In Search Of Excellence - Bobby Ryan: Overcoming Adversity | E10

Episode Date: October 19, 2021

Randall Kaplan is joined by professional NHL hockey player and Olympic athlete Bobby Ryan. They discuss how, at age 10, Bobby and his family lived in hiding under an assumed name for years after his father tried to murder his mother and escaped bail, Bobby’s rise to becoming an NHL All-Star, his battle with alcoholism, his views on why you need to eliminate the takers in your life, and much more.Topics Include:Separating great athletes from elite athletes.  Excelling at hockey from an early age.  Going 39-0 with the LA Kings junior team.  Winning a national championship at age 12. Being drafted as the second overall pick in the NHL as an eighteen-year-old.  Shifting goals and priorities with age.  Learning about work ethic and dedication from his parents.  Asking for help when you can’t stop drinking.  Making a comeback and being a leader.  And other topics...Bobby Ryan is a professional NHL hockey player who has played for the Anaheim Ducks, Ottawa Senators, and Detroit Red Wings.  He began his hockey career on the Los Angeles Kings junior team, winning a national championship at age 12.  Bobby has also represented the United States in international and Olympic hockey, winning a silver medal in the 2010 Winter Olympics.  After taking a leave for substance abuse in 2020, Bobby was awarded the Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy, an annual award to the NHL player who best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship, and dedication to ice hockey.Sponsors:Sandee | Bliss: BeachesWant to Connect? Reach out to us online!Website | Instagram | LinkedIn

Never let any kind of outside voice dictate the way you're going to live your life, whether that's a good outside voice or a negative or a positive. Just don't let them wear you down, I guess, right? Or don't let them build you up to when you do fall, it's going to be a crumble. Control is controllable. Have the things around you that mean the most to you, and when you can control those, your world will get smaller and it'll get easier to manage. Welcome to In Search of Excellence, our quest for greatness and our desire to be the very best we

can be. To learn, educate, and motivate ourselves to live up to our highest potential. It's about planning for excellence and how we achieve excellence through incredibly hard work, dedication, and perseverance. It's about believing in ourselves and the ability to overcome the many obstacles we all face in our lives. Achieving excellence is our goal and it's never easy to do. We all have different backgrounds, personalities, and surroundings. We all have different routes on how we hope and want to get there. Today, my guest is my good friend, Bobby Ryan. Bobby is a professional hockey player who recently finished his 15th season in the NHL. Bobby started playing hockey in grade school. When he was 10 years old, his father was arrested for trying to murder his

mother, and he lived in hiding under an assumed name until the age of 15. He was a hockey prodigy from the moment he started playing, and in 2005, he was selected by the Anaheim Ducks with the second pick of the NHL draft. Since then, he's been an NHL all-star and has played for the Anaheim Ducks with the second pick of the NHL draft. Since then, he's been an NHL all-star and has played for the Anaheim Ducks, Ottawa Senators, and the awesome Detroit Red Wings. In 2019, after he returned from a successful stay at a substance abuse program, he was awarded the Masterson Trophy as the player who best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship, and dedication to hockey. Bobby, welcome to In Search of Excellence.

It's my pleasure. You have an incredibly unique life to get to where you are today. It's a truly remarkable struggle and inspirational story about talent, family, mistakes, loyalty, struggles, hard work, focus, and best of all, redemption. And I want to start today by talking about your childhood, your family life, and your journey to becoming an NHL All-Star. It's a story that I think many people don't know about, and I'd love to start from the beginning. Where were you born, and where did you live, and what kind of kid were you? I was born in Cherry Hill, New Jersey,

so Southern Jersey. I'm just across from Philadelphia. And through my life, I've kind of lived everywhere. And we'll get through all that, I guess. But by way of California, Michigan, Northern Ontario, Canada, into Anaheim, Ottawa, now Detroit. So a little bit everywhere. I was just an athletic, know I was a single single child so my parents had a lot of time to invest in me but I was an athletic kid that played nothing but hockey and a very studious kid early on so I was good in school got good grades small Catholic school upbringing until I was homeschooled later on in life so in a nutshell I guess I'm a mixed bag of where I'm from, but I call Idaho home now

primarily and wherever hockey takes me in the winter. Excellent. What were your parents like when you were younger? My dad's kind of a dying breed. I think he was hard. He built a business from the ground up and became pretty successful and did a good job of things. But I almost want to say militaristic with what works for him. He's in his early 60s now, and it's still about diet and working out and fitness and all those things. And he's very militaristic in his approach. So that kind of rubbed off on me. And that's how I was brought up 100% kind of focused on task at hand type guy. So that's, that's how I, I am in a lot of ways. And you had a normal childhood for a while. And then when you turned 10 years old, what happened?

So, uh, you know, the, the story is pretty out there, but my mom and dad had an altercation that really had been coming for years that became the big night and the finding moment of my childhood where, you know, my dad made a lot of mistakes that night. And, you know, we all suffered the consequences. But he went off the handle and got physical with my mom. I slept right through it. And that was the first time I actually have ever slept through one of those. There were smaller ones, but nothing of this scale. You know, I woke up at my grandparents' house the next day and still had no clue my mom was in the hospital and my dad was on the run.

So it was a big night, a night that I was 10. So I didn't know what was coming, but I felt like something was always brewing. And this was the big night. It was a night that I'll never remember, but I'll never forget if that makes any sense. Right. It does. Your dad had been at a bar. He came home very drunk, and then he became violent with your mom. It landed your mom in the hospital, four broken ribs. And your dad is charged with a number of felonies, including attempted murder. And you're 10 years old. And as you said, your life has now changed. What happens then? Your father is in prison.

He makes bail, a post bail. I think his bail was $75,000. And then what happened? Yeah. So there's this kind of long lull in between where I hadn't seen any of my family, but mom got out of the hospital and came and lived with her parents. And I stayed there. My dad had obviously turned himself in. And it wasn't a year. It was a short period of time that he was behind bars before he posted bail. So we were in limbo,

a major limbo, I guess. But when he had posted bail, he ran and decided to kind of flee and find a place where we could go, all of us. And that was my parents' decision that all three of us would go somewhere. So he was out on the run under an assumed name. And we were in limbo, just waiting, living with my grandparents, playing hockey. You go into school, all the things you do, but we were doing them with the knowledge that we were leaving very shortly. And it took about a year for all of that to unfold before we eventually took off. Your dad had been in prison for some amount of time. You're 10 years old. Did you go visit him in prison? And what was that like? At that time? No, we weren't sure how long he was going to be there. And I don't think my parents wanted to

make it a thing that they were seeing each other still talking kind of thing. So there was no real direct communication. He wasn't gone too long i i wish i knew exactly but i feel like it was a matter of months that he was behind bars i remember seeing him when he got out uh one time at my other grandparents house and he said he was going to be going away and he did and then that was kind of when he went on the lam so that was back in the old burner phone days i would come out of school and we would talk for five minutes every three four days tell me where he was looking at hockey teams so that I could go there and play. And then we would move on to the next location and we would do that. So I was in New Jersey just waiting to go somewhere all this time.

At some point, your parents made up. They went together. You all made this plan. And so what happened? You're around sitting at night, the three of you at a dinner table and your dad says, all right, I'm going to run. And I want you to join me later once I get set up somewhere. Yeah. I think for me, I was so young that it was just assumed that we were going with them, but we weren't going right away. He told me he was going to go find a place to live somewhere

that we could hide, where he could secure all the documents to change our names and all that kind of stuff and be off the grid, but somewhere that I could play. So I was so young that I looked at it like an adventure. I didn't know how life changing it was. I really had no clue. I just knew that we were going to be going away for some time. I always thought we'd be back in New Jersey within a year or two. I just, I really had no clue what was coming down the line for us over the next couple of years. So you drove across country, I read, to Washington, D.C., and then eventually you settled in El Segundo, California, right in my neck of the woods. And I think your dad had lived there before you all went there for a few months.

So why El Segundo? So we actually, El Segundo is where we finished. We ended up first in Redondo, living above the old chart house there. And I think the chart house is still there. Actually, I went and saw it when I was back living there with the Ducks. But he found a place that I think everybody thought we would go to Michigan, Minnesota, those hockey states. He went there on a whim and found two Canadian coaches and a Russian coach that seemed to

be a little bit above their time. So that fit the narrative that we could hide. California wasn't a hockey hotspot. He could play professional poker and make his living that way and kind of hide there. And there was no work stuff to overcome. And ultimately, the weather helped convince them. So all those things kind of factored into that decision. And I was surprised when he did say where we were going,

but it ended up being the move of a lifetime for us. When he was looking at places to go, and he's in Southern California talking to the hockey people, did people know who he was? Did he tell people, I have a secret, don't tell? Or he just by that point had a new name? When he went, he had just saw the hockey team was being put together and it was the first AAA team in the state. So it was the highest level of hockey they were ever going to have.

He basically said, listen, I have a kid from the East Coast, my son, that I promise you just watch him once, he'll make your team. So I flew out, I tried out in a men's pickup game with guys that are 30 and 40 years old. And the coach said right away, we have a spot for him, bring him back. So that fast forward a couple of months, we get back out there and nobody knew the secret you know my my original last name was Stevenson and now it was Ryan so we did that we switched my birthday the problem was not in the ice hockey world but in the roller hockey world I was arguably one of the better players in the country and they knew me from roller hockey and there were pictures and magazines of me talking to the next big thing and roller hockey and all that and that was the first time like we

had to lie you know I had to lie just straight up to say no I'm not so-and-so when it clearly was me in these pictures and people it's amazing when you when you stick to something how and you're resolute with it how how much people let go and just not push. It became a one-time conversation with a lot of people. And although I think people knew, nobody ever pressed the issue. It was just, okay, you're not so-and-so, even though I'm wearing the same gear as that picture from a year and a half ago. It all just kind of went away. Nobody bothered us about it. Right. I heard that it wasn't uncommon for you to look out the window and look and see if there were maybe undercover police officers. Were you always

wondering when that day was going to come where the secret would be out? Yeah, I think we dealt with that because we were left behind, my mom and I in New Jersey, that they were foreclosing on the houses that my dad had owned and the properties and things like that, that people assumed because we weren't paying these bills, we were going to be meeting my dad eventually. And we dealt with a lot of that. We dealt with a lot of... And there were people following us all the time. I would never understand it, but mom would just say, put your head down. So I would sit in the front seat with my head down or whatever it might be, or I would be taking a license plate down for my mom of who is following us.

