Detroit News column
July 4, 2006
by Bob Wojnowski

Maybe it was so hard for him to leave — and so difficult for many to let him go — because everyone knew what it meant. More than a hockey playing career ended Monday when Steve Yzerman retired. One of the great runs in Detroit sports, and one of the special runs in all of sports, was consigned to the pages of history.

This is a tough one, not because of all that Yzerman won, including three Stanley Cups, or all he endured, including numerous surgeries, or how long he played, all 22 seasons with the Red Wings.

The impact is found in what Yzerman represented, the qualities that made him the leader of a winning team and the face of a city. He was stoic, tough and determined. He was how Detroit hopes to be perceived, at its best. He was understated to the end, choking on his words a few times during the generally upbeat news conference.

A few hours later, after Yzerman had left Joe Louis Arena and headed home, he admitted he felt relief, even happiness. The decision was correct, he was positive of that. But no, that didn’t make it any easier.

“I’m never gonna play again, and I know I’m really, really going to miss it,” he said. “I’ve loved every single moment of my career, so I’m not pretending this is easy. The toughest part was last Friday, when I called Kenny (Holland), Jimmy (Devellano) and Mr. I. (Mike Ilitch). I really feel I made the decision I had to make, and I was the one that had to make it.”

And now today, we all feel a little older, nostalgic for a time when sports figures finished what they began, and finished where they began. There goes the longest-serving captain in NHL history, the second-greatest Wings goal-scorer, and although Yzerman won’t go far, eventually to the Wings’ front office, he leaves a void that rarely gets filled anymore.

Who stays in one place long enough to build such stature, to return such dividends on fans’ emotional investments? Who changes their playing style and their role without affecting their attitude? Who, on the day he exits as a city’s reigning sports icon, sums it up with such modest simplicity?

“I did the best I could,” Yzerman, 41, said. “It’s been a great honor for me to be a player for the Detroit Red Wings, to play for an Original Six franchise. … I know I’m far from perfect, but I learned a lot. And for the team, I always tried to do the right thing.”
Yzerman knew most of last season that retirement was the right thing. The pain had wracked him for years, even after a radical surgery on the right knee in August 2002. By the end, it was bone rubbing on bone, not to mention the aching neck, or the rib muscle torn during the playoffs.

His body was falling apart
As we suspected, Yzerman’s amazing revival late in the season was less a reprisal and more like a farewell. Oh, the heart and mind kept knocking, reminding him the desire was still there. But there was a snapshot right before the playoffs, as Yzerman sat in the team lounge, staring at his puffy right knee. He looked up and shrugged.

“My body’s basically falling apart,” he said then, and now we know it takes more than passion to hold a body together.

So this is best, ultimately, although Yzerman should be prepared for old pangs. You don’t get to script your ending, and losing in the first round to Edmonton was rough. But as much as Yzerman showed by performing well in the playoffs, he knew he was pushing it, tempting a worse fate.

“There are just too many obstacles,” he said. “I’m very confident my health isn’t going to allow me to be a good player, especially in the spring. I’m exhausted trying to stay healthy. Enough’s enough.”

Good for him. After two months of mental wrangling, Yzerman sounds completely fine with his decision. He struggled with his diminished role at times last season but he communicated with coach Mike Babcock and they worked through it. Obviously, the same scenario could have presented itself again.

If healthy, there’s no doubt Yzerman could have helped. But deep down, he knew. He knew he could only guess about the knee, and with one twinge, the frustrations would resurface.

It probably helped knowing he wasn’t going anywhere, gradually easing into a management position, although nothing has been set. He said he planned to meet with Holland and Mike and Marian Ilitch later in the summer.

“Everything is 100 percent amicable,” Yzerman said. “We’ve talked about it for years, and there’s always been an understanding we’ll figure something out.”

Yzerman never wanted to leave, and he credits the organization’s success for making it possible to stay. But looking back, there wasn’t a more-powerful moment — or a more telling referendum — than opening night in 1995 when, amid Yzerman trade rumors, the Joe Louis Arena crowd booed Scotty Bowman and unleashed an unbelievable, unrelenting roar for Yzerman.

That’s where it all could have ended in Detroit, and instead, it really started. The Wings have made the playoffs 15 years in a row, and while Yzerman certainly isn’t the only reason the team has won, he’s a major reason the fans cared so much.

“That night is vivid in my memory,” Yzerman said. “Absolutely, that was symbolic of the time. It could’ve gone either way. I very easily could’ve been traded (to Ottawa).”

A modern-day marvel
Careers like these don’t come along often, not in modern-day professional sports. Detroit had Al Kaline with the Tigers and Isiah Thomas and Joe Dumars with the Pistons, and who else? Barry Sanders had a shot to be a lasting icon, and Nicklas Lidstrom, likely to replace Yzerman as captain, still has a chance.

But too often, it ends ugly or abruptly, as it did for Sanders, who walked out, and for Thomas, who limped out on a torn right Achilles tendon. Gordie Howe is Mr. Hockey, and rightly so, but even he played elsewhere before finding his way home.
Yzerman always showed persistence on the ice. It took more than that to remain.

“For me, a lot of it was timing and luck,” Yzerman said. “Our team could have gone in a lot of different directions. I also feel I adapted. I was willing to try to fit into any role. The way I figured, it was always up to me to prove my worth, that I deserved to be here.”

There’s something you don’t hear often from a long-standing star. Yzerman found the spotlight but never sought it. He played as well as he could for as long as he could, long enough to leave an impact that might never, ever be matched.