Thomas John Laidlaw (born April 15, 1958) is a Canadian retired

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hock ...

defenceman Defence or defense (in American English) in ice hockey is a player position that is primarily responsible for preventing the opposing team from Goal (ice hockey), scoring. They are often referred to as defencemen, D, D-men or blueliners (the la ...

. Laidlaw started his

National Hockey League The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranked professional ...

career with the

New York Rangers The New York Rangers are a professional ice hockey team based in the New York City borough of Manhattan. They compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Metropolitan Division in the Eastern Conference. The team plays its home ...

1980 Events January * January 4 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter proclaims a grain embargo against the USSR with the support of the European Commission. * January 6 – Global Positioning System time epoch begins at 00:00 UTC. * January 9 – ...

, arriving from

Northern Michigan University Northern Michigan University (Northern Michigan, Northern or NMU) is a public university in Marquette, Michigan. It was established in 1899 by the Michigan Legislature as Northern State Normal School. In 1963, the state designated Northern a uni ...

. He also played for the

Los Angeles Kings The Los Angeles Kings are a professional ice hockey team based in Los Angeles. The team competes in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Pacific Division in the Western Conference and was founded on June 5, 1967, after Jack Kent ...

. He left the NHL after the 1990 season. He played one season for the Phoenix Roadrunners of the IHL before retiring from hockey. Afterward, he became the colour commentator on Kings' radio broadcasts. He currently runs a sports management company in

Rye Brook, New York Rye Brook is a village in Westchester County, New York, United States, within the town of Rye. The population was 9,347 at the 2010 census. Rye Brook has been designated as a Tree City USA for 14 years. History Rye Brook is located in sout ...

. Laidlaw is also a motivational speaker and frequently uses his mantra of living a "True Grit Life". Laidlaw promotes the "True Grit Life" through public speaking engagements and weekly podcast episodes. Laidlaw competed on '' Survivor: Island of the Idols'', the 39th season of the

CBS CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainmen ...

series '' Survivor''. He was the first Canadian-born person to be a contestant on the show. He was voted out on Day 14, finishing in 16th place out of 20 contestants. In the 2009 book ''100 Ranger Greats'', the authors ranked Laidlaw at No. 87 all-time of the 901 New York Rangers who had played during the team's first 82 seasons.

Career statistics

Regular season and playoffs

Awards and honours

''Survivor''

Laidlaw was one of 20 castaways to compete on '' Survivor: Island of the Idols'', the 39th season of the American reality competition show '' Survivor''. At the start of the game, he was placed on the Lairo tribe, where he formed a bond with fellow tribemates Elaine Stott and Vince Moua. On Day Eight, Moua was voted out by the majority, despite Laidlaw's attempts to get tribemate Karishma Patel out of the game. On Day 12, Laidlaw and Stott were split up by the tribal swap; she was sent to Vokai while he remained on Lairo, where he was joined by five old Vokai members. On Day 14, Laidlaw again tried to get his tribe to vote out Patel, but the new members of the tribe, wary of Laidlaw's connections to his old tribemates, decided to vote him out instead.

References

External links

* *Tom Laidlaw'
True Grit LifeOfficial CBS biography page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Laidlaw, Tom 1958 births Living people Canadian ice hockey defencemen Ice hockey people from Ontario Los Angeles Kings players National Hockey League broadcasters New Haven Nighthawks players New York Rangers draft picks New York Rangers players Northern Michigan Wildcats men's ice hockey players Phoenix Roadrunners (IHL) players Sportspeople from Brampton Survivor (American TV series) contestants San Jose Sharks announcers