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Rick Martin
Richardmartin
Position Winger
Height
Weight
5 ft 11 in (1.80 m)
179 lb (81 kg)
Teams NHL
Buffalo Sabres
Los Angeles Kings
Nationality Flag of Canada Canadian
Born Junly 28,1951,
Verdun, QU, CAN
NHL Draft 5th overall, 1971
Buffalo Sabres
Pro Career 19711982


Richard "Rick" Martin (born July 26, 1951 in Verdun, Quebec) is a retired Canadian professional winger who played in the National Hockey League (NHL) with the Buffalo Sabres and Los Angeles Kings for 11 seasons between 1971 and 1982. He is perhaps most famous for playing on the Sabres' French Connection line with Gilbert Perreault and Rene Robert.

Playing career[]

Martin was drafted 5th overall by the Buffalo Sabres in the 1971 NHL Amateur Draft after a junior career with the Montreal Junior Canadiens of the Ontario Hockey Association (OHA). He played 685 career NHL games, scoring 384 goals and 317 assists for 701 points. His best season was the 1974–75 NHL season when he scored 52 goals and 95 points in only 68 games. Martin scored at least 44 goals five times in his NHL career. Martin was selected to play in 7 consecutive National Hockey League All-Star Games (1971–72, through 1977–78) and was selected as the official NHL All-Star First Team left wing in 1973–74 and 1974–75 and the official NHL All-Star Second Team left wing in 1975–76 and 1976–77. Martin holds the franchise career records for hat tricks, four goal games, 40 goal seasons, consecutive 40 goal seasons, 50 goal seasons (tied with Danny Gare), consecutive 50 goal seasons.

Martin was involved in probably one of the two most frightening injuries on Buffalo home ice (the other being when Clint Malarchuk's jugular was lacerated). Dave Farrish of the New York Rangers hooked Martin around the neck from behind and kicked Martin's feet out from under him, causing Martin to hit his head on the ice. He was knocked unconscious, and went into convulsions. After that play, helmets became a much more common sight on the heads of his Sabre teammates.

On November 8, 1980 his career was dealt a cataclysmic blow. In a game against the Washington Capitals in the Aud, Martin was racing in on a breakaway. Capitals forward Ryan Walter managed to trip Martin and no penalty was called. Capitals goalie Mike Palmateer, already way out of his crease, knocked Martin back down by kicking his knee, causing severe cartilage damage from which Martin would never fully recover.

Martin got surgery in Toronto and on March 10, 1981, Scotty Bowman traded Martin and Don Luce to the Kings for a pair of draft picks, one of which the Sabres used to get goalie Tom Barrasso in 1983. Martin played four games for the Los Angeles Kings before hanging up the skates. His number 7 was retired along with Rene Robert on November 15, 1995 to hang alongside Perreault's.


Records and Achievements[]

  • Most goals by a rookie- 44 in 1971-72, surpassed by Mike Bossy (53 in 1977-78) and currently held by Teemu Selanne (76 in 1992-93)
  • He was the youngest player in NHL history to score 200 goals (24 years, 141 days) until he was surpassed by Bryan Trottier (24 years, 98 days).

Career statistics[]

    Regular season   Playoffs
Season Team League GP G A Pts PIM GP G A Pts PIM
1968–69 Montreal Junior Canadiens OHA 52 22 21 43 27
1969–70 Montreal Junior Canadiens OHA 34 23 32 55 10
1970–71 Montreal Junior Canadiens OHA 60 71 51 122 106
1971–72 Buffalo Sabres NHL 73 44 30 74 39 -- -- -- -- --
1972–73 Buffalo Sabres NHL 75 37 36 73 79 6 3 2 5 12
1973–74 Buffalo Sabres NHL 78 52 34 86 38 -- -- -- -- --
1974–75 Buffalo Sabres NHL 68 52 43 95 72 17 7 8 15 20
1975–76 Buffalo Sabres NHL 80 49 37 86 67 9 4 7 11 12
1976–77 Buffalo Sabres NHL 66 36 29 65 58 6 2 1 3 9
1977–78 Buffalo Sabres NHL 65 28 35 63 16 7 2 4 6 13
1978–79 Buffalo Sabres NHL 73 32 21 53 35 3 0 3 3 0
1979–80 Buffalo Sabres NHL 80 45 34 79 54 14 6 4 10 8
1980–81 Buffalo Sabres NHL 23 7 14 21 20 -- -- -- -- --
1980–81 Los Angeles Kings NHL 1 1 1 2 0 1 0 0 0 0
1981–82 Los Angeles Kings NHL 3 1 3 4 2 -- -- -- -- --
NHL totals 685 384 317 701 477 63 24 29 53 74


External links[]

Preceded by
Gilbert Perreault
All-Time NHL Rookie Season goal record
1971–72
Succeeded by
Mike Bossy
This page uses content from Wikipedia. The original article was at Rick Martin. The list of authors can be seen in the page history. As with Ice Hockey Wiki, the text of Wikipedia is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike License 3.0 (Unported) (CC-BY-SA).


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