Detroit News article
July 4, 2006
by John Niyo

He spoke softly, as he almost always did, collecting his thoughts and measuring his words before sharing them.
But try as he might, when it came time Monday for Steve Yzerman to say the one word he’d been avoiding for so long, the stoic face of the Red Wings’ franchise finally cracked.

“Today, obviously, I’m here to let everyone know I’ve decided to retire,” Yzerman said, the last two syllables getting stuck in his throat as he announced he was calling it a career after 22 seasons in the NHL.

Dressed neatly in a chocolate-colored suit, Yzerman, 41, made it official at an afternoon press conference at Joe Louis Arena on Monday. But though everyone — and Yzerman most of all — had seen this day coming for months, the impact of his decision hit home as the longest-serving captain in NHL history wrapped up his 15-minute opening statement.

“I’ve had a wonderful career,” Yzerman said, pausing — and then apologizing — as his voice trembled with emotion. “And I really will miss it.”

There were no tears Monday — none publicly, at least — but no regrets either, Yzerman insisted. He was seated at the dais inside the Olympia Room, flanked by team owner Mike Ilitch, senior vice president Jimmy Devellano and general manager Ken Holland, the only bosses he has ever had in his adult life.

It was Devellano who’d drafted a skinny, 18-year-old kid from Nepean, Ontario, back in 1983 and told him he’d be the cornerstone as new owners tried to rebuild a storied franchise that had fallen on hard times.

“I told him that we’d win five Stanley Cups in his career,” said Devellano, who won three titles as one of the architects of the New York Islanders’ dynasty in the early 1980s.

Remembering that chat Monday, Yzerman smiled and said: “We’ve accomplished a lot of the things we talked about 23 years ago. We didn’t quite get everything, but we got a lot of it.”

Along the way, he gave even more. That, of course, will be Yzerman’s legacy in Detroit: All the sacrifices he made — physically and emotionally — as he assumed the Wings’ captaincy at the age of 21, bore the brunt of the criticism for the next decade, and eventually willed his team to reach the pinnacle of sport.

Yzerman leaves the game ranked eighth on the NHL’s career list in goals (692) and sixth in points (1,755) — second only to Gordie Howe in the Red Wings’ record books.

And while Howe is still Mr. Hockey in this town, Yzerman will forever be The Captain, or “Captain Courageous,” to use Ilitch’s words.
“He wore that ‘C’ with pride,” said Howe, who greeted Yzerman with a hug and a handshake after the press conference. “And you could see it in everything he did.”

From Yzerman’s perspective, he was merely doing his job, and playing a game he loved.

“I always wanted to be an NHL player,” said Yzerman, a sure first-ballot Hall of Fame inductee when he’s eligible in 2009. “I started playing hockey at the age of 5. I played hockey all winter, and thought about hockey all summer.”

The past few summers, though, his thoughts turned to retirement. And last year, on the heels of an NHL lockout that wiped out the 2004-05 schedule, the Wings’ captain decided to return for “one last season” to chase one more title.

He didn’t get the title as the Wings were bounced in the first round of the playoffs. But after nearly quitting in midseason, plagued by chronic pain in his right knee and a series of groin injuries, Yzerman looked rejuvenated as he finished with a flourish this spring. His strong play down the stretch forced him to reconsider his farewell.

“I thought a lot about coming back and trying to play, but when it was time to actually call Kenny and say, ‘I want to come back,’ I really couldn’t do it,” said Yzerman, who underwent major reconstructive knee surgery in 2002 and has played through pain — agonizing, at times — for years.

“At this stage, it’s just too difficult on my knee to be doing the things that I expect to do or want to do.”

So late Friday, he phoned Holland — and Ilitch and Devellano, too — and did what he had to do.

“This was the right decision for me,” Yzerman said, nodding, “and I really don’t have any doubt about that.”

Team officials spent the holiday weekend putting together Monday’s hastily arranged press conference, tracking down current and former players, coaches and teammates while trying to keep Yzerman’s decision — he’ll ease into a front-office position later this summer — a secret.

Scotty Bowman, the Wings’ former head coach, came in from Chicago, where he was visiting relatives.

“Sorry, I was about 10 minutes late getting here,” he told Yzerman afterward, as the two posed for photos. “But I was listening on the radio on my way in.”
Mike Babcock, the current coach, flew in from his offseason home in Saskatchewan. Teammate Kris Draper left his family in Toronto and hopped on a plane to be here. Ted Lindsay was there with his wife. Igor Larionov strolled in, just ahead of a group of more than a dozen of the Wings’ prospects, most of whom weren’t even born when Yzerman played his first NHL game.
Ilitch, for his part, said he’d spent the weekend fretting like a kid preparing for a final exam.
“I thought, ‘Oh, my. What am I going to say about him?’ ” said Ilitch, who tried to put it down on paper, then scrapped that idea because, as he explained Monday, “It’s hard to find all the words.”
“It’s very emotional, especially if you do a lot of thinking about what’s taken place over the 23 years,” said Ilitch, who bought the Red Wings franchise in 1982, then made Yzerman his first draft pick. “You’ve got so much to reminisce about. Stevie talked for, what, a half hour? We could talk for a week about 23 years. It’s pretty much a lifetime — a lifetime of hockey — is the way I look at it.”
Yzerman, whose No. 19 jersey will be the sixth Red Wings number retired soon, allowed himself to reflect on that lifetime Monday, something he’d mostly refused to do while he was playing.
The 10-time All-Star and two-time Olympian, who never hid his impatience with the officiating during games, opened his remarks by saying, “I know there’s a lot of referees in the NHL doing cartwheels today.”
He later recalled some of the memories that had piled up over the years, from the playoff disappointments — a loss to Colorado in the 1996 semifinals still stings the most, he said — to the euphoria of finally hoisting the Stanley Cup in 1997, and then again in ‘98 and 2002.
He downplayed his legendary locker-room speeches — “I made a lot more that didn’t have the desired effect,” he said, laughing — and even joked about overstaying his welcome.
Yzerman also took time to thank his wife, Lisa, and their three daughters for the “perspective” they’d brought to his career.
And in the end, he praised the fans in Detroit, without whom he just wouldn’t be the same.
“It’s a special place to play, it’s a special city to live in when you’re an athlete,” said Yzerman, struggling to speak in the past tense. “I almost feel like a little boy trying to please my parents every time I step on the ice with the way the fans here support our team.
“That is something I will miss, and had I played another five years, I would still miss that.”