It’s easy to find Carolina Hurricanes fans gushing over former play-by-play man John Forslond. Which is fine. But please don’t forget the legend himself, Chuck Kaiton. For almost forty years Kaiton was the radio man for the Hartford Whalers and Carolina Hurricanes. He also holds the title of the greatest play-by-play voice the National Hockey League has ever known.
In 1978 Kaiton worked at the University of Wisconsin broadcasting Badger football and hockey games. This is where the New England Whalers discovered Kaiton, a boy from Detroit who dreamed of calling games in the NHL.
There was only one problem. In 1979 the Whalers were members of the fledgling World Hockey Association. Kaiton then a father of two, knew he couldn’t take a job in a league on the verge of collapse. Whaler officials were convinced they’d join the NHL in the near future. Kaition disagreed.
“I picked up the paper on June 3rd, 1979, and saw the merger take place,” Kaiton said while on A Brief History of Triangle Sports last summer. “I turned to my wife and said, I guess they were right.” Two months later the Whalers circled back to Kaiton assuming he would jump at the opportunity. “Absolutely I will,” Kaiton replied.
His first game behind the mic for the Whalers was an expedition game against the Pittsburgh Penguins. His color analyst was Mr. Hockey himself, Gordie Howe. Howe was at the start of his final NHL season but sat out the first expedition and joined Kaiton in the broadcast booth. “We had a lot of fun,” Kaiton said after Howe’s death in 2016. “It was a wild game. I had to pinch myself a lot during that broadcast.”
Take a moment and imagine you were growing up in Gordie Howe’s golden years in Detroit. Then you grow up and call your first NHL game sitting beside him. This was just the start of Kaiton’s Hall of Fame career.
Chuck wasn’t afraid to be himself in his dream role. Early in his second season in the broadcast booth Mark Howe was impaled by the deflector plate which was a standard feature of NHL nets at the time. The injury left Howe with a five-inch gash on his upper thigh and led the NHL to change their standard net design. Howe missed the next several weeks recovering from an injury that could have ended his Hall of Fame career early.
After dropping the next three games Kaiton saw his chance to make light of the situation thanks to an L.A. Times feature on whale watching. Accompanying the feature were four photos of a whale’s tail disappearing slowly into the ocean. Kaiton wrote the dates of the Whalers’ last three losses and added, “Does Mark Howe mean that much?”
Kaiton could be spotted at almost every major event around Hartford. Hosting fundraisers for the local children’s hospital. Serving as the master of ceremony at banquets. You could even hear Kaiton’s voice when calling the Whalers team offices. Starting in the early 80s, Kaiton created a highlight tape of the big moments in Whalers news for the week. The tapes were played when callers were placed on hold. “I think when people are put on hold things get dull,” Kaition said. “I want to make us sound like Stanley Cup Champions before we are.”
As time passed Kaiton grew into an institution in Hartford. When he missed his first exhibition game in January of 1989 it made the paper. Kaiton had a conflict when the Whalers faced the Soviet Red Army team in the 1988-89 Super Series. The St. Louis Blues honored their long-time play-by-play man Dan Kelly who suffered from cancer. “I feel sorry for missing the game,” Kaiton said to the Hartford Courant. “[I] will represent the NHL Broadcasters Association. Dan is one of the kingpins of our fraternity.”
Out of the 873 regular season, playoff, and exhibition games played by Hartford since joining the NHL, this was the first without Kaiton in the broadcast booth. The Whalers Radio Network decided not to broadcast the game. Which was probably a wise move. Hartford lost 6-3 to the Red Army Team.
Radio has been a dying medium since World War II. But Kaiton never wanted to be a television star. “I don’t think I could stand a director talking into my ear all the time the way they do on television,” Kaiton said. “In radio, we have a three-man operation. We’re in control. I have a good, dedicated engineer, Bob Joyce, and a good rapport with Andre [LaCroix, his broadcast partner for home games]. It’s simple, really. I think we can get a better production that way.”
It also helped that Kaiton was incredible in the booth. “The Fastest Man In The East.” was a two-page article published in the Hartford Courant in February 1989. Both pages praise Kaiton’s ability to make every second of the broadcast captivating. And perhaps most importantly make you feel like you were in the arena. “You just haven’t fully experienced the sport of hockey until you have heard Chuck Kaiton put it into words.”
Ten years of service and 1,000 games called isn’t terrible for an NHL broadcaster. But when Kaiton reached the milestone he set the expectation for his career. “It’s only another game, but I’m happy to have been around for 1,000,” Kaiton said. “You’ve got to hit 1,000 before you get 2,000.” Kaiton already had enough stories for a manuscript but was just getting started.