And it didn't dawn on me that people were putting so much together, but we left at two o'clock in the morning. One night I met my dad in DC and drove across the country together in our little van. But we got, it's funny. I got quite used to living that lie and that lifestyle before I had even gotten to California that it felt like a very easy transition when I got there at 11, 12 years old. Was part of it fun? I mean, you're an actor, right?

You're 11, 12 years old, and you're living a somewhat normal life. You're homeschooled, though. You're not in school. I assume that was to keep the secret. But is part of it fun? Are you all sitting around the dinner table thinking, all right, we're all cool now. Things are fine. I don't think I knew any better. I know I didn't know any better. I knew what we were doing was wrong for sure. But at 11 years old,

not only are you doing what your parents tell you, it felt like a big game to me. And you love your parents, right? You have a family. You want to be together, obviously. So at this point, you found the Los Angeles Kings junior program and you thrived. How did the junior program come about? That was the team that my dad had said to try out with. So I got there and within two days, I was meeting my teammates and playing a game.

This program had been around, I think, for a year or two, but had marginal success. But this was the first group of 1987 born, my birth year, players that they were going to be able to have. And for whatever reason, that birth year thrived in California for hockey. We had some great hockey players and we had to play. We were so good for our age that we had to play up. And, you know, we're playing against 16 and 17 year olds getting our butts beat on on the weekends. But then we're playing teams like Michigan's, you know, Detroit Honeybaked and such and such elite teams. And we're beating them by five, six points in our own bracket. So my first year there, we went 39 and 0 and won the national championship. And it was the first time in Southern California that had happened. And I thrived in that program because of the guys around me, the kids around me were just tremendous hockey players. So I got very lucky that that was the situation. Cause I don't know if that would have been the case had we picked another place to live. And at this point you're

12 years old. Yeah, I was 12. Yes. Peewee triple N. And you're beating 16 year olds at this point. Well, the 16 year olds are kicking our butts because they played the local california teams that were a little bit older they'd kick our butts but then we would go play our age and we were much more physical from playing against the 16 year olds that we we ran teams right out of the building and 2000 was also an important year because one morning people showed up at the door what was that like and and what happened did they knock and say hey is somebody somebody home yeah no there was no knock there was no knock it was four o'clock it was give or take four o'clock in the morning

when they came and they came in strong with all with you know the u.s marshals and and got it down to you know armed and and i think that they and i know this now that they felt that they were going in for a guy that was going to fight and be armed and all this. And when they got in, they saw the 12 year old sleeping on a futon and a pull out couch. Right. They I think they were a little surprised. But my dad obviously surrendered because I was in the crosshairs of everything and went peacefully. But it was it's a weird thing. I've said it in the past. They treated us with respect, even though they're taking away a criminal. And the problem was they knew that they were going in for a guy that had been convicted of attempted murder when it was a

Trump, that charge was a little more aggressive than it needed to be. Right. So he has a five-year sentence. He gets extradited to New Jersey and now he's at Riverfront State Prison. You're playing hockey in LA. Did you have a chance to go visit your dad when he was in prison? Eventually, I got back a couple times, but we stayed put in California. Things were going too well. That same year was the year that we had won later on. So he went away in January. We won in April. I was so comfortable in California with our new life, really. I don't think we wanted to mess with that. Our team was just so good. Excuse me, there was no point to leave. My mom wanted to go back a little bit, but I convinced her to stay. So we ended up staying three more years there and won another

national championship with the same group of guys. Got it. And when he was in prison, did you talk to him by phone regularly? Are they allowed to use the phone every day? Most of our communication at that point was by letters and phone calls. We stayed for another three years in California and didn't have the financial resources to get back to Jersey and then come back. It just wasn't feasible. Mom was working two jobs. I was working as well at 13 sharpening skates for $5 a pair and doing anything we could get by. But we kept in touch just in sporadic emails and letters, excuse me, phone calls and letters. So that leads me right into your mom. She's suddenly a single mom and your dad's in prison, not making a living. And your mom's

working two jobs. And I've heard she did some pretty remarkable things for you. Do you want to talk about what she did for work and how that factored into what you were doing? Yeah, of course. She was great. She worked at the rink during the day so that I could skate for free. And I stayed homeschooled through all this with no teacher or anything. I just kind of did it and she helped where she could.

But she held down two jobs comfortably. She worked at the Westminster Ice Palace palace the rink there during the day so that i could skate for free do my school at the rink during the day and then at night she went to lax and worked for cathay pacific in the lounge there for people before the flights and that allowed me to be on standby for all my team's flights we had to leave we had to leave the state every other week to play team to kind of gain that recognition. So she put in 14, 15-hour days every day, came home, cooked, slept, went back and did it again. So she was remarkable for those three years.

My parents divorced when I was two and a half, and my mom, suddenly a single mom, has to help support two young kids. My brother was four, and I saw my mom work really hard. There were a lot of tough moments there where she was worried she wouldn't be able to pay rent. So it definitely had an impact on me. Did that also have an impact on you just watching her work two jobs, 16 hour days sometimes? I think I learned the hard work aspect through my dad, but I think I worked the dedication learned the dedication through my mom in the grand scheme of things because she just put her nose to the grindstone and did whatever it took to get by it's funny you mentioned rent because we were we were always late so we were always hanging at home with the lights off when when they came knocking on the door because it

just always worked out that we were a little bit behind on when a paycheck would come through for her so you know I know that struggle as well but she had a profound effect on me in those years working the way she did. Similarly, my dad has an incredible work ethic. He used to go to work at four in the morning. And one summer I lived with him before college and I was working construction. I know you're new to Detroit, but if you go to Telegraph and 11 Mile, the Weight Watchers World headquarters is there. And I dug ditches one summer, working for $5 per hour cash off the books. I thought I was really cool. I had my shirt off. I was this super skinny, scrawny kid. I was hanging with the boys and I used to come home and have to hose off my mud, put them on

the fence. Then I'd go back to work. I had to be there at seven in the morning, but I used to come home and have to hose off my mud, put them on the fence. Then I'd go back to work. I had to be there at seven in the morning, but I loved it. It's good hard work. One night I was out with friends and I was out very late. I was a studious kid. I got into no trouble, was very much a nerd. And I came home one night and it's very late. It's four in the morning, maybe 345. And I think I'm sneaking in, no issues. And as I go to open the door, it opens for me. And my dad is sitting there and he looks at me. He looks at his watch and he just nodded.

We didn't even have a conversation. I went to bed and out the door, he went with his briefcase and he was off to work. Pretty funny story, but you're a product of your parents. And I think that's pretty important. Yeah, a hundred percent. But I can, I drive right by that, that area. So I'll have to keep an eye out for a ditch that you dug. Yeah.

When you're heading North, it's on the left-hand side. It used to be a really hot building. Okay. All right, good. I'll snap a picture for you. There you go. All right, let's talk about hockey now. That was incredible. Your family, your childhood. I mean, that's just awesome. You know, I'm a crazy hockey fan, Detroit. I mean, hockey is the sport. We'll

talk about that in a little while, but you have immense talent at a very young age. When did someone say, man, you are awesome? I think I started to learn a little bit more about it my last year in California. So I would have been 14. I had left there and went to Michigan, oddly enough, and it's, you know, a full circle. I'm here again now, but I played for an elite program here to kind of put myself on the map. And when I started playing against the competition the Michigan and Southern Ontario hockey Toronto area when I started my first year dominating that at 15 and I think I it was something like 152 points and yeah I got to a point where I once I started to put up the numbers that I was putting up and teams were taking notice of the Ontario Hockey League, which is the big main

feeder to the NHL. They came knocking, the US national team came knocking, Minnesota or Michigan's college came knocking. So all these things are kind of happening as a once to a 15 year old in 10th grade. I was, I was overwhelmed, but that was when I know that, okay, this is, this is an option for me that, that making a career out of this could be a thing. I mean, a lot of kids when they're younger, you ask a six-year-old, a seven-year-old, what do you want to be? I want to be a professional football player, hockey player, basketball player. I mean, so few kids make it, but you're 10 years old and your parents are moving you to play hockey basically. So they must've known something was up. It's sort of like these kids now, they play tennis, they go to Nick Volatieri's tennis camp or IMG was there there must have been some promise when you were 10 or 11.

There was I mean I was always one of the highest scorers but I just didn't know how but I guess the competition how that translated to the rest of the world I just always figured that the kids in Canada were so much better so it took some time for me to learn that on a national level that number one, we were just as good as what they were doing up there. And if you can be one of the better players here, that translates. 15 is where everything changes. That's when the game gets much more fast, much more physical. And you watch a lot of players and guys that I played with kind of fade when that starts because number one they're scared or number two they can't think the game at the speed and and as things sped up I got better because it made it easier for me so I think that's when I started to really really see the potential in something and you mentioned you're in Michigan I think

you're considered University of Michigan at one point, best university in the history of the planet. Obviously, I went there and they had a most famous coach in collegiate hockey, Red Berenson. Were you trying to play for Red? I did. Michigan was my dream school. So when they offered me in 10th grade, nothing formal about it, but hey, you're coming here when you're ready. Yes, I'll be school. So when they offered me in 10th grade, I, you know, nothing formal about it, but Hey, you're coming here when you're ready. Yes, I'll be there. So we had a deal in place and I reneged on the deal because I went to Canada, but I just didn't know what was out there for me. At that point, I knew that I wanted to go to Michigan. Here it was. And I said, yes. And

I think I really pissed Mel off or excuse me, read off a couple of years later. It just wasn't my journey. It wasn't my path. I had to, I had to find what was right for me. And I thought that was going up to Canada. And Bobby Clark, a hall of famer for the Philadelphia flyers had been a friend of your dad's and was a mentor of yours, advised you to go play in Ontario. Yeah. Bobby Clark was just, uh, you know, he, he still is very close with my dad. Still somebody that I can text if I need it. Hall of Fame player, Hall of Fame general manager, but all around just a good human being that's always been in my family's corner.

