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ec06aaj · 03-26-2024, 09:02 AM

[Image: ?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.vox-cdn.com%2Fthu...38bd_9.jpg]

Simo hitting Brandon Strongstick of United States White, during the quarter-final of the S74 WJC

Until about a week ago, I was flying high as one member of the reigning champions in two fields. Unofficially, Detroit lost our status as the team to beat a few weeks before that but formally, we were still the defending Four Star Cup holders until last week, when Colorado took down Newfoundland and stole the trophy out of our cabinet.

I’m not bitter about it either. We made our run and slapped the Raptors down last season, this was their turn to go all the way. That’s the playoffs.

But even with that title gone, I’m still the man to beat at the World Juniors. Last season, Team Norden came together to shove the rest of the world and show off the power of Scandinavian hockey. I'm writing this in another generic hotel room, Team Norden are 2-0 and gearing up for a game against Team Rhine tomorrow. We look good. Repeat champions? Possibly. If the Solberg sisters find the form from the SMJHL regular season, the rest of the world is going to have a hard time stopping us. Hopefully their playoff form doesn't turn up instead. (I joke, Froya, Sonja, I joke.)

It is not wise to spend your rest night on a five mile run, but I only claimed to have wisdom - never to be wise.

Next season in the J is going to be my last. Four years is the limit and then it’s off to the big leagues, where I’m going to stop being a physical brute and one of the best players at my position and become a 20-year-old rookie staring down people with a decade of experience at the highest level under their belts.

If you stick a microphone in their face, most professional athletes will talk about embracing the new challenge; the truth is that I’m terrified of it. I was worried when I was going to be heading to Minnesota and be a depth player with some time to get acclimated to the way things were, but now I’m with the Edmonton Blizzard after the GMs stripped the team to the bone.

I have flaws. I know what they are and by this point, anybody who has a decent hockey brain in their head knows what they are. If I shoot, I’m about as likely to knock out somebody’s teeth as I am to score. I learned to read an offense to work out where I need to be to stop the puck, not to get my name on the scoresheet. Nobody should ever be looking to me as a threat with the puck.

I’ve built my reputation on being a great defensive mind, having an engine with an endless fuel supply, being willing to do the dirtiest work and be nasty in the pursuit of victory. What the hell do I do if I go up, join the Blizzard and discover that that’s not good enough?

It’s not a rhetorical question.

There are a lot of players who looked great at this level and found they just could not make the jump and become stars. For every MVP, there are a hundred, a thousand people making up the numbers, and every one of those were once the best player on the ice at some level of hockey.

I used to be a holy terror in Tampere. There’s a tiny scar on my ring finger from a piece of Swedish glass, because I put Adam-Jonas Svensson through the crowd protector barriers playing for Djurgardens. There have been games for the Falcons that I took over, playing almost half an hour and refusing to let anybody even get close to my goaltender. But at some point that path is going to end, and it scares me to think the end is closer than I want it to be.

I know I’m twenty. It is going to be easy to ignore any advice I give because what life experience do I have to justify it. But this I say to the SMJHL class of ‘76: brace yourself.

Your first season in the J is probably going to suck. Wherever you come from - American high school, Swedish junior set-up, some French team that barely qualifies as a wine league - all of you are going to stop being the studs you think you are right now. I’ll say it again because you need to hear it: your days of stepping onto the ice knowing you’re the best player there by a mile are over.

You’re going to be worked harder than you ever have. It wasn’t that many years ago that I was thinking whether I wanted to play professional hockey or devote myself to long-distance athletics. I thought I knew what it was like to push my limits and I was so stupidly wrong. You’re strong, you’re fast, you’re powerful and yet again you are going to run into players who can shower you with snow or stop you dead in your tracks.

Some of you, especially those of you with potential and talent, are going to be drafted high and be picked by the worst SMJHL teams. Alexa Johansen is a future teammate of mine in Edmonton, picked second in the SHL draft and second in the J draft, and spent last season on the worst team in the league. St. Louis lost 50 games. If you come to us with a proven track record of winning and being part of the best team in whatever league you played in, some of you are going to get hit with a hard dose of reality. It’s going to suck but if you let it fester, you are going to fail.

You are going to play with people you find out you detest and for people you want to punch in the face. Not even the best locker rooms are free from tension or friction but the best rooms are full of people who can work past that. If you cause problems with your teammates, especially if you join a team with an attitude, the years you spent in the J are going to be a lot longer and a lot less pleasant. I have been there: I think that may be why I’m no longer part of the Monarchs organisation.

You are going to come in with the confidence and the invincibility of youth, and that is going to get knocked out of you eventually. You stop feeling invulnerable very quickly when you’re throwing up inside the goal from a practice session spent bag skating. And it’s hard to feel confident when you’re minus two on the game within a single period and coach staples you to the bench.

These are things I would have liked somebody to spell out for me in my first season. I came in brash and arrogant and a loner, not because I was an introvert but because I thought of the SMJHL as a stepping stone, something where I would spend three or four years and never think about again. I don’t think my attitude was the whole reason, but I also don’t think it was a coincidence that when I stopped thinking of myself as a man alone my play and the team’s play got a lot better a lot quicker.

Some of you who read this will still think it’s not going to happen to you, and perhaps it won’t. But I’m sitting here, on a free night, with a Four Star Cup ring and a WJC gold medal back home, writing this in the hope it reaches somebody. I’ve been through it; maybe some of you will listen to me and not have to. And some of you are going to get drafted by the Detroit Falcons, which means you’re going to be coming into my locker room.

The day after I was picked into the SHL - the second round, pick number 27 - I went out and ran for 84 minutes, because it took 84 minutes from the start of the draft until my name was called. I did it on the day of the draft last season, I’m going to do it this year and I’m going to do it every year until I stop playing professional hockey. I run for nearly an hour and a half because I wasn’t good enough to be picked in the first round.

If I push myself that hard, do you think I’m going to let you get lazy?

See you soon, kids,
Simo

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[1547 words, with thanks to @boom for reminding me the Players' Tribune exists]

ibuprofenaddict · 03-26-2024, 10:07 AM

It was never your attitude, it was your musical choices! Thanks for a good three seasons, see you out there brother Wink

-Marek

***boom*** · 03-26-2024, 03:54 PM

Love this!

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