It might surprise you to know that Kaiton was a math major. But, eighteen years into his career, you knew he was as loyal as they come. “If they liked me and if it was the right situation, I’d be the kind of person who would stay a long time,” Kaiton said.
When Peter Karmanos moved his team to Raleigh in 1997 Kaiton had a choice to make. Most employees stayed in Hartford. General manager Jimmy Rutherford came to Kaiton to see if he was planning to move south. Kaiton didn’t hesitate. “Of course I am. I have two years left on a contract. I’m not going to walk away. I want to be a part of building something there.”
It wasn’t that Chuck wouldn’t miss Hartford. He was a member of the community. His sons played youth sports and he volunteered as league president for the East Granby Baseball Association. Connecticut was his home.
“Chuck is hockey,” said John Forslund in 1997. “He could have gone anywhere.” Kaition was known around the league for his raspy voice and energetic approach to play-by-play. But he’s the type of guy who wants to spend his entire career with a single franchise.
Kaiton only missed one regular season game during his 18-year Hartford career. His father passed away in late January 1992. Chuck called two more games that weekend before returning home to be with his family in Detroit. “My dad was a great guy. He loved sports,” said Kaiton. “I talked to my sister about it. I know he would have wanted me to stay and do the games last weekend.”
In addition to serving as the team’s public relations director, John Forslund also served as Kaiton’s analyst during broadcasts. Forslund would broadcast solo in Kaiton’s absence. After the funeral, Kaiton stayed the night at his mother’s house. He walked to the garage to warm up his mother’s car, then turned on the radio. From several hundred miles away Kaiton listened to his replacement for a few minutes before turning it off.
“The mood is all you have in radio,” said Kaiton. As the Whalers’ final season ended Kaiton felt queasy. He reflected after the game that it felt like a divorce. One parent left town with the kids, leaving the other alone.
For his final broadcast, Kaiton did the unthinkable. He cut back on his preparation. No power-play stats, and no streaks to maintain. That’s not the mood of this broadcast. Kaiton’s normal excitement was absent from this one.
6:35 was left in the game when Chuck and his broadcast partner dropped all pretenses and started talking about the end. “They’ve broken your hearts,” Kaiton said. “They gave you reason for ecstasy.”
“You have lost hockey in Hartford but you have not lost the memories,” He said as the clock counted down. As fans waited in the seats cheering on the team one last time, long after the game had ended Kaiton as always summed up the events. “This love affair is going to go on for who-knows-how-long. They are not hanging around. They are just trying to seep in what’s left of the memories of National Hockey League play in Hartford Connecticut U-S-A.”
Chuck left the Civic Center as the radio voice of the Hartford Whalers for the last time. He traveled home and had a family dinner with his wife Mary and their three boys to discuss the future. There wasn’t a lot of time between the final game in Hartford on April 13th, 1997, and Kaiton’s first broadcast in the team’s new home. To be exact, it was only four months.
Along with Rick Francis who served as the new team’s vice president of marketing and sales Kaiton was tapped to create the Carolina Hurricanes Radio Network. A month before the team’s first preseason game the duo announced the team’s first major deal. “WPTF was our first choice,” said Kaiton. “They’re an established station with a format that’ s conducive to running professional hockey.”
WPTF broadcasts in both the Triad and Triangle regionals. A necessity for a team that played its first two seasons in Greensboro waiting for a new arena in Raleigh to be finished.
As an organization, the Carolina Hurricanes knew they had a steep hill to climb. Except for a few minor league teams the old north state had no experience with hockey. The team hosted hockey clinics and visited local schools throughout the region. “Hockey 101” was produced to teach prospective fans about the game and its rules.
Fortunately, Chuck didn’t have to change his style. Kaiton didn’t want to talk down to listeners. Nor did he want to create a barrier for new fans who didn’t understand the lingo. He tried to call each game down the middle. “The way I took it was simple,” Kaiton said on A Brief History of Triangle Sports podcast. “There’s a lot about hockey that new fans may not realize. When there was icing, not every time it happened but periodically I would say ‘again, once the puck is shot from your half of the center red line over the goal line untouched and the other team goes back to touch it that’s icing.”
Kaiton taught a generation of Hurricanes fans about the game. He also used the second intermission as a mailbag. Kaiton’s Corner taught listeners about hockey rules, history, and anything else fans wanted to know about the sport.
Those first few years in North Carolina weren’t easy for Kaiton or the organization. WPTF didn’t broadcast Canes games for long. By the 1999-00 season, the rights shifted to WRBZ-850. WRBZ already held contracts with Duke basketball and football, Carolina basketball and football games, and Carolina Mudcats baseball. All of them took precedence over the state’s newest pro team. Hurricanes’ games were played on tape delay late into the evening. “If you think too much about who’s listening or who’s not listening, you can’t concentrate on doing your job,” Kaition said. “Besides, I envision a one-to-one relationship with the listener.”
