For years, Bill Goldsworthy, one of the original Minnesota North Stars, battled alcohol. That problem may have contributed to another, deadlier fight - the one against AIDS.
In a copyright story Sunday, the Saint Paul Pioneer Press said Goldsworthy acknowledged having unsafe sex during his worst drinking binges."As athletes, we tend to think of ourselves as invincible," Goldsworthy, 50, told the Pioneer Press. "We fight through the tough times and we begin to think we can handle anything that comes our way.
"This is different. This isn't a broken arm."
Goldsworthy played with the Stars from their first season in 1967 until 1977 during a 14-year NHL playing career that began with the Boston Bruins in 1964 and ended with the New York Rangers in 1978.
The Pioneer Press said Goldsworthy was told he has AIDS in November while in a hospital in Memphis, Tenn., where blood clots that moved from his leg to his lungs set him on a month-long fight with pneumonia.
"I said, `Whoa! You've got the wrong guy. You've gotta be kidding. There must be a mistake,' " Goldsworthy said last week from his apartment in the Minneapolis suburb of Edina.
"There was no mistake."
When J.P. Parise, a former linemate and roommate, visited Goldsworthy recently, Parise saw the oxygen tank and the tubes leading to Goldsworthy's nose.
"That sort of hits you hard, makes you realize what he is up against," Parise told the Star Tribune of Minneapolis in an interview published today. "We were two grownups who hugged and cried together. It was very sad. You ask him, `How long have you got?' He doesn't really know."
Goldsworthy was the coach of the San Antonio Iguanas of the Central Hockey League when he was hospitalized Nov. 11, but he said he had been feeling ill since September. Barely into his hospital stay, the Pioneer Press said, San Antonio fired Goldsworthy.
Iguanas general manager Jim Goodman did not return telephone calls to his home Sunday.
Goldsworthy and his wife, June, have been divorced for nearly 15 years, and have two children: Tammy, 26, and Sean, 23. The Pioneer Press said Goldsworthy has been involved in a relationship for years but has never remarried. It said all of the people closest to him have tested negative for the HIV virus.
"There was a period of three to five years after my divorce when I was really into the bottle and I wasn't careful about my sexual relationships," Goldsworthy said. "And there were a few times when I was a scout for San Jose (the NHL San Jose Sharks), after I started to drink again, that I wasn't as careful . . . as I should have been."
Goldsworthy, who said he has quit drinking, said he knows no other way to deal with his disease except to fight.
"I can live a good life; I can't live a long life. Every day when I wake up, I know I have one less day to live," he said.