Sat me down and didn't really ask me, just said, you're going to Canada. And this is where you need to be because you're a lottery pick. You're a top 10 pick. You just don't know it yet. So he really put Canada hockey on the map for me. And then I started to really look at it. And that was where I ultimately took myself to. Ontario Hockey League.

I grew up in Detroit. Drinking age is 21. Ontario, it was 19. So we used to drive across the border beneath the tunnel. I don't know if you've been over again over the tunnel, or you take the Ambassador Bridge. And we used to go to the bars there, had fake IDs back in the day. You couldn't buy them online with actual barcodes. You took a colored pencil and you try to change the date. But I spent many, many, many times in

Ontario, had some very interesting moments there. Had you been there before? What did you think? What'd you think of Ontario? So the first time I went with, after I got drafted and I had been to Toronto, that's it, right? The GTA area. So you have to understand I got drafted to that league, but I got drafted to a team.

Nobody wanted to go to, it was really up north called owen sounds on the georgian bay beyond cold when i got there and the team the team kind of rolled out the red carpet and had a weekend of i guess adoration poured on me to kind of impress me enough to go there and when i left i still didn't know if that's where i was going to go but it over time it kind of wore on me and it was a very small town feeling and I troubled with large groups and large gatherings probably related to some of the other things I had gone through so that small town feel immediately just hit me and thought this is where I need to be still didn't like Canada very much but it grew on me over time 39 points your first season 89 your second season and you're 18 years old now. And

then boom, second pick in the 2005 draft by the Ducks. I think Sidney Crosby was first that year. What was that whole thing like? Did you know where you were going? Where were you? Just must have been your wildest dreams have now come true or they were about to come true. They were getting there. Yeah, I was getting close. I knew the night before that anaheim was going to take me so i was able to sleep okay but that process is tough that you especially in our year where there's a lockout in the nhl so nobody knew where anybody was drafting until a week beforehand so as opposed to when you're a top 10 pick you might interview with the top 12 teams but now you're interviewing with 31 and it was a nightmare you're just you're on the phone all day you're doing top 10 pick, you might interview with the top 12 teams, but now you're interviewing with 31. And it was a nightmare.

You're on the phone all day. You're doing this and that. And there was no video conferencing then. So a lot of times I would leave a hotel room with, I'll just say the Boston Bruins, and then go to a next hotel room with the Columbus Blue Jackets and so on and so on. And you're doing it all day long. I was just happy to get that part of it over with. But it was a dream come true weekend.

I got to spend it with my family. My dad wasn't allowed in the country, but found a way to the draft in Ottawa and had to do house arrest after the fact, but it felt like a culmination of a lot of things. What kind of questions do they ask you? You hear about football now, you go in, there's all kinds of psychological tests.'re 18 years old how many people are in the room and who's in the room and what are the questions i think generally you always have the general manager and his staff so assistant gm three or four scouts some rooms are just that small right and they keep it very internal but you would walk in other rooms there'd be 22 guys at a table and you're supposed to go around and shake their hands and then remember them. And I'm like, guys, I've met 200 people

today. Like I have no clue who you are. I remember, I didn't know at certain points, which team I was talking to. It just, it didn't matter because the same questions come across. What do you think you need to get better at? Why should we draft you? What are your weaknesses? What kind of food do you eat? Do you diet? Do you date? Do you drink, smoke? All these things. And it's just so monotonous that you're doing it over and over again. I know for a fact that I blew some of them towards the end because I could have cared less. I honestly was like, I don't know where you're dropped in, but it doesn't matter to me. I've done this 18 times today and I'm done. Obviously you impressed the docs. And at this point you saw

a therapist, I think for the first time, why did you finally decide to go to one? And were you still excited to play at that point? No. So after I got drafted, like I said, it felt like a culmination of a lot of things. And I felt like for the first time after all of those years of hiding, running, lying, whatever, the story had come out on ESPN. So that was out there. I felt like, okay, I think I'm done. Like I honestly thought I was done with hockey for a little while. Just didn't have the drive or the interest. Part of me was being spurred on by getting there. And not that I had played a game, but I got there. I got drafted. Now I can relax and I relaxed and my game but I got there I got drafted now I can relax and I relaxed and my game didn't slip I got better the next year you know statistically in every category

and things but I just wasn't my head wasn't in it and it wasn't right I had a lot of things weighing on my mind conversations I felt like I needed to have so I I seeked out well actually I didn't seek out Brian Burke from the Ducks helped me find somebody they use for sports performance and started driving down to her every Monday in Toronto, which is about a two and a half hour drive each way. So I would get up in the morning, drive down, meet her, get back for practice every Monday. And she helped me find that inner passion again,

that I seemed to be lacking for a little while. It just, it helped me off the ice, which helped me on the ice. And I stuck with her for a lot while. It helped me off the ice, which helped me on the ice. And I stuck with her for a lot of years. I think it's important to let our listeners and viewers know there's a stigma against going to therapy. And I've seen a therapist for a long time. I started seeing one as a child, was bullied as a child. And we all go through some struggles in life. I've gone through my fair share. When I got divorced, my best friend said to me, first thing you need to do is you got to find a therapist and you have to go in and say to the therapist, don't tell me all

the shit that happened when I was 10 years old. I need to get through my divorce now. And he was right. And I'm still with the same therapist who is my coach, basically my coach in life. I go in there, I bare my soul to her, talk about all the stupid shit I did and all the bad things I've done. And these are all my problems. And we worked through the problems and she really has moved my needle in a good way. I always want to be a better person. So I've talked to so many of my friends. No, I don't want to go to therapy. I'm embarrassed. It's not right.

And that's how I grew up. People didn't talk about it. Of course, I live in Los Angeles now. And you're a minority if you don't have a therapist. That's very true. And that's especially for me in the hockey world. This was 2006, right? Nobody, and the conversations changed dramatically dramatically but nobody but a few people might

have gone to sports psychologists but like real actual therapy is so awful for using that as a tool so i i hit it that i went and for the longest time and i stopped going because i didn't feel like i needed it anymore which i know now that i needed it more than ever and i'm glad that the conversation around mental health has changed quite a bit and And the NHL is always going to be a little bit behind, but they're starting to embrace it a little more. Right. Now you're back at the game. You have a good sports psychologist. In 2007, you finally play your first game. Where were you and what happened? London, England was my first NHL game as part of the premier series. So we were playing the Kings for two games over there. And first game was my first goal. game as part of the Premier Series. So we were playing the Kings for two games over there.

And first game was my first goal. So I got that out of the way. And really, I had a good first two games over there. My original stint with the team wasn't very long. I was up and down through the minor leagues that first year quite a bit. But it was a good start to a professional career back in 07, yes. What are you thinking? What's going through your mind?

You're on a bus going to the o2 arena in london one of the most famous venues in the world and where was your heart beating a million miles a minute as you're lacing up your skates and you're coming out of the tunnel and your foot hits the ice for the first time and what what was all that like i'm honestly i'm glad i got to play it over there because there was no the people didn't know who to root for they were just excited that they were watching hockey so there was nobody cheering for us or them per se i got to play my first two games in a relatively easy setting i thought i'd be more nervous than i was i remember looking back thinking i just felt like i belonged there at this point that I had earned it through training camp and special teams and all

that kind of stuff. So I was at ease going into those two games. And then you said you're back and forth to the minors for a couple of years. You had been with the Sound Attack and now you're with the Iowa Chops. What's up with these names, by the way? Where are these junior names coming from? Iowa Chops. What's up with these names, by the way? Where are these junior names coming from? Iowa Chops. The Chops were my second year pro. My first year pro was back and forth between Portland, Maine, and Anaheim with the Portland Pirates. I think I did it eight times that year. It was ridiculous.

Get called up and you're on a red-eye out to California and you're playing that night. Get sent down and you're on a red-eye back to Boston and up to Portland playing that night that was the hardest year logistically for me but I was young and my body could kind of handle it but it was it was an up and down year and then the second year you know I made the team out of training camp but salary cap issues were were a thing so I had to get sent down to Iowa Chops and I think I ended up playing 12 games there and they somebody got hurt on the big club and had to get down to Iowa chops. And I think I ended up playing 12 games there and they, somebody got hurt on the big club and had to go on long-term reserve for their injury. And that allowed them to call me back up and haven't been back down

since that was in no way. Yeah. That was, that kind of took off for me that year. And then you had a first hat trick in 2009. Things were really good for you then. What, what was that that like i mean you you you hit one you hit two and now you know you're on the verge of a third you're you're just gunning for it at that point that was uh it was incredible so the funny story about that was that was 12 years ago now i know that because the night before that i went on my first date ever with my wife and she had never seen a hockey game. So she said, I'll watch it.

I had a hat trick. So she thought I did that every night. And I remember, I was like, that was one of those nights that you just, you know, it was kind of like coming out party in the NHL that night. I remember the feeling was just incredible. But the NHL is such a forget league that, you know, we were playing 24 hours later. And the hat trick didn't matter right in the grand scheme of things. So I think I celebrated it for 20 minutes.