In fairness to prospective listeners, it wasn’t always easy to find the station carrying a Hurricanes game. Being the new kids in class gave them the lowest priority when conflicts arose. In one case in 1998, the Hurricanes broadcast aired on WIX, a country station based out of Goldsboro after they were conflicted out by three college football games.
Twenty-eight hours before the Hurricanes opened their second season against the Tampa Bay Lightning for the 1998-99 season, WRBZ opted out of their contract with the Canes. WRBZ also known as 850 the BUZZ stepped in and played the game on delay as the Hurricanes organization scrambled to assemble a state-wide radio network. “As long as there are people hearing us live on the internet radio and our other stations, I don’t get distracted thinking about the tape-delayed broadcasts in the Triangle. I just do my job,” said Kaiton.
At the end of the 1999-00 season, Kaiton got a lifeline. Chuck has been the head of the NHL Broadcasting Association for a decade. He was known around the league as the most talented at his craft. But no one listened in Carolina.
That spring the Boston Bruins stepped in and made Chuck an offer. Harry Sinden, the Hall of Fame GM of the Bruins reached out to Jim Rutherford for permission to talk to Kaiton. Recognizing that this wasn’t a suitable situation for Chuck, he agreed.
Kaiton also got an offer from the Minnesota Wild who entered the league as an expansion team. Kaiton wasn’t looking for another job. But he also couldn’t refuse the opportunity to work for an original six-team. He met with the Bruins to hear their offer. Carolina hockey fans were lucky that the benefits were better in Carolina. Kaiton turned down Boston’s offer to stay in Raleigh.
“It’s a challenge for me to help the Hurricanes sell hockey in this market,” Kaiton said. “I want to help them do it.”
Two years later the Hurricanes gifted Kaiton a career first. The 2002 Stanley Cup finals. It was Chuck’s first time calling the championship series and it had the added benefit of being against the Detroit Red Wings. Growing up in Detroit, Chuck always liked the Red Wings. But Bobby Hull’s Chicago Blackhawks hold the top spot in his heart.
Carolina lost the series to an overloaded Red Wings team two seasons before the NHL implemented a salary cap. Kaition did have the opportunity to call an overtime winner before the series was over.”
“Up the middle, a lead pass, Francis at center. He stick-handles, get it through Eriksson, kicks it over the line, tries to force it, kicks it forward infront to O’Neill, who shoots… he SCORES! JEFF O”NEILL, up under the CROSS bar. Ron Francis does it again, kicks it to his stick, draws TWO men to him, PUTS it over to the right side, and JEFF O’NEEEEILL snaps it upstairs.”
A couple of seasons later, he was honored for his twenty-five years of service in Raleigh during a pregame on-ice ceremony. But one of the greatest honors of his career came during the following summer. In his role as NHL Broadcasters Association president, Kaiton was heavily involved in the selection of Foster Hewitt Memorial Award winners. Being selected for the honor makes you a member of the unofficial Hockey Hall of Fame for media members.
When New Jersey Devils broadcaster Mike ‘Doc’ Emrick called Kaiton in Raleigh to finalize the organization’s selection, the decision had already been made. “I went kicking and screaming,” Kaiton said. After twenty-five years of calling NHL games Kaition would receive his fraternity’s highest honor. “There are a lot of qualified people ahead of me,” Kaition said. “I’m honored to have the award and I know a lot of people think I’m worthy, but I think there are some people out there who deserve to go in before me.”
When the day came for Kaiton to accept the award the NHL was weeks into a lockout that would claim the 2004-05 season. You may have wondered what Chuck did during the year hoping for a return to play. It was a little of everything. Besides scratching items off his to-do list at home Kaiton also spoke at the Raleigh Sports Club and participated in a read-a-thon at Northwoods Elementary in Morrisville. And played golf. Lots and lots of golf. Mostly, he says he stayed out of his wife’s way as she remodeled the kitchen.
A year off work isn’t something Chuck Kaiton would ask for. He’s the type of person who needs something to do. Having to sit through an NHL lockout with no control was frustrating. But a fair trade-off for the seasons ahead. There wasn’t much Kaiton hadn’t already achieved. But he never worked for a Stanley Cup-winning franchise. Until 2006.
“Now the Hurricanes pour in, a centering pass, they pull Ward for the sixth attacker. Here’s Staal into Williams, he’s bumped. Gets loose, he centers, Stillman palmed it wide, three seconds to g- He SCOOOOORES! A centering pass to Staal! As Williams dumped it out of the corner, and Eric STAAL with THREE seconds to go tipped it, AND THE PLACE IS GOING WILD! UNBEEE-LIEVABLE!”
