Quotes from the man himself…

“And for the team, I always tried to do the right thing.”

“As a kid in British Columbia, going back a long way, I learned to skate.”

“Balanced is probably what I am, although that’s just a polite way to say that you don’t do anything very well.”

“Being out last year with an injury, I sat up high and watched a lot of games, and you see so much more and it just seems so much slower from up top.”

“But I’m gonna do the best thing for the team and the best thing for me. And I think they’re one and the same, really.”

“Darren McCarty is a big video game guy, and he brings his systems with him on the road.”

“Every player should have the opportunity to play for a city that supports the team the way (Detroit) does.”

“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.”

“I don’t have any plan right now if I don’t play hockey. I always thought I’d take one full hockey season and just do nothing.”

“I don’t know if I’ve ever had a memorable body check. It’s not really part of my game.”

“I don’t know much about the techniques of fighting, but I know throwing a punch on skates is a lot different than throwing a punch from the ground.”

“I don’t know that I’d agree I was our best player.”

“I don’t see myself as an agitator and I really don’t consider myself a sniper by any means, I might be a basic role player.”

“I have no notion, whenever it is that I retire, of taking anybody’s job. I don’t expect that and I don’t deserve that.”

“I honestly don’t think I’ve been in a fight in over ten years. And any of the fights that I did participate in, weren’t of any note.”

“I hope people like me and appreciate me the way I am.”

“I just have to make a decision, then live with it for a few days. And if I’m comfortable with it, stick with it. If not, I can change my mind.”

“I look forward to a lot more free time, at least initially, with my wife, Lisa, and our three children.”

“I’m exhausted trying to stay healthy.”

“I’m never gonna play again, and I know I’m really, really going to miss it.”

“I’m very confident my health isn’t going to allow me to be a good player, especially in the spring.”

“I’ve been hit hard a few times, been hit really hard a few times, but I don’t think I’ve ever left a memorable, lasting impression on anyone I’ve ever hit.”

“I’ve loved every single moment of my career, so I’m not pretending this is easy.”

“It’s almost like you see too much, because when it happens for real, everything flies at you so fast, you never get a sense of the ice and where everyone is at that one moment.”

“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.”

“My body’s basically falling apart.”

“My parents would take us on weekends up to a lake and we’d shovel off a little part of it, wheel the station wagon up, open the back, put on our skates, and we’d skate around all the time. The ice used to get snowy pretty quick and there isn’t a zamboni out there to clean it off.”

“Nobody ever got hurt stepping in front of one of my punches, let’s put it that way.”

“Since the season ended, I’ve let things settle down, and I have to talk to the coaching staff and management. I really don’t want to turn this into a big drama. So I plan on making a definite decision relatively quickly.”

“That’s where it originated, but now you have to win 16 games. We need to find something that has 16 legs, I guess.”

“The 70’s hair with the long on the sides, just doesn’t look good coming down the sides of the helmet.”

“There used to be an old thing where every team had a heavy bag in their locker room for people to punch, but again, it was more about conditioning because if you hit a heavy bag for a minute, it feels like your arms are about to fall off.”

“Very few cities in the NHL have the history or the following of the Detroit Red Wings.”

“We have to get better at that. All of the Stanley Cup winning teams throughout the past few seasons, when they needed to play defense, they did it. If you can play defense, that’s when you know it’s game over.”

“We have two tables on our airplane that are set up with the games.”

“We used to play a lot outdoors, not in leagues, but just in our spare time.”

“When it gets to this point, it’s just hard to pull the trigger.”

“When you’re on the ice, you have very little time, you see very little, and everything happens really quick.”