I remember texting, you know, my then person, I'm dating for one day and said, I don't do that every night, you know, tamper expectations for next game and moving on. But it was, I've got some incredible pictures of it all these years later. And I got the wife that I, i you know 12 years later as well so it was a good weekend for me let's talk about the hat trick for a second i've never understood this so for those of you who don't know someone scores their third goal it's called a hat track and people in the stands throw their hats on the ice obviously because they're wearing hats but these

things are 30 bucks a pop and there could be 50 hats on the ice and they're throwing them from the rafters it's like you're taking 30 ice and they're throwing them from the rafter. It's like you're taking 30 bucks and you're throwing it to the ice to celebrate your home team, which is cool. I mean, it's fun to see, but it's there's thousands of dollars of hats on the ice. Who gets the caps, by the way? Do you get to keep them? I get none. No, I've seen trashed. I've seen donated. There's a couple of buildings that have a wall on the concourse where they pour the hats into and you can kind of see them pile up over the years i don't know if

that's still a thing oddly enough i don't get to see many concourses of the rinks that we play in so i don't know what they do but i never understood it either i've seen a lot of hat tricks and never once threw a hat keep keep my money on my head i keep my money on my head as well i do have a bunch of red wing hats by the way yeah i probably have i probably have eight hats you know a bunch of jerseys i i bought this one a charity auction championship jersey got the whole team on the back okay so you you break the franchise rookie point record and you're a finalist for rookie of the year, the Calder Memorial Trophy. Are you sitting there thinking, I'm really proud of myself

at the end of the season? Are you, at some point, you must have to sit back and think, I've had a really good year. I'm doing pretty well. Yeah, I had, you know, I decided that I was going to move to California full time at that point.

So I had bought a house in Newport Beach. I needed the money from the rookie bonuses to be able to do that. So I was like watching as that money came in. I was like, thankfully I can, I can breathe a little bit, not only financially, but security. I know that I'm going to make the team next year. Yeah. I took a deep breath for a little bit, but at that point I was just 21 turning 22. I was still hungry. I still wanted to get back to work right away and really didn't take much time off really just hopped right back into training that summer to continue it we had a good couple years together there in Anaheim we we I think we should have won one cup but your team in Detroit knocked us out in game seven of semi-finals and that was it for us I watched every single Red Wing playoff game from the minute they made the playoffs for the first time.

And we'll talk about that a little bit later on. I do know the game. I did see the game. So you had a couple of really good years with the Ducks. And then you went to the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver. That must have been pretty cool. That was a very, very cool moment in my life to be honored to get to wear that jersey. I think it would have been cheap if it was overseas, but for it to be in Canada, the mecca of hockey in Vancouver, a city that I love,

everything just kind of aligned. Obviously, we won silver, but to get a medal, to go to that, and have a chance for gold was just an incredible, incredible experience. Probably the best in my hockey career. I think it took you a minute to score a goal in the in the first game yeah yeah i scored yeah the one and only goal i had i yeah i was a couple minutes in and against switzerland and the goalie for switzerland was the goalie for our anaheim team so i got the score on my buddy and a guy that i played with and spent a lot of time with so it was it was very cool who was the goalie? Jonas Hiller. So now retired, but he was in Anaheim for quite a few years.

I assume you saw the 1980 game against Russia, the US and Russia, the gold medal game at some point. Yeah, oh yeah. I saw the movie. I never saw the actual game. Yeah, I was only, I'm an 87, so I wasn't around yet. But I know the story and watched all the movies about it i was in dunham sports which to give you a sense of where that is it's no longer there was a big chain and i remember they had the tv on in the corner and it was

incredible i left the house we were down a goal or two and i we were in the store people had stopped shopping everyone was watching and then al michaels who i think is the best announcer in all of sports he's just incredible the do you believe in miracles one of the great moments in u.s sports history just an incredible incredible thing it must have been such a good such a thrill for you to play yeah i've got what a dream it did i've gotten to go to lake placid to that original rink many times and there's a cool tour where if you press a button they do the last 10 seconds live so you actually get to look down at the rink that they did it in and hear al michael say it i remember being like 12 the first time i did it and just the goosebumps and then then to get to live that, obviously one goal short of

that, but to get to live that experience was pretty incredible. So you finished your second year and then the ducks say, all right, time for the big money. And you get a very big contract, your 23, five-year deal, $25 million. That's a ton of money, let alone for a 23-year-old. We're going to come back to money a little later on, but what was the first thing you did when you got that contract? I didn't spend very much. I waited a while. I waited until the second year of my deal, where I was a little more financially secure to buy my dream car, which was a Bentley. I did that and drove it for six years and eventually resold it. But

nothing extravagant. I paid off the rest of the house and then bought my dream car and that was it. I used to go to the Porsche dealership a couple of times a year when I had no money. I'd sit in a 911 and said, one day I want to buy one. Our company went public and I thought, okay, it's time now I can buy a Porsche. And I waited a full year before I bought the Porsche. I felt very... Yeah. I have a 1996 convertible, a 911. And I remember it was $107,000 without tax. I thought, oh my gosh, that's more than some people make in a year or five years or 10 years. I felt guilty buying it. And I still have it. It's in my garage. I'm going to keep it probably forever. It's expensive now to maintain. It costs around $5,000 a year. And Charlie, who you know, my son who's 16, said, you can never sell that car, dad.

And it's a symbol for me of my hard work. I worked so hard and I had so many ups and downs and I made some money and I bought my car. Funny thing about that car, I had the car for a day and I figure, okay, I'm going to wash my car. So it's a nice day. It's hot outside. I've got the bucket. I fill it up. I filled it up with way too much water

and the bucket slipped and the corner of the bucket clipped the back of the car and scratched the car one day. One day. Never fixed it. It's just, you know, it's what it is. It's a very authentic car. It's there. It's there. It is what it is. I waited a year and

I still felt guilty when i bought it for sure and uh i don't know if i ever really appreciated it when i had it if i'm being honest why why not just it's your dream car you have there was just yeah i felt guilty driving it i like every time i was like if i if i just clip somebody it's a it's a thirty thousand dollar boo-boo so i drove it like a baby and I think it gave me more anxiety than enjoyment were you worried about the perception of how you look you're 24 years old you're driving a Bentley around LA no because I figured everybody just thought I was a trust fund kid like most of the people in LA seem to be so I remember some people give me that look and I was like I just wish I could tell people I did it my own right I got this on my own, but I got over that

a little bit. Yeah, there was always those stares for sure. In sports, there's always these really unique moments. You're watching a sports center and Scott Van Pelt or someone will say something. This is incredible what happened. You're never going to see this again.

You were in a game against the Minnesota Wild one year. And what happened in that Minnesota Wild game? I scored one of the, I think probably the craziest goals in NHL history. I scored on a one-timer shooting my original way with a left-handed stick on their backhand. Crazy play where the sticks got all mixed up and their players stole mine. So I found it on the ground and just happened to pick the stick up and their players stole mine so I found it on the ground and just happened to pick the stick up and the puck came to me with a wide open net and pure reaction I just took a one-timer without shooting my normal way with a stick that was facing

backwards and then got cocky and held it up like this for everybody to see so certainly not I remember they tried to rebuke the goal and say, you know, you can't do that. But the guy that was doing it was their captain. He had already stolen my stick. That was either you give up the goal or you're going to the penalty box. What do you want? And they just eventually let the goal stand. It was a weird one. For those of you who haven't seen, I encourage you to watch it. It's on YouTube. It's phenomenal. 2013, you've been in Southern California for a while, and now it's time to go. You go to Ottawa, you're playing for the Senators. Did you know the trade was coming? Yes and no. We knew it was a possibility because of the financial ramifications of guys signing a

couple of long-term big ticket deals. And, you know, I probably would have been the third given my statistics, they just weren't going to pay that for three of us. So being young and really a chance for them to kind of capitalize on my value, they, they moved me out, uh, with two years left on my five-year contract that, you know, that was disappointing. I felt like we had some work to finish there that we didn't get a chance to do but enter the business side of hockey and that's how things go what did danielle think were you married at the time no we weren't married and that was that was kind of the thing that you know i guess pushed us to the next phase because i got traded from newport beach where she's comfortable she's from canada ontario which could not be farther away.

And we decided that she'd come and we'd try it. And she lived there for a year or two and decided she could stay long-term and it just continued to work out for us. So now married and all that, but it was kind of the catalyst for us making that next step. How long at that point had you been dating before you got traded?

So we're at 12 years now. Yeah, three, three and a half years, give or i would say somewhere yeah maybe even four i don't know i forgot my anniversary yesterday so i'm not good with dates apparently oh geez not the wedding one not the wedding anniversary i remember that one but our first date anniversary it's like how many do we need how many anniversaries can you possibly have but yeah i, I know how it goes. So you had a good year there and then boom, it happened again. You get another massive contract. This one, seven year, $50 million.

And by the way, where I grew up, people didn't talk about money. No one knew what people made. People were humble for the most part. It was something you didn't talk about, but you're a professional athlete and everybody knows how much you make. It's a little weird. It has to be a little uncomfortable, right? People are counting your money, essentially. Yeah. It's definitely a weird scenario. People know what you've made to date, right? Or what you've made on any given day. And they break it down by period, second, minute, and hour.

And it can be a little disconcerting, especially I didn't have the best of my career was not in Ottawa. So when you go through slumps and ups and downs in a Canadian market, and you're making 7.2, I don't even know what it was, 7.2 a year, the labels come with that. So it's weird when people know what you make by minute, second, hour, day, whatever it might be, and they can break it down and attach it to how you're playing each and every game. And then people do that. Now it's social media. It's right there in front of you all the time. So it's a little disconcerting and it gets old pretty quick, but it's a very small problem to have when you're making that kind of money. You don't get to have reservations about it when

you make that kind of money. I don't get you don't get to have reservations about it when you make that kind of money i don't i don't believe anyway you'd rather make more money than less money obviously in here it's like people are always like how do you feel people always ask me they're like you're overpaid i'm like isn't that the goal isn't that isn't that what you're trying to do essentially would i rather be underpaid no you know you've earned it right people? People take a risk, right? Some athletes have low salaries. They do well. And you never know how you're going to do.

