Aging Gracefully

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Sports, and sports fandom, exist partly to mark the passage of time.

You can see it in the names we give to some of the events (the October classic, March Madness, etc.), by the way a diehard fans of certain sports use championships and other events as a way to remember dates (ask a Maple Leaf fan about 1993 or 1967), the way we tend to lionize players who are able to play into their 40’s (at least, those who do it without performance-enhancing substances), and especially in the way that both the retirements of older greats and the ascension of younger stars can force us to examine just how old we are getting, and how very quickly we’re doing it.

The first time a man in his mid-20’s sees an athlete who was not yet a pro when he began following sports call it quits, an nervous sense of mortality creeps up a little closer behind him.

(Unless it’s Eric Lindros, because he no doubt saw that one coming a long time ago.)

So time ebbs and flows, from World Series to Training Camps, to the World Juniors at Christmas … past the Superbowl and the All-Star Games, then the NCAA tournament and the Masters … into Spring Training and the Playoffs and Opening Day … through the Dog Days of Summer and baseball games that really don’t matter much, into the pennant races and then to October and back to the World Series.

Somewhere in there (right about the time the pennant races heat up) I have another birthday, and kids go back to school, and various countries vote in various elections, and terrible disasters happen and we wonder if these damn games matter so much anyway. Then we realize that they don’t, but that if we don’t play them, the Terrorists Win … so we play ‘em. What else can you do?

So … yeah, sports mark time, or at least they do if you bother to follow them.

Which is why watching this just-concluded Red Wings season has been such a joy. Shut up and indulge the schmaltz for a minute…

I’ve seen the Wings win cups before. Three times, to be precise. The first time it happened, in 1997, I didn’t quite appreciate what I was watching. I’d been a hockey fan for about five years, and although I’d already suffered through some awful losses (to the Leafs, the Sharks and the Devils, just to name a few) I still didn’t quite understand just how long it had been and how difficult the journey was from Dead Things to Stanley Cup Champions. I was just happy for Steve Yzerman.

The second time it happened, I was happy, but I barely paid attention. I was young, I was busy falling in love for the first time and it seemed at that point that the Red Wings would win a healthy percentage of the next five or 10 cups … so why worry? Besides, some things are just more important. Realizing that is part of growing up as a fan, too.

Anyway, I got to see the final game of the finals (on replay, late at night) and I think I bought a hat. My eyes still get a little cloudy when I watch Yzerman hand the cup to Vladimir Konstantinov, in one of the most touching sporting gestures I’ve ever seen … but this was still a veteran team, and beyond Yzerman, and a few players I’d adopted as my own, I didn’t have a feel for them.

The third time it happened, I was in the Canadian Press newsroom in Toronto, watching on tv and displaying anything but journalistic objectivity. Which was fine, since my main duties in that newsroom were updating the weather, sending out the horoscopes and making sure there wasn’t anything on the CBC that we didn’t have. I loved it. Yzerman’s one-legged heroics were inspiring, Nicklas Lidstrom was the first European to win the Conn Smythe trophy and Dominik Hasek finally got his cup …

But again, this was a veteran-heavy team, full of guys like Brett Hull, Igor Larionov, Luc Robitaille, Hasek, Shanahan, Chris Chelios, Jiri Slegr who were in the NHL before I ever bothered watching a game or looking forward to the latest EA Sports title. I loved their machinelike work ethic and the way they sublimated their own impressive individual resumes and played like a true team … but again, aside from some guys that I’d always loved, they weren’t really my team.

This time …

This time, I’m older. This time, I’ve watched most of these players grow up, instead of growing up while watching them.

Instead of reading profiles about the team’s stars, I remember watching Pavel Datsyuk, as a rookie in 2002, feeding the puck to a hockey legend. I remember wondering how good that little Russian bugger could be.

I watched Henrik Zetterberg come over from Sweden and turn into a truly complete hockey player. I spent four seasons hoping that Niklas Kronwall could avoid injury, knowing how devastating he would be if only he could stay healthy. I watched Darren Helm play for the Canadian World Junior Championship team and salivated over his speed. I watched Darren McCarty go from champion to train wreck back to champion. I remember Kris Draper, acquired from the now-defunct Winnipeg Jets for a single dollar, coming into his own in Detroit as a four-time cup-winner. I know how high Chris Osgood has been, and how low, and how good it must feel for him to prove the haters wrong again. I watched Brett Lebda sign out of Notre Dame as an undrafted free agent, and force the Red Wings to offer him a contract when he immediately took over the blueline for the Grand Rapids Griffins. I suffered through the Andreas Lilja era … every last shift of it.

I’ve now watched Nicklas Lidstrom play hockey for 15 years, and I fully understand — after seeing 15 years of error-free defense played against the best forwards in the world — exactly how rare and special he is.

Nobody has to tell me about this team. There are no backstories I don’t know and no legendary performances I missed out on. For the first time, I saw it all.

In short, this one means the most to me as a fan. Because while the other championships were won with more stars, with more legends and while the finals were won in more convincing fashion … this one was won by a team that felt like mine.

So yes, sports marks time. And this time, I understand how hard it is for a hockey team to achieve consistent success and how quickly sporting glory fades when that yearly calender moves on to its next event. I know how quickly the newspaper stories will peter out, how soon hockey fans will turn their attention to the Maple Leafs new coach, the various free agents who will find new teams this summer and how fast we will all move on.

And I’m good with that. Because I’m older; because my interest in these games and this team is less of the loyal fanatacism of youth, and more of an appreciative recognition of excellence. That’s not to say that I wasn’t pulling for them all the way, or that I wasn’t screaming at the refs, or that I didn’t have a sickening feeling in my stomach when Petr Sykora scored in triple-overtime of Game 5. It just means that I have the perspective to appreciate this team for what it is — a group of good people who put the collective ahead of the individual and gave a real boost to a city that was badly in need of some self-confidence.

I understand now, how many things are more important than sports, I understand how quickly we grow up; how fast bodies give out and promising careers end and how, eventually, both players and fans alike trade in their dreams and try to find peace and happiness where and when they can.

I understand now how players age at least as fast as I do, how teams can change in the blink of an eye and how few chances I’ll actually have to watch a group like this in my lifetime … so yeah, I’m good with that.

And one day, I’ll be telling my grandkids about Nicklas Lidstrom and Henrik Zetterberg, and how good they were and how they just don’t make ‘em like that anymore … and they won’t understand, and they probably won’t believe me … but I’ll know.

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Filed under Blatant Homerism, Life Lessons, Media, NHL Playoffs, Sports, The Franzen