Helmuts Balderis

Playing career

Helmuts Balderis spent most of his Soviet Hockey League career with Dinamo Riga, suiting up for the club from 1969 to 1977 and again from 1980 to 1985. In between, he played for CSKA Moscow from 1977 to 1980, a move that was required for him to earn a spot on the Soviet national team. He topped the league in scoring during the 1977 and 1984 seasons and was named Player of the Year in 1977. Across his Soviet league career, he netted 333 goals, making him the highest-scoring player ever to come out of the Latvian SSR and the republic’s top player in both the 1970s and 1980s.

On the international stage with the Soviet Union, Balderis took home a silver medal from the 1980 Winter Olympics and gold medals at the World Championships in 1978, 1979, and 1983. He appeared in five World Championships (1976 through 1979, plus 1983), the 1976 Canada Cup, and the 1980 Olympics. At the 1977 World Championships, he was recognized as the tournament’s Best Forward. After returning to Dinamo Riga in 1980, he was left off the 1984 Olympic squad and participated in only one more major international tournament.

Balderis first retired in 1985 and went to Japan to coach. When Soviet players gained permission to join the NHL in 1989, he came back. The Minnesota North Stars drafted him, making him the oldest player ever selected by an NHL team at age 36. He played 26 games for Minnesota, recording 3 goals and 6 assists, and at 37 became the oldest player to score his first NHL goal. After that single season, he retired again. Following Latvia’s renewed independence, he came out of retirement a second time, playing several games for the newly formed Latvian national team in 1992 as its captain and scoring 2 goals. He later coached that team and served as its general manager. As of 2017, he sits on the board of the Latvian Ice Hockey Federation.