Before my feature starts, I wanted to say a few things.
1) Behind the Jersey started off as a feature “column” for On the Wings and eventually became a separate blog of the same name, Behind the Jersey. Unfortunately, I left this feature behind but have now decided to revive it. The original feature looks at a specific Detroit Red Wings player. I try to uncover who they are when they’re wearing the jersey and then what they do outside the hockey rink. I want you to get an idea of who the individual is behind the jersey. I’ve only covered four other individuals: Pavel Datsyuk, Chris Chelios, Darren McCarty, and Kris Draper.
2) Usually it takes me a day or two to write this type of feature. I research the individual online and in any books/magazines I have. I then start to write about this person as a player and who they are outside the sport. However for this player, I spent many days working on this feature. The research alone took a while with my busy schedule and since Steve Yzerman’s private life is a lot harder to uncover who he is outside the rink because he keeps his private life, well, private. I’m sorry it took this long to get the latest installment up, but I wanted to do Yzerman justice.
3) Like many Wings fans, Yzerman is my favorite player. Ever. While he is an amazing player and leader, his priority is with his family and other people. He is selfless and humble. But I have a different reason why he is my favorite hockey player of all time. Cancer patients and survivors look to Lance Armstrong for inspiration. While knee problems are nowhere near the magnitude of seriousness as cancer, I look to Yzerman for inspiration. As you all know, Yzerman has had his fair share of knee injuries. He is the only known professional athlete to return from an osteotomy, a realignment surgery of the knee usually done for the elderly. Typically, it’s a surgery done to postpone a total knee replacement. While I haven’t had that surgery, I’ve had 6 knee surgeries (more minor ones than major). I’m currently waiting to have my 7th and 8th surgeries for my torn lateral meniscus repair, ACL revision (a 2nd ACL reconstruction), and a medial meniscus transplant.
Pain is a part of my everyday life and Yzerman is a major source of inspiration to me. For someone to come back from all of his surgeries and a major osteotomy to play professional hockey, I know that even when the pain is awful, I can make it to class. I have a big autographed photo of Yzerman that I purchased from Hockeytown Authentics over my bed at home, and it always reminds me that I can and will overcome my injuries because he did and succeeded in a very physical sport.
I spent so long working on this feature because I wanted to do Yzerman justice. While I realize he will never read this (most likely), I wanted to reflect his life and career for how amazing it has been and that’s no easy feat. I hope you enjoy the feature and please leave a comment with your thoughts on it. Thank you.
Behind the Jersey: No. 19
On August 2nd Steve Yzerman calmed many fans’ doubts and fears, the Captain would return for another year with the Detroit Red Wings. The 2005-2006 season marks Yzerman’s 23rd season in Hockeytown, including the lockout, and his 19th season as captain. If Yzerman had decided that his knee couldn’t take it anymore or that he was done with playing hockey, his last moments would’ve been him crumpling to the ice after a puck deflected into his eye. Fortunately for fans and the Wings, we will all have an opportunity to say a proper farewell to our beloved Captain.
Yzerman stands to make $1.75 million for the 2005-2006 season plus various bonuses.
“I spent a lot of time thinking about it, going back and forth, and in the end, I just felt if I didn’t come back, I’d be wondering if I could’ve played. I wanted to give it my best shot. I’m not afraid of the challenge, and this year, there’s a lot to try and accomplish. I wanted to see if we could correct some areas and have better feelings than we had two years ago.”
While Yzerman is no longer the player of his youth, he brings leadership a team that is transitioning from the wealthy Stanley Cup winning era to a more youthful salary cap era. Even after recovering from knee surgery, the Captain scored 18 goals in the 2003-2004 season including game winner in the season opener against the L.A. Kings with 1.7 seconds remaining. “I’m very happy he’s back,” Wings GM Ken Holland said. “I feel two years ago he played a big part in us winning the President’s Trophy, a guy who played 17 minutes a night, in all key situations.”
A lot has changed since that game against Calgary. The Wings have a new head coach in Mike Babcock. Darren McCarty, Ray Whitney, and Derian Hatcher were bought out. Chris Osgood is going to be competing with Manny Legace for the number one goaltending spot. When Yzerman saw all of this unfolding, he wondered if he too shouldn’t move on.