Star players aren’t remembered solely for their stat lines. They’re remembered for moments that changed the trajectory of a game, season, or franchise. Think of Bobby Orr’s Stanley Cup-winning goal. Sidney Crosby’s golden goal. Or for more recent Hurricanes fans, of Brock McGinn scoring the overtime winner against the Washington Capitals. Thousands of goals are scored each year. It’s the moments around these goals that make them special.
For a broadcaster there is nothing sweeter than calling a game seven Stanley Cup winning goal. “Hurricanes steal, Staal gets it up the middle to Williams. He’s walking in on an open net AND HE WON THE STANLEY CUP! JUSTIN WILLIAMS HAS WON THE STANLEY CUP FOR THE CAROLINA HURRICANES! In all likelihood with an empty net at 18:59.”
I was blown away by what Kaiton said next. It still gives me chills almost twenty years later. “9,393 days of frustration and on the 9,394th day of NHL existence the Carolina Hurricanes, the Whalers organization until 97′ have won the Stanley Cup!”
He didn’t take the easy way out by diving into the exuberance filling the RBC Center to its breaking point. Chuck returned to his team’s roots, Hartford, and the heartbroken fans. Back to Greensboro when no one was listening to his calls. Twenty-seven years of hope and pain had finally paid off.
Kaiton owes a lot to the hockey world, but it owes just as much to him. Along with Mike Emrick, Kaiton created the pronunciation guide broadcasters and public address announcers still use. He served as the head of the NHL Broadcasters Association for over three decades. The original plan was to become a doctor. And I’m sure Chuck would have been an exquisite physician. I just can’t imagine what modern hockey broadcasting would look like without him.
It was a passion-filled affair for Kaiton. He knew it was his job to call games. It just wasn’t working for him. Chuck woke up every morning to do what he loved. He took pride in never letting down his listeners. One of my favorite Chuck stories comes from the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs in 2009. Carolina faced off against the New Jersey Devils. Longtime listeners could hear Kaiton’s raspy voice fade as the series moved on. Allergies attacked the veteran broadcaster.
When it came time for the winner takes all game seven in New Jersey Chuck’s producers were afraid to put him on air. Going as far as having Mike Manascalco, then an employee of 99.9 FM a Raleigh sports station sitting down the hall in case Chuck’s voice gave out. Not being one to give up Chuck did whatever it took to get his voice ready for the game. When the game-winning goal was scored by Eric Staal with just seconds left in regulation Chuck’s voice jumped back to life. “Now Gleson to Staal, HE’S ACROSS THE LINE, HE SCOOOOORES! STAAL SCORES with thirty-two seconds to go with a stunning wrist shot that beats Broduer on the long side. And my voice is suddenly back.”
A constant professional Chuck’s weakened vocal cords still reached the pitch that Hurricanes fans expected to hear.
Not every fairytale comes with a heartfelt ending. In 2018, Kaiton’s contract renewal was approaching, and his career with the franchise he served for almost forty years was about to end. The team’s new ownership slashed costs around the organization to try and stop the financial bleeding that had almost led to the team’s relocation. There had been rumblings before about a possible Kaiton exit but this one felt different.
“We haven’t made a final decision on that yet,” said Hurricanes general manager Don Waddell. “We think it’s important to continue to do radio. Radio is not a prudent financial decision.” Depending on who you asked at the time there were less than 2000 people listening to each broadcast. It was easier for most people to listen to the game on their phones than turn on the radio. Carolina’s radio broadcast would suffer from an evolving landscape. The question wasn’t if Chuck would return to radio play-by-play. It was as if the organization would find a new role for him.
On July 24, 2018, the official word came down. After 39 years, Chuck Kaiton and the Carolina Hurricanes parted ways. “I think the game has come a long way in this state,” Kaiton said. “I am honored to have been a part of that. I’ve always envisioned being with one organization. That’s positive to me. I’ve been lucky to work 39 years with one, through a move and three ownerships. They’ve treated me well. I can’t complain about that at all. The fans have been great and I admire and wish Rod Brind’Amour the best of luck in his coaching career. I think he’ll do well.”
That was it. The last Carolina Hurricanes fans heard from a franchise icon. No chance to say goodbye. Hurricanes fans never got a chance to sit around and seep in the memories of what it was like to hear Chuck Kaiton call Carolina Hurricanes games. They didn’t have the chance to give Chuck the sendoff he deserved. Until now…
For the first time since his departure in 2018, the Hurricanes have invited Chuck Kaiton back for Whalers Night. Long-time equipment manager Chip Cunningham, who was the first hire of the New England Whalers in 1973, accompanied Kaiton. I would be lying if I said my eyes didn’t well as PNC Arena welcomed home the only radio voice they’ve ever known.
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