Flyers alum Bernie Parent does a meet-and-greet.
Boston’s Ken Casey, front man for the Celtic rock band Dropkick Murphys, admitted the other night that he was leaning towards becoming a Philadelphia Flyers’ fan. In his neck of the woods–Bruins territory—that’s not just heresy but a potential cause for justifiable homicide.
But even the most devoted Bruins fan would have to bend a little just this once. The Flyers organization came out in force to support Casey’s Claddagh Foundation on Wednesday at the annual celebrity golf outing at Woodcrest Country Club in Cherry Hill, NJ. About a dozen current and former players joined foursomes—which went for $2,000—to play the William Flynn-designed 178-acre course. That included stogie-chewing, wisecracking Flyers alum Bernie Parent (”Only the Lord saves more than Bernie Parent”) and popular right winger and All-Star Jacub Voracek, a Czech native, who allowed himself to be auctioned off (along with girlfriend Nicole Warneke) for a date night with a lucky bidder.
“Jake’s been a big supporter of the Claddagh Fund,” says Kate Diehl McCloud, director of the Philadelphia Chapter of the organization, which helps support underfunded nonprofits in the region and in Casey’s hometown of Boston. “He’s been helpful in recruiting players. In fact, the Flyers organization as a whole has ben extra helpful from the very beginning. The Phillies have also been very supportive and the Eagles have worked with us. We’ve been really lucky.”
The Fund, which focuses on some of the most vulnerable in society—children, battered women, veterans, and recovering substance abusers—presented two checks on Wednesday night, one to Devereaux, one of the oldest and largest nonprofts providing behavioral healthcare to children, teens, and adults, and the other to Healing Ajax, a peer support organization helping veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars reintegrate into society. Those are just two of about a dozen organizations that will benefit from the organization’s fundraising activities this year.
Below you can see photos of the players—and golfers—who came out this week to support Casey’s efforts.
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