“I went through periods when I thought, this is tough, I’m too old to do this stuff, maybe it is time to retire. But then there were periods when I felt good and energetic. What it came down to was, Kenny and Jimmy D. expressed they really wanted me to be part of the team. If I felt they were jammed on the cap, I’d have moved on. Now I’m excited about playing again.”
Even with all of the changes and a new CBA, Yzerman expects the Detroit Red Wings to remain as a competitive team. “Our team is going to be good. You add a couple of young guys like (Niklas) Kronwall and a few free agents and I expect us to be a strong team. I don’t know about favorites, because I think Tampa Bay and Philadelphia are real strong. But I expect the Red Wings to be Stanley Cup contenders.” The Captain has talked to Babcock and knows that his role will be hammered out over time. He will most likely play on a line with Kirk Maltby and Kris Draper.
“I know he didn’t like going out — and we stated we didn’t like the way he went out — with that cheekbone and that eye injury,” Wings owner Mike Ilitch said. “Just the kind of person he is, I got a hunch that he’ll want to come back and maybe skate on a line with (Kris) Draper and (Kirk) Maltby, and I think that’d make a great line.”
Not many Detroit athletes have remained in the Motor City for as long as Yzerman. Only Alex Delvecchio has played more (23) for a Detroit team. After this season, the Captain will be tied with the Tigers’ Al Kaline for 22 seasons in Motown.
When Yzerman is finished playing hockey, probably following this season, he hopes to turn to the management aspect of the sport like Joe Dumars did with the Detroit Pistons. “My goal is to one day run a hockey team, to be the guy responsible for putting everybody in place, for signing players to contracts,” Yzerman said. After playing 14 seasons with Detroit, Dumars became president of operations with the Pistons. He guided the team to an NBA title in 2004. Yzerman has followed Dumars’ career and admires what he’s done while playing for the Pistons and while managing them.
“I followed his career from player to a management position and follow his team closely,” Yzerman said. “I read all his interviews, watch his transactions. I read the reasons he gives to the media for the moves he makes.” Dumars thinks highly of Yzerman as well. “The first thing that strikes you about him is his humility and class,” Dumars said.
Dumars isn’t the only person that the Captain observes; Yzerman looks to the Wings own General Manager Ken Holland and Assistant General Manager Jim Nill.
“Between observing Joe from afar and talking to Ken and Jim Nill and Jimmy D over the years, I’ve learned a lot. I have no expectation of retiring and taking a significant management position with the Red Wings,” Yzerman said. “My goals are realistic in doing something like that. My route will take a little bit longer.”
Because of the lockout, Yzerman may have a harder time returning to the ice since he wasn’t out there practicing almost daily. Aside from his many knee surgeries, the Captain suffered a groin injury, scratched cornea, and multiple fractures to the orbital bone in the 2003-2004 season. All of which will make it more difficult to return. Steven Karageanes, sports medicine specialist at Henry Ford Hospital, worries that layoff-related injuries will abound early in this upcoming season. “The body gets used to not being beat up, the less-stressful lifestyle. It’s hard to get that back again. The aging process goes on,” Karageanes said.
John Wharton, former Wings trainer, was pleased to hear that the Captain is returning for one more year but also worried about how the layoff would impact him, “It can either really help him or really hurt him. I just hope they don’t expect too much from him early on.” Wharton compared Yzerman’s layoff during the lockout to being in “semiretirement,” but he also believed that Yzerman would condition quickly. “Knowing Steve and the way he conditioned himself and the way he takes care of his body, it shouldn’t take much longer than a couple months,” Wharton said. Yzerman isn’t the only one who needs to be careful in his return to the NHL, “Kind of the same thing goes for all those guys. They’re all looking at the same boat. Sixteen months for any of them is going to pose a problem.”
