*Originally Published August, 2017
He fought every fight in his head before he ever hit the ice.
He knew their moves and how he would counter.
He prepared his hands, his shoulders, his knees.
He never fought angry.
Every move, every swing, was carefully calculated. Each hit was effective and full of rage, or so it seemed. But again, he never fought angry. He purposely conditioned his body a specific way to prepare and be able to deliver the most impactful hit possible (it doesn’t hurt that his hands are the size of a gorilla’s).
I’ve heard every story. We’ve watched the videos, and he remembers EVERY fight in detail. He can replay you the conversations he had with the guy he fought after the game. He can tell you what they said, about their family, about their friendship.
There is no arrogance in the conversation. There is no puffing his chest out and talking about how he was the best in the league. Those are words that you will NEVER hear come out of his mouth. It was never about that to him.
Others will say he was one of the best. Some will argue against it. But he will tell you that he just did his job. His job was to be an Enforcer, and that’s wholeheartedly what he did. Every single time he hit the ice. That was his objective, and he executed.
Watching these videos, it’s kind of incredible to see. You can pick out the way he didn’t see anything else in the room other than the guy in front of him, the guy he was determined to beat. The crowd would be standing, chanting his name and he didn’t even hear it. The refs would be trying to break them up and he didn’t notice, his eyes stayed on the target.
He loved it. He fought because he absolutely LOVED EVERY MINUTE OF IT.
While yes, walking next to this man I have never once had an ounce of fear inside of me because as you can see in this video, yes, he’s tough… tougher than most. But what I see when I watch these videos is the way he has taken the skills he learned in hockey and uses them in life every day.
For those of you who don’t know, I’m an observer. One of my favorite things to do is sit back and watch people. Watch their reactions, their processes, how they handle situations, how they prepare, how they carry themselves, how they interact with other people, etc. I find it utterly fascinating and honestly, I learn SO much from doing this that it’s one of my most valued tools.
Over the years I’ve had the privilege of watching this man, this feared Enforcer go through his day-to-day. I’ve watched him use his skills to build a business, to build a team, to mold his life into exactly what he wants it to be. No apologies, no questions asked.
Is he insane a lot of the time? Absolutely, you kind of have to be to punch spend over 10 years bare knuckle fighting.
Is he one of the most difficult human beings I know? 100%, again… I think this comes with the territory.
Have I learned more from him than anyone I’ve ever met? WITHOUT A DOUBT.
I learned that you should visualize every move you want to make.
Be calculated.
Replay it in your mind over and over again.
Be ruthlessly committed to the execution.
Be obsessed with the process.
Be aware of your surroundings but don’t let them stop you.
Those are just a FEW of the things I’ve learned from spending many years of my life on the arm of one of the last true enforcers in the NHL. But, those few things I’ve listed are simply the things I learned just from watching him fight, and seeing how he used those skills to execute his job better than anyone else.
I’m not sure what lead me to watch random hockey videos earlier, but as I was watching I started thinking about the lessons and wanted to share just a few of them with you because you see, there’s a lesson in everything. And by sharing our experiences and our realizations, regardless of what prompted it, it triggers realizations in others.
This is one of the best compilations of his fights I’ve seen… for you hockey fans out there, feel free to share yours in the comments.
https://www.facebook.com/GlovesOffHockey/videos/1388420427899932/