by Max Domi
I had wanted one for a long time. I’d always felt they were a cool statement, and when I found out that my buddy Jared had a tattoo, I thought they were even cooler. My parents knew it was inevitable. My mom had just one rule.
“Make sure it’s in reference to something significant in your life. Don’t get something you’ll regret.”
It was good advice. What sort of image would I never get sick of? Finally, it came to me— I should pick something that related to my type 1 diabetes. After all, that was something I was going to be living with my entire life, and it was a big part of my life. There was no way my parents could get mad at me for that.
The chef at the Budweiser Gardens was named Kim, and she had full-sleeve tattoos. Kim and I were friends—she would prepare gluten-free meals for me, so we were always talking about my diet—and I told her I was thinking of getting a tattoo.
“What were you thinking of getting?” she asked.
“I want it to look like the medical alert bracelet. I always have to take off my bracelet for hockey, and I’ve already lost a few, so why not have the tattoo show the same symbol and then I won’t need to wear a bracelet at all?” I said. The medical alert bracelet features the caduceus symbol—two snakes wrapped around a pole that is topped with a pair of wings. The symbol is associated with the Greek god Hermes, and it represents healing. My idea was to use that as the image for my tattoo, but I would also add the words “Type 1” to it.
She smiled. “I like it. You should go see the guy I use. His name’s Sean. He’s a big Knights fan—he’ll help you out.”
Sean agreed to see me, even though he had a yearlong waiting list at the time—a good sign that he knew what he was doing.
I reassured my mom that the tattoo would just be a little thing on my arm. But when Sean stenciled it out before starting, my first thought was, Whoa, that’s pretty big.
I was a bit nervous, but I trusted Sean’s judgment, and when he was finished, it looked fantastic. Now I had a daily reminder of the disease I had to respect and manage every day of my life. It was right there for everyone to see: I had type 1 diabetes.
The tattoo was the first step in my transformation during that time. The second was the NHL Entry Draft. The draft had been marked on my calendar for months, if not years.
But before putting on my best suit to attend the draft, I would have to attend the annual NHL Scouting Combine. The combine was the same thing every year—an event spread out over a few days where all the teams in the NHL physically and mentally measured all of the players in that year’s draft class. But for each individual player, it was more than just a standard test. It was our moment to stand out and make an impression, for better or for worse.
I was nervous for the physical tests. I wasn’t injured, but I was completely burned out. For two years in a row, we’d gone all the way to the Memorial Cup, and between that and the international competitions I’d played in, the games had added up. I was worried that if I underperformed in the physical tests, it would hurt my chances in the draft. Luckily, my agent, Pat Brisson, was there to reassure me.
“There are other players who went deep in the playoffs and all the way to the Memorial Cup, just like you did. And they aren’t doing the physical testing, either, so you don’t have to do it if you don’t want to. The scouts already know what you can do on the ice,” he said. That was a relief to hear because I had pushed my body and was overdue for some rest.
One thing I couldn’t miss, though, were the individual interviews with the NHL teams. They were an important part of the process. One of my first interviews was with the Boston Bruins. As I walked into the meeting room, I was a bit on edge. I could hear a buzzing in my ears, and my skin was warm to the touch. I tried telling myself I had no reason to be nervous, but I didn’t want to mess up.
I sat at the head of a big boardroom table and looked around at a group of faces I’d never seen before.
“Hi, Max,” said the head scout. “Thanks for meeting with us today. We wanted to start off with an easy question—what’s your favorite animal?”
I froze. I was expecting questions about my workout habits or how I worked with a team. But my favorite animal? That was weird. I tried not to panic and blurted out the first thing that came to mind.
“I guess it’d be a dolphin,” I said.
I watched the scouts glance down at their papers and try to hide their laughter. Suddenly it dawned on me—they didn’t care what my favorite animal really was. It was a joke—considering the team’s historical logo, there was only one answer to a room full of Boston Bruins staff.