Yzerman missed eight games in October to start the new season due to a groin injury. His first goal of the season didn’t come until November 8, 2005 against the LA Kings when he tipped Mathieu Schneider’s shot in during the first period. Head coach Mike Babcock is gradually giving Yzerman more ice time as he adjusts to the new NHL. “We want him to feel good and be an important part of our team,” Babcock said. “He told me the other day that he feels he’s skating well, and that his leg doesn’t hurt. Well that’s great news for us. He’s dominant in the face-off circle, his brain works all the time; he knows how to play in all situations.”
NHL Rookie Season
22 years ago, on October 5, 1983, the 18-year-old Yzerman played his first NHL game with Detroit. In that game, he also scored his first goal as an NHL player by beating Winnipeg goaltender, Doug Stoetaert. That goal was only the first of many in his rookie season when he lead all NHL rookies with 87 points and 48 assists. He was also selected to the All-Star Game making him the youngest player in NHL history to do so. He capped off his rookie year as Calder Trophy runner-up and with The Sporting News naming him NHL Rookie of the Year.
In the years following, Yzerman was named to 10 NHL All-Star Games (missed one in ’99 due to injury), won an Olympic gold medal with Team Canada in 2002, and won three Stanley Cups. Jimmy Devellano wasn’t surprised by Yzerman’s success both individually as a player and as a team leader.
“You may find this hard to believe, but I knew almost his very first year,” Devellano said. “It might sound silly, but, truthfully, he was the first pick ever for me. And he came in as an 18-year-old, and we had a very poor team. He scored 39 goals and just narrowly missed being rookie of the year to Tom Barrasso. I knew he was the real deal that he was going to be a really good player. He was a pretty special guy from his very first game.”
However, Yzerman was a star player on a sub par team. In his first eight years in the NHL, the Wings only had one winning season.
“He grew with the team, with all the ups and downs we all suffered through. Even into the ’90s, we had a lot of playoff disappointments before we eventually won some Cups,” Devellano said. “We were bounced in the first round — we had a lot of that. Then there was a lot of criticism, on talk shows, that maybe they can’t win with Yzerman. But eventually we did. He stuck with us and we stuck with him, and that goes to show that sometimes in sports you really do need to stick together.”
Pre-NHL Hockey
Before going into detail on Yzerman’s success in the NHL, let’s take a look at his past with the Nepean Junior A Raiders and OHL’s Peterborough Petes. As a fifteen year old, Yzerman played for the Raiders, a team in the CJHL, for one year. After Yzerman won his first Stanley Cup in 1997, the Nepean Sportsplex was renamed the Steve Yzerman Arena. At the ceremony, he brought the Stanley Cup. The Raiders then retired his jersey in 1999 at the CJHL All-Star game in the arena named after him. In his fifty games with the team, Yzerman scored 38 goals and had a league-best 54 assists. “He’s still the same guy who left Nepean. He’s quiet, doesn’t like the publicity and hasn’t changed one bit. He’s just a great guy,” former Nepean Raiders coach Mike Goddard said.
Yzerman played for the Petes from 1981 to 1983, right up until the Wings drafted him. Peterborough selected him as their first round draft pick, fourth overall. As a major junior rookie, he notched 64 points (21 goals and 43 assists) and a year later, 91 points (42 goals). While he didn’t make the top ten scorers list, he still was viewed as a strong prospect. Petes’ coach, Dick Todd, ingrained a team approach into his players. While equally splitting playing time among the four lines, Yzerman got to develop both his offensive and defensive abilities. “I don’t know whether Steve would admit to this, but we really stressed to him to learn the game at both ends of the rink. He was an excellent defensive player for us as well as contributing offensively,” Todd said. Yzerman was named to the OHL’s Scholastic All-Star Team in 1981-82.
“I’ve got to tell you, if you ever look at tapes of him in junior hockey with Peterborough, he was just like he is now,” said Darren Pang, former NHL goalie and one of Yzerman’s closest friends since the age of 14. “He is the same kind of player. Everybody talks about Stevie changing how he plays. He always had that in him. He always played both ways all the time.”
1983 Draft
While Yzerman wasn’t the top choice for the Detroit Red Wings in the 1983 draft (hometown boy Pat LaFontaine was), Devellano wasn’t disappointed with his first round pick (fourth overall) either. Yzerman, on the other hand, had dreamed of playing for Detroit and was hoping to get picked by the Wings in that year’s draft.
