Avalanche training camp starts Thursday, and this is the final season I’ll be covering/analyzing/commenting on the team, which will mark 30 years of me doing so. Or, just a little more than half my entire life to this point.
It’s been an honor, one I never, ever took lightly or for granted. Denver is the place where my wildest dream actually came true, where my son was born, where I had more fun than a goofy, awkward, 6-6 red-headed dude from the boonies of New Hampshire ever deserved. I always felt like an honored guest in Denver, and always wanted to be the well-behaved guest. Sometimes my crazier side came out and it wasn’t always great for me, but never once did I not take my writing for Avalanche fans in Denver (and around the world) for granted.
So, as always, I’m writing from a place of gratitude. I’ve been a bit sensitive at times over being maybe perceived as the “old guy who only wants to talk about the good ‘ole days”, which is why I try to limit stories from the old days somewhat. But, enough people have told me, “Dater, that’s your superpower, the thing you have over most everyone else in the media, so use it more!”
That makes a bit of sense, even though I am more interested in this year’s Avs team over anything else. But, hey, with camp approaching, I’ll tell some training camp stories from three decades of experience. And, I’ll try to write things I haven’t anywhere else before, including (in Part 2 tomorrow) about that photo you see above:
You always remember your first, and so for me that first Avs training camp, at DU Arena in 1995, will always stand out. Being totally wet behind the ears, I remember thinking “wait, what’s an agent?” when Rick Sadowski of the Rocky Mountain News asked Peter Forsberg who his agent was, with me at his locker as well. Oh, OK. He/she is the guy who represents the player in contract talks. Rick had just come from L.A. after covering the L.A. Kings for the previous 12 years or so for the Los Angeles Daily News, and I was quite intimidated by him at first. I mean, he covered the first eight Gretzky years in L.A. I didn’t know anyone in the NHL to that point. It made me work harder, and Rick and I were always good friends. Don Baizley, by the way, was Foppa’s agent, along with Joe Sakic. I got to know him quite well over the years.
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