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Still, it was the other stuff that captivated his audience. In one of the loopier decisions of the Gillis administration, he was named the team’s captain. before the 2008-09 season. That spring, he allowed seven goals in a series-ending 7-5 loss to Chicago in the second round of the playoffs and wept in front of the TV cameras. Before the start of the next season he signed the infamous 12-year, US$64 million deal, a contract that, among other things, led to the NHL changing the rules on long-term deals in the next CBA.

Remarkably, that contract still hangs over the Canucks’ head.

Photo by DARRYL DYCK / THE CANADIAN PRESS

Luongo and the team, however, were entering their peak years and you know what happened there. As for what happened next, well, we don’t have the space to recount it all, but there was drawn-out goalie controversy with Cory Schneider, a near trade with Toronto, a Schneider trade, a tortured year under Torts highlighted by a snub in the Heritage Classic and, finally, the trade back to Florida.

As mentioned, there was a fair bit going on in those years, but, amid all that intrigue, something wonderful happened with the relationship between the goalie and the Canucks fans. A mercurial sort in his early years here and something of a diva, Luongo changed his image through his intensely human reaction to the events that raged around him. It helped that he mastered social media. But there was also a raw honesty about him with which fans could identify. He could be funny, he could be frustrated, he could be jubilant, but you never had to wonder what he was feeling and in a world where the principals take such pains to hide their emotions, Luongo was an open book.