“I was happy and surprised to go high. I knew I was rated high, but you never know how things are going to turn out…I really hoped [Detroit] would pick me. They’re rebuilding and I figured I would have a good chance of making it this year. They expect me to make it and told me to just give it my best shot,” Yzerman said after being drafted.
At his first training camp at Port Huron in ’83, Yzerman supposedly showed up weighing only 155 pounds when the draft report said he was 175 pounds. The front office did not expect Yzerman to start off playing in the NHL, rather a lower league. However, he thoroughly impressed the organization with his skill and hard work. Sadly, they admitted that Yzerman was the Wings’ best player. Their best player weighed only 155 pounds and had yet to play an NHL game, never a good thing. However, in his first NHL game, versus the Winnipeg Jets, Yzerman scored a goal and earned an assist as well.
Why did Yzerman choose to wear No. 19? He chose it in honor of his favorite player, Brian Trottier of the New York Islanders. Randy Ladouceur had previously worn No. 19, but he started the year in the minors so that number was open and Yzerman started wearing it. Now Yzerman is the reason for others choosing to wear No. 19. In Edmonton, Boyd Devereaux wore No. 19 because of “The Captain.” Joe Thornton of the Boston Bruins also picked No. 19 to wear because of his admiration for Yzerman. “I haven’t put too much thought into it,” Yzerman said of the influx of No. 19s. “There have been a lot of good 19s, Joe Sakic…I’m sure there’s people wearing it because he does.”
Early NHL Years
In 1986, Yzerman was named captain, succeeding Danny Gare to be the youngest captain (21 years old) in Detroit franchise history. He played in all 80 games and led the team in points (90) with 59 assists. In the years to follow, Yzerman performed well individually, but the team as a whole continued to struggle. He won the Lester B. Pearson Award, which is selected by his peers, in 1988-89 for the league’s top performer when he become only the fourth player to notch 150 points in a season. In that season, he accounted for 49.5% of Detroit’s goals. Additionally, a fan poll in The Hockey News voted Yzerman Player of the Year and Inside Hockey Magazine picked him as NHL MVP. He had six straight seasons with 100 points. Five of those seasons, Yzerman scored at least 50 goals.
However, the Wings either failed to make it to the playoffs or didn’t last long in the post-season.
“The last five years, you didn’t want to be recognized. I put a hat on, glasses on. You don’t want people to recognize you,” Yzerman said. “A couple years ago, I went to Las Vegas after the playoffs. I don’t remember which year. I was at the craps table. Two old guys from Windsor came by and saw me. They said, ‘You don’t want to play at this table. There’s no luck at this table.’”
By the 1993-1994 season, the Wings finally captured a Central Division title with 46 wins and 100 points. In the following two seasons, Detroit earned the President’s Trophy but lost in the Stanley Cup finals to the New Jersey Devils (’94-95) and Western Conference finals to the Colorado Avalanche (’95-96).
Stanley Cup Wins
After 42 long years without winning the Stanley Cup, the Detroit Red Wings swept the Philadelphia Flyers in the 1997 Stanley Cup finals. In the 20 playoff games that year, Yzerman notched 13 points. While the victory was sweet for both Yzerman who had waited 14 years and for Detroit, it only lasted a week when an accident tragically ended Vladimir Konstantinov’s career and injured team masseuse Sergei Mnatsakonov.
In the following season, “believe” became the Wings’ team mantra. Believe that they could win. Believe that the Wings could repeat. Believe in their players. It was also stitched onto their jerseys as a reminder of Konstantinov and Mnatsakonov. That year, Yzerman led the league in playoff points with 24 including 18 assists. For leading his team to a second straight Stanley Cup title (after sweeping the Washington Capitals), Yzerman was awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy as MVP in the playoffs.
“First of all, I can’t believe I’ve won two Stanley Cups,” Yzerman said. “I’m totally amazed by that. The Conn Smythe, I’m delighted to have my name on a significant trophy. It’s great to have the Yzerman name on there along with my idols and my dad’s idols.”