But I'm your friend. I think you earned it. And I'm glad you got it. So too bad for everybody else. Thanks, man. Thank you. Too bad for everybody else. I had a lot of criticism.

I guess, yeah. I came from the financial world, worked at a big company and managed to make a lot of money as a young person. There weren't that many people who were happy for me, frankly. There's a lot of envy and chatter behind the scenes. I've lived it, not like you have that publicly, but certainly within my community my true friends super happy for me and then you know there are some people not not so happy for you but i'm happy for you yeah it's in every walk of life you get that right so just no matter what you surround yourself with is what i've learned in the last little while no doubt you made your first All-Star game in 2015 in Quebec. How did that feel? Was that on the bucket list at some point?

I wouldn't say it's on the bucket list, no. I guess to be an All-Star is a feather in the cap, right? It's something that you have and you get the jersey and the photo op. But I think most players would tell you they'd rather the four days off to relax and recharge their body for the second half of hockey. Because it's a grind. They also get the grind. You're there for four days off to relax and recharge their body for the second half of hockey because it's a grind they also get the grind you're there for four days and it's all media and obligations and i went to one and i was like i don't i don't need to go to a second but it is a nice feather in the cap did you make any friends that weekend who you weren't expecting to make who you've kept uh in close contact with i assume you're meeting people in a different way from different teams

who you really haven't spent a lot of time with. Yeah, it's cool because you're having beers with guys that you normally play against, right? And that's a different kind of thing. That's the first time I met Tyler Johnson, who's become one of my closest friends in the league and our neighbor at Gaza Ranch. And didn't really keep in touch after,

but certainly we see each other every day in the summer now. And yeah, i think that that kind of stems from there so there's some positives to go in for sure you're one game away at some point from going to the stanley cup what what kind of a dream is it for you to win the cup wings are clearly in rebuilding mode but where is that in your goals in life i think if you asked me when i was 20 it would have been the number one thing and it would have been, you know, all consuming for me as you get older. And I realized, I don't know how much time left is in my career. I'm getting older and I'm injured and things like

that. And now I'm a dad and a husband. I think your priorities shift. You know, when I go to the rink, it's still my hunger to go to the rink for the cup. But I think there's a little bit less there for me than there would have been even five years ago before kids. It's still something that I'm trying to chase actively, for sure. Now I want to get to some of the struggles in particular, the addiction to alcohol. It's a problem that affects over 15 million people in the United States. Only 10% of it is actually treated. I think that's one of the hopes from this podcast.

People will listen to it. It will encourage them to seek help because many people do need to seek help. What happened last year? You recognized you had a problem. I think you were in Detroit when this happened. And what had led up to this? And then walk us through this. Yeah.

So I mean, you know, personally I was struggling with it for a while and just couldn't get a handle. I would get 20 days of sobriety doing great, feeling good about myself. And then I would just kind of have that day that you just can't get back. It was like a binge,

a binge day. And then I've always had a crippling fear of hangover. So to get rid of that, I would whitewash it and just couldn't i guess get ahead of it and we were here in detroit the guys went out i went out with the guys and had drinks and just woke up in the morning and i think there was a hangover but there was also this like this crippling anxiety that was like i just can't keep going like this there's no good end in sight for the way I'm living my life, right? Just professionally, more personally than professionally for me at this

point, I could have given, give or take the hockey. I just didn't want to keep letting my wife and kids down. So I had all this thing brewing in me for a while. And then I finally hit my peak and said, it's like it's it's time so i called my wife from here she was in ottawa and just said hey i don't know what's going on but i'm i'm leaving like i'm getting on a plane and i don't even know where i'm going i'm just going to wherever they can get me in to a rehab so i went for 30 days to malibu out by you as well and um i know we talked about it a few times but it was the best thing i've ever done it was you know you i know you reached out and the support was incredible.

I should never really even thank this. Thank you for that, for, for, you know, reaching out. And I know I could have called you to say, Hey, come grab me for dinner or whatever it might've been, but, and I know you would have done it. So I appreciate that. But it was just 30 days of clearing my head, learning about myself and learning that all these emotional problems that I have which and I'm not good in a lot of settings emotionally with being vulnerable with being up

front with my wife whatever I've got a ton of them there's some PTSD there that I had no control over and as I started to check out those boxes I realized that alcohol is just a crutch to get away from treating these things so I left there in December of last year and got finished the hockey season sober, went through the summer as best as I could and COVID kind of changed it and kind of put me in a bubble. So it's made it easy. Now as the hockey season starts back up,

I'll get to put it all into practice, but I'm excited about it. It's been a, it's been a hell of a ride the last year with ups and downs, but finally in a place where I feel equipped to handle whatever comes my way. I mean, it's amazing. And I want to go back though and talk about some of the details. When did you start drinking? And when a lot of people, when they're teenagers, they drink socially, you go out with your buds. I drank

socially in college or plenty of times in college. I drank too much and woke up with a hangover and that was fun. And I think that's at some point normal, not that I condone it, but you're on the road, you're living with random families, playing in different cities. When did you actually have your first drink and then how did it progress i'm guessing 15 or 16 sometime in junior hockey in canada was probably the first time i ever drank and in hockey it's a big part of the culture having beers with the guys after a win being on the bus late night whatever it might be just hanging out and you know i always kind of partook in that i would always have beers with the guys go out. As you get to the next level in the NHL, it's a little more rare that you get a night out as a team.

But I was always a guy that went for those and, you know, kind of went to the rink the next day to sweat it out and do what we all do. But it wasn't until later that I think my mom died in 2016 when it just became more of a regular occurrence for me to kind of just bury myself in that as opposed to dealing with any kind of fallout or residual feelings i was having from that looking back on it now my my wife said that when riley my oldest daughter was born and my mom died within a couple weeks of each other she's like that's for, the defining moment when you started to have an issue. So 2016 to 2019 was my big, I guess, window of really being dependent on it.

How often did you drink? I know obviously summer you're not playing, but during the year you said it's hard to go out every night. Would you drink alone or would you only drink when you were out with your team or your buddies yeah i would i would drink alone but never like never to obscene amounts but i'd be at home with my wife or whatever and we'd have a bottle of wine with dinner and that was it so i wasn't your everyday average drunk that left the rink got drunk did rinse and repeat kind of thing i was always okay with having two glasses of wine and calling it in the evening, but I always wanted more. I just knew that I had to perform the next day. So I was always able to kind of shut the wine drinking or the beer drinking off at that point.

But every other day I'd have wine with my wife at home or whatever it might be. And then I'd go out on the road with the guys and those were my blowouts. But it was getting to the point where I was thinking about getting to five o'clock to open wine or we were opening a second bottle and danielle wouldn't have a glass and it'd be gone so it was just like all these little tiny minuscule details were piling up and the signs were there i just wasn't recognizing them and she was but she wasn't getting through to me either. So I was kind of lost in my own little, my world at this point. Did some of your friends try to help you? I mean, you and I were playing golf a few times and, you know, we would hang out at

lunch, dinner, you were over at my house a few times for dinner and you, you were not sober. And a couple of times I was very worried about you where you could hardly get the words out. And one time during lunch, Madison, I said, I think he has a problem and he's my friend. And do I go to him? Is he going to get mad? Is he going to be insulted? Is he going to say, who the fuck are you? Because I had dated a girl two and a half years. We were three months into it when I realized she had a serious problem. We were at a wedding in Mexico and she made just the most embarrassing scene out of herself. She embarrassed herself, me, and we got back to the room and I said,

this is just not okay. And I noticed some things before, but she had hit it for me. We dated two and a half years and I encouraged her to get help. She had been to rehab before a couple of times and it was hard on me. And, you know, you always wonder, are you going to push someone? And what I learned, I've been to 50 AA meetings with her. I've been to Elanon meetings and it affects the people around you and it's really a hard thing to go to people who you care about.

You and I are good friends but it's still just a very hard thing. I was afraid to come to you even though I thought there was an issue. Yeah. I think I wasn't... No, if somebody had said think, you know, I wasn't like, no, if somebody had said something looking back,

I don't think I would have been receptive to it. I think I had to, I think when you learn it, you have to learn it on your time and on your own. Like something has to click here. And what I learned was like, even the person I love the most, when she mentioned it, it still didn't click for me

when it was coming from her. So for me, I don't know why it clicked on that day but it did a year ago but it did and it rang true and it drastically changed my life yeah i don't i think people need to come to their own realization they can get you can get help getting there but until you feel it for yourself i don't think there's you have to have a rock bottom to get there, to understand it, I guess. And I was lucky enough that my rock bottom was pretty high. I didn't, you know, I didn't burn any bridges on my way down. I didn't lose my money, my house. I didn't drive drunk. I knew for a while, I just couldn't get myself over that hurdle of getting to get help. And you're right. It is harder on the people around you. Cause I watched her go through it for six months before I went. Right. I think one of the other things I hope people take from this podcast is that there's

a lot of people out there who do need help and don't get help. The first meeting I went to with her, there were 25 people there. And I walk into the room and I recognize five people, people from my community, parents at school, very high performers, multimillionaires in the hedge fund world. And I'm looking around the room and this is the reality for a lot of people. They have a lot of problems. And I do know many people who have a drinking problem, who just should be getting help and don't get help. The final straw for me, my girlfriend would often drive drunk. I mean, she was a mess. She would drink a few days a week and it was just a bad situation between us.

