence he has for the game, and some of the coaching and team leadership like Pat Quinn. You get a sense of how Odjick makes it to the NHL, and the persona he cultivated. What the Messer’s. Johnston and Leech have also done is reveal the loving household he came from, as well as the struggles with alcohol abuse, and personal health challenges in later years. Joining me now is one of the authors of the book, Peter Leech. (Patrick will be on the program tomorrow.) Peter is himself a former professional athlete, and a former amateur boxing champion. He was close friends with Gino Odjick for more than twenty-five years, and for the last ten years of Odjick’s life, he and his wife Charlene were host to Odjick in their home. It’s a unique and close relationship, and I’ll ask Peter to give us some insight into what it was like navigating through the health issues that Odjick contended with, which led to his death at the age of 52 in 2013. A member of the T’it’q’et Community Village of the St’at’imc Tribal Nation, he has worked for many years with Indigenous Nation communities and organisations, including mentoring Indigenous youth, which he and Gino Odjick worked on for many years. This new book is published by Greystone Books. We taped this interview one week ago, with Peter joining me from his home in Burnaby. Please welcome to the Planta: On the Line program, Peter Leech; Mr. Leech, good morning.
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