For his strong leadership, readers of the Detroit Free Press voted Yzerman as the top sports figure for 1998. A season later, he won his first Frank J. Selke Trophy given to the top defensive forward.
The Knee Injuries
Since his first injury in 1988 when he tore ligaments in his right knee, Yzerman has faced numerous knee injuries including one that he suffered on January 26, 2002. The next day he had an additional arthroscopic knee surgery. While playing in that year’s Olympics for Team Canada and winning a gold medal, he reinjured the knee and didn’t return to the ice until April 10. Because of his injuries, he only played 52 games but was still sixth on the team in scoring with 48 points. “It’s amazing what he’s doing out there, playing on almost one leg,” Luc Robitaille said. “It just shows what kind of player he is and what kind of character he is.”
His knee got so bad that he would use his stick as a crutch to get up from the ice with a grimace prominent on his face in the 2002 playoffs. During the post-season, Yzerman had to have fluid drained from his knee twice and receive injections before every game. “You saw how it was,” Wharton said. “The first couple games in the playoffs, we were all holding our breath every shift, just hoping he could make it back to the bench in one piece, let alone make it through the game or the series or the playoffs.”
Even under those painful conditions, Yzerman led the team with 23 points in 23 games during the playoffs; only Peter Forsberg had more, with 27 points. “I never realized Stevie was such a quiet leader,” Brett Hull said. “He probably doesn’t even realize how important it is to have him back. He’s off, what two months (with the knee injury), and then comes in and plays as if he hasn’t missed a beat.’” The post-season ended with the Stanley Cup back in Hockeytown after defeating the Carolina Hurricanes. “It has been kind of an enjoyable year [in] that everybody has played pretty hard and played competitively,” Yzerman said. “Guys have gotten along very well to this point and remained pretty well focused on trying to win this thing.”
After celebrating his third Stanley Cup victory, Yzerman had a major knee surgery, an osteotomy. This surgery is typically performed on the elderly, those who want to return to walking pain-free; not a professional hockey player. Before the surgery, Yzerman had this to say, “I know (the surgery) doesn’t guarantee me anything. But I had to do something, whether I wanted to play or not. I couldn’t run or swim or even start training.” But after six long months of pain and rehabilitation, Yzerman became the first professional athlete to return to his sport after an osteotomy. “We didn’t do it so Steve could return to playing hockey,” his surgeon, Dr. Peter Fowler said. “We did it so Steve could return to walking without pain.”
Yzerman ended the 2002-2003 NHL season by winning the Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy, which is given to the player who best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship, and dedication to hockey. In fact, he was the first Wing to win the award since Brad Park won it in 1983-84. “The most impressive story I’ve heard about him is when it was explained to me how bad his knee was, and he continued to play on it,” Dumars said. “The people I spoke to said there was no way possible he should have been playing, and there he was, getting it done on the ice.”
We’ll have to see how much longer Yzerman’s career lasts. Whether he’ll be done after this season as many believe or if he’ll hold out for a couple more years and possibly reach Gordie Howe’s 25 years in Detroit.
“Gordie Howe is probably considered the greatest Red Wing of all time,” Devellano said. “He played a quarter of a century with the team. He is right up there even today as one of the greatest goal-scorers of all time. I think the best is to describe it is as 1 and 1a. Gordie, 1, because he was first. And Steve is 1a. They’re neck and neck. That’s the way it should be. Gordie is the old-time all-time Red Wings favorite; Steve is the modern all-time favorite. One thing is clear: There’s nobody else. There’s no other player who enters their domain. This franchise has been very, very fortunate — take Howe’s 25 years, and Yzerman — if we presume this to be his last year — his 22 years, that’s 47 years the franchise has had a terrific, terrific player.”
Yzerman’s Private Life
As most of you know, Steve Yzerman is a very private individual especially when it comes to himself and his family. For that reason, I decided to just give some quick facts about his family and I can always add to this when I find out more.
Yzerman Quote Sheet
To view a collection of quotes either from Yzerman or about him, please click here.
