Columbus hockey fan favorite ‘Boom-Boom’ Bechard lands new job

He came to Columbus just over two decades ago known as “Boom-Boom” because of his fierce skills and protecting fellow hockey players through bone-jarring body checks on opponents — and an occasional on-ice fight for entertainment value.

Then he transitioned from player to coach and general manager of a professional hockey team that fought for a half dozen division and league championships on its way to capturing the hearts of local fans who called the team not only the Cottonmouths, but also the adopted name, the “Snakes.”

Now, Jerome “Boom-Boom” Bechard is making yet another transition, this one into the highly competitive world of Columbus and Phenix City real estate, with the goal of succeeding once again as he works to help area citizens make one of the biggest purchases of their lives.

“Over the years, I’ve been fortunate to be involved in this community in a positive way with the Cottonmouths, and providing great family entertainment and, hopefully, being a good role model to kids and all of that stuff. That all kind of translates to hopefully having an impact on somebody’s life,” said Bechard, 48, who recently earned his real-estate license and is now going through additional training as an agent with Kennon, Parker, Duncan & Davis, the Columbus Coldwell Banker affiliate.

Not that the former hockey player who became the “face” of the Cottonmouths through the years for his hard-nosed play and longevity with the team in multiple roles has given up on the sport. The Southern Professional Hockey League club ceased operations earlier this year due to financial reasons, with no successor found thus far to fill the Columbus Civic Center ice.

“Hopefully, hockey will come back to Columbus at some point and at that time, if I could be involved that would be great,” he said. “That hasn’t happened yet, so I had to do something totally different.”

It took Bechard a few months to figure out that what he would be doing to earn a living locally so that he could remain in Columbus, a community he has grown as fond of as fans have of him. After all, he married wife and local girl, Rhonda, 24 years ago and the couple have two daughters, the oldest, Alex, who attends the University of Georgia, and the youngest, Kylie, a junior at Harris County High School.

At the suggestion of former Kennon, Parker, Duncan & Davis partner Jack Key, a longtime friend and business acquaintance of Bechard’s, Paul Fincher, the real-estate company’s director of operations, met with him about three months ago at a Starbucks.

“I had the benefit of us having a good relationship,” Fincher, who also sells homes, said of the conversation. “I think that and the fact that I was in real estate already; he knew that I wasn’t going to be selling him a bill of goods that I couldn’t back up. It was really sort of a personal testimony of my career in real estate.”

Bechard made the commitment, pursued his real-estate coursework and passed the licensing test. From the conversation with him Thursday, he understands there is work to be done and much more to learn, but believes he’s up to a challenge not completely unlike that of competing and coaching in an arena laden with adrenaline-fueled sports warriors flying around the ice.

“You really don’t think they’re the same, but it really is,” he said. “When I was still playing, my job was to protect guys on the ice. When I transitioned to coaching and being the general manager, now I was leading the organization and trying to coach these guys into setting goals and, ‘Hey, we want to win 30 games,’ so there’s a process to work that.”

In real estate, Bechard said, he knows there will be plenty of scouting and homework for him. He’ll also be sitting down and talking with people about their housing goals and expectations. In essence, he will be coaching once again, this time with a $250,000 home purchase on the line instead of an overtime thriller ultimately leading to a hockey title.

“Jerome is the exact type of person that you want in this field,” Fincher said. “He’s got tremendous interpersonal skills and, obviously, he’s got a lot of care for people and care for the community — and he’s driven” to succeed.

Guerry Clegg, a former Ledger-Enquirer sportswriter and columnist — who still does freelance columns for the media company — agrees that Bechard should do well in the real-estate field simply because of his work ethic and humble, personable nature.

It also doesn’t hurt at all that the newcomer sales agent has a built-in brand, that being the “Boom-Boom” persona and mentality that made him a fan favorite in his hockey career and into the coaching ranks. Clegg understands the moment, himself having transitioned from a well-recognized newspaper reporter into real estate full-time starting in 2003, also with the Coldwell Banker affiliate.

“I think it is a challenge to convert that awareness, but it’s also an advantage to have something to work with as opposed to not being known by anybody,” said Clegg, pointing out there are the fundamentals of real estate, such as knowing and listing properties and writing sales contracts. But there also are intangibles that, in a field where high dollars change hands, become necessities.

“A lot of it is you’ve got to get people to trust you, and that’s the most important thing,” he said. “If they trust you, they want to work with you. I think with Jerome, it’s the same whether it’s players or people in the community. Because he was a player and coach, he was always the face of the team out in the community. So he had to be trusted by people, and he is.”

Based on his longtime career in sports, Clegg believes Bechard will be able to adapt in real estate just as he did in hockey, where he went from a skill player to tough-guy enforcer to coaching and managing, where each season he molded the team’s style and strategy to the personnel he was able to recruit and sign to play in Columbus. Again, personality should work in his favor, Clegg said.

“For a guy that could clean your clock on the ice, he’s such a nice guy,” he said. “That’s an easy thing for him, because that’s genuine. It’s not like he’s got to try to be somebody. He’s already friendly and intelligent and has character and all of that. I think he’ll do real well.”

Bechard, of course, is fully aware of the recognition he has in the community, even if lots of people simply know him by “Boom-Boom” and not Jerome. He and Fincher see some sort of marketing of that celebrity-esque status in some form, although it remains somewhat early to know exactly how it will be presented to the public.

“I’ve been fortunate to have that here, and I’ll be the first guy to tell you I don’t enjoy talking about myself,” the hockey veteran said. “But I would be crazy not to use it, and I think it’s a huge advantage to me that I am that person or whatever.”

But Bechard, Fincher and Clegg all stress that it’s about learning the ropes, becoming intimately familiar with the real-estate business and market, and ultimately becoming known as a solid professional who can get the job done for someone who is spending hard-earned money to buy or sell a home, the latter which often includes recommended repairs and updating. That’s what it takes for anyone to succeed in the field, Fincher said.

“There are people who come into our market, get their real estate license and do not have any sphere of influence, don’t have any friends here, and just through hard work make a good living in real estate without a network of connections,” Fincher said. “With Jerome, you’ve got somebody whose probably got one of the most healthy, large network connections in Columbus. In a lot of ways, instead of starting deep in the end zone, he’s starting at the 30- or 40-yard line.”

It’s an advantage that seemingly would generate some sort of pressure on most people entering a new career and a new way of putting food on the table for their family. Again, for Bechard, it appears the comfort he finds in the community is part of his foundation.

It’s a community that others he has played with and coached through the years have connected to as well, with former Cottonmouths stars such as Craig Stahl, Tom Wilson, Marcel Richard, Tom Maldonado, Doug Mann, Mick Kempffer, Levi Lind and Ian Vigier all making the Columbus area home. Their occupations include firefighters, a contractor, the health-care field and commercial and residential real estate.

“It’s pretty cool to have pretty much a hockey team from over the years living in town. That just goes to show that this area is a great place to live and a great place to raise a family and start a future,” Bechard said, acknowledging it is similar to the legions of soldiers who come through Fort Benning, then end up staying here after leaving the military.

“That’s Southern hospitality and those Georgia peaches. These guys all end up finding a significant other and getting married and staying down here,” he said. “Most of the (hockey) guys are from up north, so who wants to fight the cold and the snow when you can have weather like we have right now?”

This story was originally published November 30, 2017 at 8:23 PM with the headline "Columbus hockey fan favorite ‘Boom-Boom’ Bechard lands new job."