CBC’s Ron MacLean saves man in Delaware River

Never let it be said that CBC’s Ron MacLean doesn’t have a flare for the dramatic. The day after MacLean got into it verbally with NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman over franchise stability and teams moving from their current homes, he did something else remarkable and heroic... He helped save a man’s life in Philadelphia.

MacLean was having lunch on a patio by the Delaware River with Don Cherry when a woman with a “heavy French accent” came in and said “help, help there’s someone in the water.”

“There was four or five of us around,” said MacLean, who was taking a break from filming segments for one of Cherry’s “Rock ‘em Sock ‘em” videos.

“We jump up and I grabbed a velvet rope off one of the dividers they have in the restaurant,” he said.

“I thought that’d be useful to help pull the guy out of the water.”

MacLean said he jumped over a wrought-iron railing they have around the patio and went down to the river.

As for the man he helped pull out of the river, it’s believed the man was trying to commit suicide as he was picked out of the water with tape around his throat and he rope around him. That’s a pretty grim visual although not as terrifying as Don Cherry’s suits. Speaking of Grapes, MacLean added this from Cherry after he returned from playing Superman.

“When I finally get back to Don, he said, ‘Well that’s just great, I was telling a great story about Dave Bolland and you go running off.’ ”

I think we’re all thankful that Ron MacLean was there so we were spared the sight of seeing Don Cherry in a Speedo.