Vicki Hall
Calgary Herald

Herb Zurkowsky arrived at Toronto's Exhibition Stadium on June 24, 1987, and looked up to see a marquee that read: "Argonauts vs. Blue Bombers."

The intrepid Gazette football writer pulled a woman aside and told her someone should change the sign.

"Where have you been?" the woman asked.

The curmudgeonly Zurkowsky had taken a few days off before the game and failed to realize the Alouettes had folded.

No matter. The man known as Zeke Herbowsky has more than rebounded from that setback. Now 52, Zurkowsky was named yesterday to the media section of the Canadian Football Hall of Fame.

"I love covering the Als and the CFL, contrary to popular opinion, and have thoroughly enjoyed my years on the beat," Zurkowsky said yesterday. "The beauty of football, with only one game a week, is that it challenges you to generate interesting stories between games.

"I've always attempted to think outside the box and show the other side of the great athletes I've covered over the years."

One of his story subjects, former Alouettes safety Tony Proudfoot, accompanied Zurkowsky as an inductee at the ceremony hosted by the Football Reporters of Canada.

"I really like the fact the Als are playing in this Grey Cup game," said Proudfoot, who worked as a colour commentator for CJAD Radio. "Being here in Montreal, it's like coming full circle all the way back to 1977."

In the 1977 Grey Cup, Proudfoot came up with the idea of putting staples on the bottom of his teammates' shoes to provide traction on the slippery turf at the roofless Olympic Stadium. The Als soundly defeated the Edmonton Eskimos 41-7 in what is known to this day as the Ice Bowl.

Proudfoot helped save the life of a student during the 2006 shooting at Dawson College. With shots still ringing out, he ran onto the street with a first-aid kit and applied pressure to the head of a student with a bullet in him.

The student survived.

At 57, Proudfoot was diagnosed last May with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or Lou Gehrig's Disease.

"These awards are usually given out to people at the end of their tenure or who are retiring," Proudfoot said, talking through a computer that generates speech from the written word. "It's easy to think it is the case with me.

"This cruel and insidious disease is truly killing me, but I am not taking it. Although I can't talk well anymore, I'm still hoping to find ways to be involved with this game.

"Although my voice is almost gone and I have an increasingly hard time swallowing and breathing, I can still go out and continue to be as active as anyone - actually more than most of the print media."

Zurkowsky is a legend among his peers in the print media.

"His stories in The Gazette have lots of quotes from Alouettes slotback Ben Cahoon, but none from general manager Jim Popp," said Darrell Davis, the FRC's secretary-treasurer. "They're a mixture of hard-nosed reporting and heartbreaking features. They're like Herb - gruff and sentimental."

Zurkowsky also has earned the respect of the players he covers.

"Herb has watched me grow up," Als cornerback Davis Sanchez said. "As a reporter, we don't always consider him a part of the family. But to me, he is part of the team here.

"Some of what he writes is good. Some of it is bad. Whenever he writes something bad and guys give him a hard time, I always say he is not doing his job if people don't get mad sometimes."

Als centre Bryan Chiu can't help but laugh as he watches Zurkowsky prowl the locker room on the lookout for his next big scoop.

"He's definitely controversial," Chiu said. "But, at the same time, he's definitely a great writer.

"I loved watching him cover (ex-Als coach) Don Matthews. It was a sit-com around here. I loved that love-hate battle.

"As much as our coaches didn't like him at that time, I think he's great for the league."

Although Proudfoot's medical prognosis is dire, he promised to keep fighting and keep living every day to the fullest.

"I promise you I do not plan on retiring any time soon," he said. "I will see everybody at the Grey Cup in Calgary next year."

Courtesy: www.calgaryherald.com