I had three young kids. I was divorced. She had young kids the same age as mine. And I would go out trying to find her in the middle of the night. I couldn't find her. She would call drunk, hang up on me. And I was depressed. It was just so difficult on me. I thought I could save her. And you talk about in these meetings, you have the master of the universe syndrome. You can fix anything. And like you said, you can't. It has to come from you. But the final straw for me was my daughters were graduating kindergarten the next day. And two in the morning, she went out and hit a pole on sunset and her fancy car was wrecked into a tree. Thankfully, she didn't hurt herself. And that was it. I'm done. I just can't do it anymore. And the other thing I learned, interestingly, is that there's a lot of people in the program, just because you're in the program,

and you're going to these meetings doesn't mean that you're cured. I think it's great to be there. But a lot of people treated the meetings as okay, I've been at the meetings, and now I've earned the right to drink. Yeah. Most of the people, but it's certainly a large percent of the people because I got to know through these meetings and my ex-girlfriend what people would do. I think it's great to hear you hit rock bottom. You want to save your family. And I just think it's a really great thing what you did.

I'm proud as your friend. And I know Danielle and your friends, I'm sure are very happy to see you sober now. You have to have a desire to change things. Because if you don't, you're going half-assistedly and you're not doing yourself any benefit. You're not doing the people around you any benefit. I'm admittedly not a meeting guy. I find, and for me, going to meetings actually fuels my desire to drink or my anxiety that leads to drinking I feel like when people people go to meetings to unload right what's bothering them that day or that week and they want to unload that so it's off their chest and they

can not deal with it I feel like I was taking those things on and then I was worrying about people that I didn't know from meetings that, you know, had no business affecting me really, but they would. I work my, my sobriety a different way through, through therapy and reading and podcasts and all sorts of things. But what I've learned in, in my year is that just what works for a might not work for B and you know And there's no scale of alcoholism. You have an issue or you don't. And even if you're a person that, I've been to a meeting with a lady

that had one glass of wine every single night for 50 years, but it took all of her all day long to get to that one glass. And then she would savor that glass for an hour and then do it. And then she said, I know I'm an alcoholic because as soon as that glass was done, I would start to think about the next one.

I think you learn how not to be judgmental because I could think, I could say, okay, well, how is that any different? Or I'm so much worse than you because I drink 15 glasses of whatever it might be. No matter how big or small, it's still an issue and it's still somebody's journey. So I learned that the meetings aren't going to be my way, but I talk a little differently than Joe Blow and I'm there to support him and his journey as much as I can, but got to find what works for you. What was rehab like? I think a lot of people really don't know what rehab is like. You get there and what happens? What's the program? I learned from her, there are various treatment programs.

Some facilities run this way. Some run the other way. What's it like? They go in. Do they take your phone? Are you allowed to do certain things? Are you allowed to leave? Yeah, there's a 72-day or 72-hour isolation period.

So no phone. They took my passport. So I was left with my clothes on my back and in my suitcase which wasn't much because I left from a road trip so I had arguably the Ritz-Carlton of rehab it was a beautiful facility very small you're in a house with six other people and you're I mean you're getting what you pay for or what the NHL paid for for me so my dues finally came in handy but it's great for me. It was just, you know,

you get to go out and you go to the gym every day. If I had brought my hockey gear, I could have skated every day. There's different concessions for different ways of life. And the NHL is great about getting me to this place. But yeah, after 72 hours, you have full access to phones and tablets or whatever it might be.

But for me, I was like, okay, I'm here to work. So I ended all the meetings, the lectures. There's a lot of them. Every other hour, you're doing something. And when you're not doing something, you're kind of journaling or trying to figure out what works for you to, I guess, best sponge what's coming your way.

So in 30 days, you kind of got to develop a program for yourself that's going to work for you outside the walls. And I got very lucky in the sense of the place that I was gave me those tools. Because I learned very quickly that I'm not going to be a meeting guy, but I'm going to be a therapy guy probably for the rest of my life. And are you doing therapy now? Yeah, yeah, it's been the best thing I've ever done. I left there and went right back to Ottawa, was home for Christmas and met my, you know, new therapist there. She's from Ottawa. So we're on

Zoom now. So I'm traded, but I'm going to continue with her until she feels like I can make a transition to somebody else that's going to be local. Yeah, it's cognitive behavioral therapy, CBT, as it's called. And by far the best thing I've ever done is learn how to deal with alcohol through that. Really. How much healthier is it mentally now that you don't have kind of the physical hangover from the drinking? I mean, your bloodstream is clean, your head must be a lot cleaner. What does that feel like? I feel incredible. It's nice not to, the physical side of my body has never felt better. I feel like I'm younger on the ice, more powerful than I have been in years.

But those are far secondary to like the mental acuity, I guess, that I, that I've gotten back to clarity. There's no fog. There's no waking up and asking or thinking about what conversation did I have with my wife last night? Did I check that box? Did I do this or that? Did I put my foot in my mouth? So, I mean, I had to wake up in the morning and wonder if I was in trouble from the night before, you know, if I said something wrong, if I forgot to do something, whatever it might be, the things that you just don't do when you're in a state of a couple glasses of wine. So I got rid of all those things, and the mental side of my life has changed dramatically. I'm closer with my kids. I'm able to tolerate more. My short fuse is getting longer.

It's still short, but it's getting longer. So all the benefits far outweigh being it being a drunk so you come out of rehab you're clean and then you come back to the ice in late february first game you're in nashville one of the great moments of the year i watched the highlights couldn't wait to see it that day what happened my first game back at home i had a hat trick i had a trick again so i think it had been five five years since my last hat trick and it was on the 101st day of being sober you know really kind of the the best part of the last year that's for sure all the journey and to come out and have a hat trick is just incredible right i only had one goal all year leading up to that and to have three the night you're back in front of your home and the building erupts.

Just, just a magical evening. And the fans love you again. What a, what a story of redemption. What, what were you, what were you feeling that first game back?

Cause you wait to get back to the ice. I mean, when, when I talked to you a couple of times, so we were texting, you know, for a couple of months, you,

you're kind of this limbo. You're waiting to get back, waiting for the league to let you back. And then you're back. What was it like first step on the ice? I can't remember. I don't remember being that nervous for a game in a very long time. I think I was more nervous to impress my wife again, right. To have that feeling again and playing in front of her. And, you know,

I knew that Ottawa was a very small community, even though it's the capital. So I knew that they were going to be good to me to kind of warn them for being patient with me through the process. I was fed up with everything I was going through at this point. I just wanted to play. And it felt like there was another hurdle every week that seemed imaginary. So I didn't know if I was ever going to play at this point, but to get back and be nervous and have that excitement to play in the league

again, and then do that. Just incredible very emotional night i was yeah i was wrecked i was wrecked for a couple days i think the next game was just a night two nights later and i was i was exhausted still just physically and emotionally spent right let's talk about Detroit, my hometown. You had been there before. The Red Wings rule the city. You signed in the offseason, a one-year, $1 million deal. We talked about Steve Iserman. I'm wearing the championship Steve Iserman jersey here. He's a hockey legend, one of the best players in league history. He is a god in Detroit. And the last year he came back to be the Wings general manager. I want to tell a quick story for, I think the Wings in their history have won eight or nine championships. And for a while they were terrible. They were called the dead wings. And I was a freshman at college. stepdad had tickets season tickets and i took one of my friends we finally make the playoffs i'm going to the first game super pumped drive from ann arbor to the joe and i've been a red wings fan forever i think my first game i was in footies at

cobo hall which you probably you know the new co Hall, what the old Cobo Hall is. And then Olympia. Actually, we were at Olympia first, and then they played a Cobo Hall. Then they built the Joe, which I think they demolished this year or last year. But I've been a hockey fan, been a fan my whole life. So we make the playoffs for the first time. I took my buddy, Rick Winkler, who had, we had been at a fraternity party the week before and Rick was in the wrong place at the wrong time. The nicest guy ever. And he gets popped in the nose. The fight breaks out in the fraternity party and he gets hit, not in the fight, but he gets hit. So we go to the game and he's wearing this huge white mask. He's all taped up. He's got the plastic over the nose. And Gerard

Gallant for the Kings scores 57 seconds into the game. And the place went bananas. I'm pumping my fist, pumping my fist. Yes. And I accidentally hit the nose. You busted him open again. Off comes the mask. He's streaming blood everywhere.

And I stayed in my seat. I didn't want to leave. And so, uh, he went off, he gets off and goes against the tissues, you know, comes back.

I said, Hey man, I feel really bad, but I want to watch games like now. Totally cool. So, uh, winks,

you're going to hear winks. I, I know you're going to listen to this. I know you're going to watch it on, uh, I know you're going to listen to this. I know you're going to watch it. I'm sorry about that. I love you, buddy. So Steve Eisenman is the GM, and I read you were his first call. How'd that go?

And what's it like to be in the Motor City playing hockey? I'm stoked. I can't wait. We settled in nicely. My conversation with Steve was incredible. I think we both acknowledged, listen, you're getting, you're getting older in the league. There's still some hockey left in you. Come and bring it here. Bring that hockey that you got left in you and we'll, and we'll try to maximize it together. It's a rebuilding team. They're

getting better. I think we're going to be, we're going to be much better than they were last year. I don't know if it can get worse if we're being honest, but we're going to take some steps forward. I'm going to help the young guys. Uh, that's kind of where I'm at in my career now is getting the young guys going. And the guy just oozes love and passion for the Red Wings. So when I spoke to him, I didn't really even need to speak to any other of the general managers in the league. I heard a couple out, but speaking with Steve, I knew getting off the phone, we were coming here. We took a cheap one-year deal with the expectations that if i play well i'll probably get traded at the deadline to a playoff contending team but they gave me the

best opportunity to come in and be myself and play and after missing all that time last year this just felt like a great a great fit so i'm excited about it did you talk to john cooper just out of curiosity before you came he's one of our neighbors as well up in Coeur d'Alene. Yeah, I was waiting for a call from Coop. I never got one. I was trying to talk to Tyler Johnson, who plays there, obviously. Yeah. I'll come in for league minimum at this point. Just get me to Florida.

