Leafs fan pays $5,300 for toilet

An Ontario lawyer is now the proud owner of a toilet from the Toronto Maple Leafs’ former dressing room.

Jim Vigmond, of Barrie, Ont., bought the unusual item for $5,300 at auction after the piece he really wanted — the 1967 Stanley Cup banner — got too expensive. The toilet was offered up along with more than 100 items from Maple Leaf Gardens, which was home to the NHL team until 1999.

Fifty-five-year-old Vigmond says his friends were skeptical about the purchase. But the long-time Leafs fan says the item was just too good to pass up.

Vigmond says he was actually willing to spend up to $10,000 on the throne.

“They thought I had money to burn, and surely there was something that I could have better spent my money on,” he said.

“They’ve got a point. But . . . it’s a part of an icon. I just thought . . . what a rare piece and just think of all of the people that have spent time contemplating in that dressing room what lies ahead of them.”

Vigmond plans to put the toilet in his sports memorabilia room, where he says he wants to sit on it, light up a Cuban cigar, open a bottle of 30-year-old single malt and, hopefully, watch a Leafs game sometime soon.