On Saturday, Steve Yzerman picked up the phone and called Steve Johnston, the Wings’ sixth round draft pick (181st overall), to tell him the good news.

At his home in Guelph, Johnston — a lifelong Red Wing fan — was floored to pick up the phone Saturday and hear Detroit great Steve Yzerman on the other end.

“It was pretty cool,” said the lanky centre. “He said he was Steve Yzerman and I wasn’t sure it was real. Detroit was my favourite team growing up. I really had no expectations for any team. But after he called, I couldn’t sit still for the rest of the day.”

Add another player to the list of NHLers who were inspired by Yzerman’s play and leadership. After recently being named captain of the Columbus Blue Jackets, Rick Nash pointed to Mats Sundin and Steve Yzerman as the two captains he admired most growing up.

Q: Who are the captains you admired growing up?

A: I would say Mats Sundin and Steve Yzerman. I was a Leafs fan growing up 20 minutes north of Toronto, and the Red Wings were right there, too. You had Stevie Y, a Canadian, with those great Red Wings teams and Sundin, who was my favorite player growing up with Toronto.

Last year on January 3, I linked to an article by ESPN the Magazine senior writer Eric Adelson about Steve Yzerman and the Detroit Red Wings reaching out to a little boy named Braxton, who had been diagnosed with cancer. As the big Yzerman fan that I am, I was very touched by the article and even more impressed with how much Yzerman had reached out to Braxton.

Yzerman told the boy to stick around and watch practice. Braxton did, and his eyes locked on the players as they whizzed by. Brendan Shanahan zipped over and handed Braxton a broken stick. Brant gasped, but Braxton hardly raised an eyebrow. “That’s cool,” he said. “But it’s not Steve’s.” Brant grimaced and looked around, hoping no one heard. But behind him, then-goalie Curtis Joseph roared in laughter. The next night, Yzerman invited Braxton to the Detroit locker room.

I enjoyed the piece so much that I emailed the reporter, Eric, with a couple questions. He responded with how he came across this story.

I was actually in town to see my parents last spring, since I grew up in Ann Arbor. I dropped down to The Joe because I wanted to do a story on Yzerman for the Magazine in case he did retire. I always let the beat writers ask all their questions first before butting in, but Yzerman disappeared after only a couple of questions. I waited him out and annoyed media relations guy John Hahn (who is as much behind the Braxton cause as Steve is, by the way). Eventually, the only people in the locker room were John and I and a little kid and his dad. So I asked John who the kid was and he told me. I introduced myself and Brant told me the whole story. I promised myself that I would write the story when they raised Yzerman’s number.

Since that article, I formed a mentor/mentee relationship with Eric so I was disappointed to learn last August that Braxton’s father, Brant, had scammed the Red Wings and Steve Yzerman. Eric felt awful that he had been duped by Brant because as a reporter, he should uncover the truth instead of leading readers astray. He even apologized to me because he felt we met through a story that wasn’t even correct.

He informed me that he would be working on an article to tell the truth about Brant and that Braxton was not sick with cancer. Earlier this week, the second article was finally released uncovering the scam artist that is Brant. The amazing thing is that even after Steve Yzerman invested all this time and money in making a little sick boy happier and being duped in the process, Yzerman says he will reach out to sick kids even more.

A few months after that conversation with Hahn my phone rings. The caller ID reads “BLOCKED.” It’s Yzerman. I tell him the whole story. “Really bizarre,” Yzerman says, without sounding angry or frustrated. In a way, his calm makes sense. Yzerman began his career with one of the worst teams in NHL history. And though he lifted that club into the playoffs, he was nearly shipped to Ottawa, then asked to play second fiddle to a flashy Russian. Over the years he rehabbed from crippling injuries and, by the end of his career, needed to prop himself up on the ice with his stick. But who ever saw Yzerman angry? Who ever saw him give up?

“I’m not going to stop reaching out,” Yzerman says. “Actually, I think I might do it more often.”

And the little boy?

“Braxton is a nice young boy who seems to have been manipulated. I hope he can realize he did something wrong. It’s not too late for him.”

The true story of the hockey hero and the healthy little boy begins now.

Maple Leafs reach out to sick kid
In a similar situation but with a much better outcome, the Toronto Maple Leafs reached out to a little boy Jordan Primeau who has cancer. You can view a great segment done by TSN about Primeau’s trip to a Toronto practice and who he got to meet along the way (including a visit from Alexander Ovechkin).

Marty Henwood, a writer for Hockey.com, compares and contrasts the story of Jordan with Braxton and comes to this conclusion.

Not surprising to those who have followed his career, Yzerman plans to continue a relationship with that kid he once believed faced same obscure future as Jordan Primeau.

A player can always leave the game. Class never retires.

Yzerman may have been duped, yes. But the kid was conned far worse by his own father.

So, maybe, just maybe, the stories of Braxton and Jordan aren’t as different as we think.

Phoenix Coyotes first round draft pick Kyle Turris scored two goals when Canada took on Slovakia in the World Junior Championship tournament yesterday. Despite scoring the only two goals of the game, Turris was more excited about meeting lifelong idol and role model Steve Yzerman at last year’s NHL draft.

Turris, drafted third overall by the Phoenix Coyotes, has always been a fan of Yzerman. You know how it works: posters in the bedroom, videos, wears No. 19.

So when Yzerman walked over last summer and introduced himself, Turris found himself going blank. (Turris’s family adviser Kurt Overhardt arranged the meeting; once Turris becomes a professional, Overhardt will become his agent.)