No dice. They were busy winning a cup. So understandable. We'll see him this summer. I'm going to get on with him about it next year because I'm going to need a contract again. So if I can stick around for one more year, I'm going to get on about it next year. Cause I'm going to need a contract again. So if I can stick around for one more year, I'm going there. That's right.

I also want to mention one other thing. And I meant to work this in before one of my friends, Bo Hostler is a PGA tour player. He was the college player of the year. He was up with Madison and I, we flew up. He was our guest for the weekend. And I thought it'd be cool.

We got a pro hockey player and a pro golfer and I just want to be in the middle of the conversation I mean I was just fascinated and I knew nothing about golf when he plays at the Riviera tournament he stays with us and I you don't realize how grueling it is to play golf he plays he has to play on a pro-am on Wednesday. He travels Tuesday, plays on a pro-am on Wednesday, and then he got Thursday through Sunday, and then he leaves Monday morning. He got to do it all again for weeks on end. So I learned a little bit about what it's like to be a professional golfer just through Bo, and I think it was fun for you guys to just learn about one another. What was that like for you? Was that cool?

Yeah, I'm a golf fan. So getting to watch him hit golf balls is one thing, right? You get to see another pro in their aspect and what they're good at. And I found that really interesting. But he was a cool kid. He's been a fringe guy most of his career with with a big step ahead of him to make so we kind of talked a little bit about that it's a grind out there if you're not one of those top guys that you're flying on every private jet whatever it's it's a grind of a living and

got a lot of respect for a guy that's you know he's still trying to cut his teeth i follow him now because of that one round that we got to play together but yeah interesting uh you know we talked about i think he was at that point he was working on his weight and he was getting a little more conditioned and i remember just think that in our very small but limited conversation just saying if you're not taking care of that then the rest isn't going to take care of it because i can tell you first and i learned that the hard way i was you know i was overweight most of my life and i had to learn how to grind and eat properly and do all that. And I got it at a young age, but if you can take that step, I remember telling him, that's just, that's just a huge thing. That's going to, going to help you.

I was, I was very impressed by his golf game, but really impressed by his attitude. He was a really cool kid. Really cool guy. Yeah. That was fun for me. First, I have to thank you for tolerating me on the golf course. At one point I was the worst, I was the worst player at Gaza, where we have our homes. But I promise you, I'm coming back with a vengeance. I'm actually taking golf lessons at this place called UGP, Urban Golf Performance here. And I'm going to be significantly better this year. And shout out to Matt Parkovich, my instructor my, uh, my instructor and friend and coach, but I'm, I'm super excited to play, but thank you for putting up with a guy who loses 30 balls.

Not, not, it's all good. Not, not going to happen. You'll, you'll see a much better player, but the cool thing for me that round was he asked you something which which was kind of like a ding ding ding moment for you he said hey when did you know you were better than the rest of the guys and you were basically saying to him you know you're playing with all these guys who are not going to make it you can see they're not going to make it but they can't see they're not going to make it so what's that like you know you've got teammates you're you're better, but the margin there is small, but it's huge at the same time. Yeah, I think the margin is much more noticeable when you're in it as a player than what meets the eye. A lot of people will say,

this guy's so skilled, he should be there, but skill doesn't necessarily translate. You need to apply that skill at speed. You need to make decisions at speed. You need to be able to apply things to certain situations. And you can see when you're on the ice that a guy can't see a play forming or a guy can't a guy can't make that 10 foot outlet pass that just makes the game much easier on them right they have to skate themselves into trouble those are things that when you're playing with guys you're like okay this is about as far as he's going to be able to take this game and that's frustrating because you want especially when your teammates at young age, juniors and things like that, you want to see guys succeed.

But at 15, I think you can already start to see the game passing guys by. It's upsetting and frustrating and you want to kind of pull it along, but a lot of guys don't get it. So at a certain point, you got to just kind of, you got to turn your mind out to it. Because I think I read a stat at 0.002 or something like that of players that play even AAA hockey, make it to this level. So it's a very fine line. I met Luke Robitaille 15 years ago through my friend, Jimmy Carson,

and he's going to be a guest on my next podcast. And who was the other player on the other side of the Wayne Gretzky trade? Most people don't know that he's got a very interesting journey to follow Wayne, which is the actual last person you'd ever want to follow. But I met Luke and I went to his retirement party, which was at the Ritz-Carlton and Marina Del Rey. And for me, this was just, I was in hog heaven, you know, Messier's there, all these incredible people are there. And Marty McSorley was reading the scouting report for luke and he basically said uh i think it was like an eighth or ninth round pick and it's too small can't go in the corner lack speed and lack hand-eye coordination and he finished his career as the highest scoring left winger in professional history in

the NHL. So guys sometimes, you know, they come out of nowhere, right. And they light it up. Yep. I think that the higher the level, especially to when you, when you get guys like Luke, he just had an instinct to find the pucker on the net and instinctual things aren't going to be taught. You can develop a little bit, but you can't teach that. And he had just this perfect doggedness around the net and a way to get his stick on pucks that kind of, at that time, was a very, very big skill to have. And yeah, he made a nice career for himself, a Hall of Fame career. And is one of the nicest guys you'll ever meet, by the way. Yes, he is. Yes, he is. So let's talk about professional athletes and money. You hear about the football players and a lot of the basketball players. I think 78% of football players are in some kind

of financial distress within two years after retiring. I think the average tenure is three and a half years. 60% of NBA players go broke after five years, large number of baseball players. You made a lot of money as a young person. I mean, early 20s. Who taught you about money? Did someone teach you? I know you're conservative with your money. You've saved a lot of money, which is awesome. But who gave you that training? I think today things are different as well than they were 15 years ago i think the league now recognizes you know they need to educate their their guys but i mean it's a lot of money when you're young what talk to me about that yeah when i was coming in they still didn't have it they have it now it's workshops right and things like that and how to how to tell who's

trying to invest your money properly, who's there, as opposed to guys just finding somebody from their neighborhood, which happens more often than it should. So the NHL has got a pretty good protocol in place to educate some young players on how to find somebody to invest, which is the biggest part of it, right? Find somebody that's not interested maybe because you're making so much. You don't need to hit home runs. You just need to continuously hit doubles and singles and learn how to do those things properly and i've been lucky enough to you know money and financially it's never money's never played a real big part of my life i mean i i've bought houses and things like that and and take my family where they need to be but other than the one car i haven't i haven't indulged

in things like that. I lease all my cars and just continuously live pretty frugally for myself. But I've been fortunate. My dad was a smart money man, found the right people for me to start with when I was 22 and just signing that first contract. And I've been with them ever since. And I think it's just about developing the right relationship with those people and stress and what you want and making sure that they're not out there trying to hit home runs that don't need to be hit. Right. That you're all on the same page. And I've been very lucky. My guys are being great. Did the money attract some of the wrong people or were people coming after you or asking for loans? When I made money, I had some very awkward conversations with people, with certain family members and people that were friends.

And one of my really good friends, two of my really good friends. It's funny, the more you make, the more people come out of the woodworks and the more business opportunities come your way. I don't think I've ever done any of them that have come my way. But the same as you, you have to have some awkward conversations and you have to say, listen, this is money for the rest of my life and I'm going to be done at 33, 34. I need this to last. And I've cut some people out of my life because of it and ultimately have to here because of it too.

So I feel like I've just continuously made the right decisions in that regard. Are you planning for your future now after life after hockey? You'll probably play a few more years, hopefully, if that's what you want to do. But have kind of redirect my thoughts to what's next a little bit I've luckily built myself a cushion that's going to last a long time so I have times I have time to decide what's next and what I want to do I'm starting to plan for the future I don't think I invested enough time in it as I should have but I was fortunate enough to build a pretty good cushion that I can take the time when I'm done to make decisions about what I want to do and how I want to do it. And if I want to live comfortably, I can live off the interest and be

just fine as well. But I'll be bored and I'll have to look at something. So we're starting to look at those transitions. They're coming rather quickly. And I don't think I'll have... I won't have an issue leaving the game or doing something dumb financially i'll be able to to kind of pick and choose what i want to do and uh and it's not that's a good feeling to have that that the people around me have done right by me that i can do that and take my time let's talk quickly about playing through pain and injury i remember you telling me about one game where you got into a fight i guess when you come into the league, people are going to challenge your manlyhood. And you were in this quite a fight.

Tell me about what that was like and what it's like to actually be able to fight legally. It's kind of this weird construct. You can go outside the arena and you get arrested, but somehow in the arena, same rules apply, but you can fight in there. No one gets arrested. Yeah, you got 200 feet by 80 feet to figure out what you want to do down on the ice. but somehow in the arena, same rules apply, but you can fight in there. No one gets arrested. Yeah.

You got 200 feet by 80 feet to figure out what you want to do down on the ice. But I've had quite a few as I've gotten older. Unfortunately, I fought more as I've gotten older. I guess my, yeah, I'm just getting, I'm old and ornery now, but I can't remember which one we were. We were probably shooting shit on some of my earliest ones. I can't remember, but I've had some broken fingers and fights and teeth been punched out. Yeah. All sorts of different ones in my, I got my eyelids split pretty good. So I wish I would,

do you remember which one I was talking about in general? Yeah, it was, I think you just got really, it was your first game and I, you were very young and one of the veteran fighters kind of went after you and knocked you, you knocked you pretty good. You had something broke and you had a concussion and you went out and you played the rest of the game. You didn't even know where you were. It was one of my first fights.

And now I remember which one. So I picked the wrong guy and he knocked me around pretty good. And it was the first time I went through concussion protocol. We'll just put it that way. So I wasn't seeing straight for a little while, but you live and you learn. And then I kind of realized maybe I shouldn't be playing legitimate heavyweights in the NHL or legitimate tough guys in the NHL.

