“Years ago while quenching his thirst at some forgotten oasis in Cleveland, Ohio, Paul Hoynes, veteran “beat writer” for that city's Guardians major-league baseball team, noticed an intriguing photograph on the wall.

The image depicted eight tuxedo-clad men who sat at the head table of the “1928 Champions of Sport Banquet” in New York City. Hoynes's chest swelled with pride when he spotted a familiar face among such luminaries as baseball's Babe Ruth, heavyweight champ Gene Tunney, tennis titan Bill Tilden, Olympic champion swimmer (and later Hollywood's original Tarzan) Johnny Weismuller, and others from the so-called "Golden Age of Sports." Bookending the top row with the Sultan of Swat and standing just behind the golfer Bobby Jones is New York Rangers great Bill Cook, the National Hockey League team's first captain who that year spearheaded the upstart “Broadway Blueshirts” to the Stanley Cup in just their second year in operation.

Picking out Cook from the octet of sports heroes, Hoynes grinned and thought: “Well, look at that, it's Daddy Bill.”

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