“It was about 15 minutes before the draft started,” said Turris. “I was sitting in the front row, and all of a sudden I saw Stevie Y comes around the table and comes right at me. I was just watching him and he came over to me, right over to the rail, and said ‘Hey, Kyle, I’m Steve.’ ”

“I just about crapped my pants. I couldn’t believe it. I was in shock. And I kind of jumped the rail and talked to him for about 10 minutes. It was incredible, it was unbelievable. He was really down to earth. It was one of the highlights of my hockey career.”

Growing up, Turris played both lacrosse and hockey wearing No. 19 in honor of his childhood hero. After big games, Turris would try to emulate Yzerman’s moves the next day.

“I had everything about him, posters of him in my room, Don Cherry’s videos of his big goals, the big slap-shot goal [in the 1996 playoffs against the St. Louis Blues],” Turris said.

It’s likely Turris will meet Yzerman again as he plays for the University of Wisconsin. His teammate Brendan Smith was drafted by the Wings in the first round of the NHL draft in June so its probable Yzerman will stop by to check on a team prospect.

Before the WJC game, Wayne Gretzky called the team to offer up some words of encouragement, but the Globe and Mail wonders how more encouraging it would’ve been for Turris had Yzerman called instead.

“When we were told that we were going to have a surprise guest calling us just before we came over here, a lot of the guys were guessing who it would be,” Turris said. “Someone said Wayne Gretzky and he was right.”

The uplifting call energized Turris and his teammates before embarking on their long journey to Europe.

But imagine how many goals Turris would have scored if he was on last year’s team when Steve Yzerman placed the good-luck phone call to the team. The answer is the youngster would have been over the moon because the former Detroit Red Wings captain has always been No. 1 with Turris.

Thanks to the Wings’ new website feature, Red WingsTV, fans can view a 22 minute video that includes Steve Yzerman speaking to Navy recruiters.

Here are some of the things he said during his talk, but you can view the entire speech in the video below if you so desire.

“I think that the things I learned in my career about leadership apply in the business world. …

Integrity. Confidence. Respect. Determination. Perseverance. To be successful. …

You have to stand for something. …

They [knee surgeries & a neck surgery] took a toll on my career, but didn’t zap my desire. I had to figure a way to get around it and overcome these things…I felt like I really earned this and I appreciated it more…Nothing good in life comes easy. You have to work at it…

Winning the lottery makes you wealthy, but it doesn’t make you successful. …

I try to act and live a certain way that my wife and three girls would be proud of me.

The Hockey News did a fan shootout with Craig Conroy and one of his answers mentioned that he liked playing against Steve Yzerman.

Which player do you enjoy playing against the most in the NHL?
Chris Brnjas, Fergus, Ont.

Steve Yzerman. He was one of my favorites growing up, and it’s always fun to play against him.

Genevieve Simard, a Canadian skier, was told by her doctors that she needed an osteotomy because of the degenerative condition of her knee in part because of the torn ACL she suffered in 1999. After talking with Steve Yzerman for thirty minutes about the procedure, she decided to have the operation in the hope that she could return to the World Cup circuit.

“That’s why I went ahead and did it,” she told The Canadian Press in a phone interview Monday. “It was really important for me to get an athlete’s perspective and to know how he did and how was his rehabilitation. That sort of clinched the deal.” …

“It’s not changing the damage to your knee,” he said. “It’s going to make it more comfortable for you do what you’re trying to do. It should, in the longer term, help your knee.”

Yzerman admitted the operation is “kind of scary.”

“They basically sawed my leg in half,” he said. “When I woke up, I thought ‘What was I thinking. Why did I do this.’ In the end I’m glad I did do this.”

Detroit Red Wings head coach Mike Babcock sees some of Yzerman’s style in Henrik Zetteberg’s play. Zetterberg currently leads the league in offensive points with 17.

In many ways, Babcock feels Zetterberg’s overall game is patterned after Steve Yzerman’s.

And although Yzerman was a prolific scorer early in his career, it wasn’t until he dialed down his offense and took on a more defensive role that the Wings transformed into a championship team.

Zetterberg’s talents on defense make the Wings stronger.

Of Zetterberg, Babcock said: “He’s one of the best two-way forwards in the game, bar none.”

According to two Detroit News columnists, Sidney Crosby has a lot in common with Steve Yzerman.

It’s not in the way they play the game. Crosby’s style is much different from the way Yzerman played. It’s in the way they handle themselves and what they say. Crosby won’t be fazed by the ‘C’, just as he hasn’t been bothered by all the attention and expectations. He has been the focal point wherever he has gone and he has worn the ‘C’ at every level he has played.

“I’m just going to keep everything the same,” Crosby said earlier this week. “I’ve always tried to lead by example. As far as playing with emotion, I think I always have played with emotion, and I need to keep playing like that.”

Crosby isn’t the kind to stop and consider where he is in his career.

“I don’t really think about it, to be honest,” he said. “There’s not too much time to think about it. I think I’m always looking to improve and get better.

“I have to focus on the things that are really important. and I don’t think it’s really important to worry about that too much.”

Steve Yzerman observed the Red Wings prospect practice on Saturday and then briefly talked to some of the prospects including Evan McGrath and Darren Helm.

“He was always my idol growing up,” McGrath said. “Seeing a guy like that put in as may years as he did and (accomplish) as much as he did, it really makes you push a little harder. Steve’s been a great person to me and a great player and just a great mentor.”

Added Helm: “Every time I shake his hand, I am always nervous. He has such a huge influence on the hockey world and in the city of Detroit. To meet him and to know him is just such a huge honor for me.”