I'll pick my battles a little better. I think today is a little different. I don't think, was there a concussion protocol 15 years ago? I mean, you just, you told me you went on the ice and you played, you didn't even know where you were. Yeah. That was the thing. The concussion protocol back then was like mean you just you told me you went on the ice and you played you didn't even know where you were yeah that was the thing the concussion protocol back then was like hey are you good yeah okay all right you know where you are yeah sure I know where I'm at but yeah and then I remember you just yeah I was out of it like I there was no way I should have played but now it's completely different you go you know they do it right by you now but it wasn't that way 15 years

ago that's for sure what are your interests and hobbies outside of hockey i think people you're an athlete people look up to but i don't know that a whole lot of people think about all right what does this person do when he's not playing hockey yeah during the season not much you know i come home and i'm a parent and then by the time they're in bed I'm in bed by 8 30 most nights as well so I'll scream a show or two with my wife and go to bed I save most of my reading I'm a pretty voracious reader on the right on the road right now I'm going through the hundred books every man must read list and I just started 1984 last week so I'm getting into that a little bit really enjoying it during the summer i golf and i surf and before kids i was a six-day-a-week golfer now i'm kind of a two or three-day-a-week golfer

but it's better it's more fun for me to be on the boat right now and my daughter is going to start surfing next summer so just family time right as you get older that's what becomes more important we're gonna wake surf next summer yeah i'll be there yeah you got to come down to black rock though i'm coming i'm coming trying to get me to play but i'm definitely coming next summer? Yeah, I'll be there. Yeah. You got to come down to Black Rock though. I'm coming. I'm coming. They're trying to get me a kilometer to play, but I'm definitely coming next summer. I hear it's awesome. Yeah. We'll be there. I'd like to get your thoughts. And I think a lot of people listening, I always want to know from successful people, no matter what they do, what are the ingredients of success to you? What do people have to do to be successful with whatever they do? So it's funny when people ask me that in a hockey setting, it doesn't really change in any walk of

life, right? You have to have a militaristic focus on not only a task at hand, but it doesn't have to be your end goal. It's just a goal along the way. You know, for my whole life, getting to that end goal, I had little small steps that i needed to make to get there and every step with a mini success that i celebrated but it's ultimately got me one step closer so you have to have an approach that can get you there slowly and incrementally you have to be able to outlast anybody that you're going against the competitor it's you have to be able to just be five percent more than what they can give you there if it's a 40 hour work week you find a way to get 44 in like those are those little things that i find that add

up over time and they're not noticeable things right there and they're not things that get adulation they're just small little work about things that can get you an edge on people and then a support structure people to bounce ideas off of people to to call you on your bullshit when you're wrong the people that are ultimately going to be there by your side whether you fail or or you see those are things that you need to have and and if you don't have that you have to build something of that regard and somebody told me and somebody that i speak really highly of a member of gaza ranch and a close friend of mine told me about 10 years ago, in life, there's givers and there's takers.

And if you can eliminate the takers and surround yourself with people that are giving, you're going to be okay in a lot of aspects of your life. And I've tried to apply that in a lot of areas. And since I've done it and had some hard conversations in doing it, my quality of life and quality of success has gone through the roof. So that last one more importantly than anything else. What's the first thing you think about in the morning when you wake up?

And what's the last thing you think about when you go to bed? Last thing? Well, I guess I could start with that is everything okay upstairs where the kids are. Honestly, as I lay down on the bed, I don't have any thoughts outside of those two now. It's door locked. It's every door locked, like every fatherly instinct you're supposed to have. The first thing, and my life's changed dramatically, is setting an intention for the day. And that kind of ties in with AI a little bit, but every day, and I write it in a book, and now I keep a book that I follow every day. I go in and I read what my intention today is. And I set the attention a few days at a time.

So some days I'll wake up, I'll go read that. And my intention of the day is sometimes just get the day started. Just get it going. And then other days it's something hockey specific or something white specific or whatever it might be. But the first thing I think about is how can I achieve the attention that I had set? It's another positive thing. If you can get to it and setting intentions,

it's changed my life a lot. Do you write down your goals for the future? What, what are your goals for the future? You're still very young. I haven't written down life goals or anything. I right now it's season by season goals and those have changed drastically, but yeah, I actually spent about an hour and a half doing it the other night. I wrote down every, every goal that I have, whether it be on the ice or off the ice this hockey season and yep, set the goals. And now I said one little increment to get to each goal. I've had a personal business plan that I keep each year. I check it each year.

I have a reminder in my calendar each two months to go through it. And I have various goals. I have a reminder in my calendar each two months to go through it. And I have various goals. I have personal goals, things I need to work on, family goal, friend goal, business goals. And then philanthropy is very important to me and to giving back. And I have a very unique list of things that I'm interested in, both kind of on a macro basis and then helping individuals and organizations. I happen to be very passionate about foster care. My grandmother, who's 102 years old, my hero, she was raised in foster care and it's something that I'm passionate about. Awesome. If you can start with the first goal, the first intention, the first whatever. And if you,

I don't know about you, but it keeps me organized and it keeps me accountable. I'm sure you agree that if you, you have it written down, it feels like there's pressure to get it done, right? It's a checklist. I mean, I have the reminder, a lot of people, I do a lot of mentoring with people and including a few professional football players who have signed massive contracts. Just I help give them financial advice. And I think some of the things I've done, they're interested in learning from someone who gets nothing in return. I just love to give and I want to help them. There's no financial incentive for me.

I just want them to do well. But whether it's them or the other people that I mentor, the interns, CEOs, entrepreneurs, it's the same thing. You can get it out of your mind and get it down on paper, put it on paper, and then don't just write it down once. You got to go back and look at it, and you got to read it like it's actual work because it is work. It's hard work. My wife finds me exhausting because I have to go back through the book five, six times a day to make sure I'm checking. I mean, I write down everything I eat, every calorie in, every calorie out, but I live by that book right now. And that book helps

me not only stay sober, it keeps me accountable in the rest of the areas that I need to get better at. So as much as she needles me about it, I think she's pretty happy I have the book. That's great. We're almost at the end. I want to know what kind of advice you have, three to five best pieces for people who are young. I'm not talking about athletes. I'm talking about people in general. You're a professional athlete, but you're more importantly a human being and you've

been through so much stuff in your life. Your experiences are so unique. I don't think there's another person in the world, frankly, who's been through what you've been through so much stuff in your life, your experiences are so unique. I don't think there's another person in the world, frankly, who's been through what you've been through for better or for worse. And it's for the better. I think we always learn and we're better people coming out of hardships. What are three to five pieces of advice you would give to younger people or even people of my age who want to do better and improve themselves? You know, for me,

I hate dishing out advice when it's not specific to something, but I would learn to control both, right? There's so many things, especially with the state of the world, the pandemic, COVID, job security, all those things are so beyond a lot of our reach, right? So control what's controllable,

like have the things around you that mean the most to you and when you can control those and let the outside influences do their thing, your world will get smaller and it'll get easier to manage. That's something that I've always found. Never let any kind of outside voice dictate the way you're going to live your life, whether that's a good inside or a good outside voice

or a negative or a positive. Just don't let them wear you down, I guess i guess right or don't let them build you up to when you're when you do fall it's going to be a crumble right you just got to continue to be on that even keel in those aspects and then you know third i had something in mind and i that's what i was going to say like i guess it would just be never too high, never too low. It's a sports cliche that I use and it sounds like a sports cliche, but it's about, I guess, never being above yourself, I guess, never being braggadocious or being too high up in the wave. Cause that way eventually going to crash down and you're going to be in a low line looking up at somebody and don't go with the wave.

Try and try and be a Stephen Keel. And I apologize because I'm not as eloquent as I think I am sometimes, but just being even keel, never too high, never too low. Through the good and the bad, like I've been saying, hockey teams, ups, downs, ups, downs. Like if you go with a wave and you get low, you're losing 10, 12 games in a row, no problem. So I was like, if you can kind of keep your head above the water

at those times and stay treading, you're going to be good. That's great advice. In closing, we've really covered a lot of things. I want to ask, is there something we haven't covered that you want to talk about or a message you want to share with people who are listening to the podcast? No, I think we've covered a lot. Ultimately, we talked about the biggest part of it is the alcoholism and addiction, whether it's alcoholism or whatever it might lot. I ultimately, I, you know, we talked about the, the biggest part of it is the alcoholism and addiction, whether it's alcoholism or whatever it might be. I think I've done a lot of little interviews and things now. And I try to always urge somebody that you don't have to admit you

need help, right? You, but what I urge people to do is have the right conversation. If you're thinking it, you're probably needing it, right? If you're starting to think I drank too much or I have an issue with this, your friends probably already think it too, right? So I would always urge somebody to talk to the one person you trust the most, admit to them where you're at and go from there. And it doesn't have to be a big thing. It doesn't have to be a little thing. It can be a very small conversation that gets the ball rolling. And that's ultimately what it's all about is getting the ball rolling because life continues to get better when you do. Awesome. Can't thank you enough for being here today for being so blunt and open with your life, your struggles. And then

I think I'm a big fan of redemption. I think it's awesome. I will say publicly that I've never met Steve Eisenman before. He's one of my sports idols. I'm going to push you hard if when this COVID thing is over, I'm coming to Detroit for a game and you got to introduce me to him. I mean, he's playing there and my buddy's playing with him. So I just got to meet him at some point. I'll do what I can. I've only met him one time in person. It buddy's playing with him. So I just got to meet him at some point. I'll do what I can. I've only met him one time in person. It was just the other day. So yeah,

I will certainly put in a word and try, but we'll, we'll get it done. He's pretty good guy. I think we can get it done. Bobby. Again, I can't thank you enough for being here,

sharing your story. You're an incredible person. You're a great friend. And you're an inspiration to so many people including me so thank you so much for being on the show i'm very grateful it's my pleasure man thanks for having me thanks for thanks for rescheduling for me a few times i appreciate it i appreciate your friendship man it's been a lot to me last year when you reach out it really does mean a lot so continue to do so and i got your back if you ever need anything as well.