“After a bear, of course,” I added.
They were nice about it, and we moved on to the next question, but I couldn’t help feeling liked I’d failed my first test.
The rest of the day went a little more smoothly. It was a long haul. I met with almost every single team in the league, with the exception of one or two. Some meetings were five minutes long, others went a little longer. It would have been easy to get frustrated at the fact that I basically had to regurgitate the same answers for every single interview. The teams had been following me and the other players on the ice for years, so they knew our abilities well by the point of the combine. The purpose of the meetings was to get to know us better as people. I wanted to be myself and be genuine, but it was challenging to figure out how to say the same thing over and over again. I just hoped I had made my best impression.
The hardest part, though, was that when it was all said and done, there was only one thing I could do: wait. It would be a few more weeks before the draft day in Newark, New Jersey, and all I could do before then was try to keep my mind off of the draft and everything it held for my future. Just that.
The less I thought about it, the faster the time went by. But that was hard because the draft entered my mind at some point every day! During the week leading up to the draft, time seemed to kaleidoscope in front me, and each hour felt like an eternity.
I spent the morning of the draft with my dad. We were getting ready in the apartment of a family friend, Nelson Peltz. My mind was buzzing, and I was checking my phone in case there were any last-minute developments.
I was in my own little world. One minute, my pulse would spike at a rumor on Twitter that the Toronto Maple Leafs might trade up to pick me. The next, I was flashing back to games in junior, second-guessing decisions and trying to remember if I had made mistakes in front of any of the scouts who had been watching me all year.
After a while, I looked up to give my eyes a break and noticed a fancy chair across the room. It was a big chair, and it had ornate wooden legs. For no good reason, that chair started to draw all of my attention, and I just sat there staring at it, lost in my thoughts. Suddenly a voice inside in my head yelled, Snap out of it! My mind was hazy, and I clumsily reached for my glucose meter, my blood tester, held it to my fingertip, and felt the familiar pinch of the needle as it drew a bit of blood. The readout on the device told me what I already knew: my blood sugar was low.
Luckily, we were prepared. My dad had made sure the apartment was loaded with every fruit and juice you could think of. Whenever I stayed in a hotel and my blood sugar went low, it took time to track down a snack or something to balance me out. But in the apartment, it was all right there at my fingertips in case anything happened.
It was only a short walk to the kitchen, but I moved unsteadily. Thankfully, I made it there without falling. Immediately after chugging some juice, I was feeling more like myself, and I was able to regroup after some downtime.
It was a good thing, too, because the day would test my patience and energy. The whole thing was a lot of hurry-up-and-wait. Hurry up to the hotel lobby, then wait for a bus to Newark. Hurry into the venue, and then wait for your seats.
I was nervous, but the excitement and happiness that I was feeling made the nerves a good thing—it helped balance me out. As we made our way into the arena, I made sure to check my blood sugar again, just in case. The
stress and anticipation could easily have thrown my levels out of whack, which was the last thing I wanted on a day like that.
TSN had assigned a crew to follow me and a few other players around all day to put together a draft special. I thought it was a little embarrassing, so every time I looked at the camera guys, I pretended to not know who they were. For a guy who hates attention, having a camera crew follow me and my family all day was the last thing I wanted.
The crew was there on the trip to the arena. They were there when I was hanging with the other draftees in the lobby. They followed me right up to the moment when the Coyotes’ GM, Don Maloney, called my name and I walked onstage and shook Gary Bettman’s hand.
“Welcome to the NHL,” Bettman said. Four words I’ll never forget.
After I’d made my way offstage and gone through the photo lineup, I was immediately pulled aside for an interview with TSN. I was pumped—I couldn’t wait to tell everyone how excited I was to have been drafted and how I was looking forward to taking the next step in my career. Then my dad showed up. It turned out the station wanted us to do the interview together. I was a little pissed. Inside, I was thinking, Hey, I got drafted today, not you. But my dad was great about it—anytime the host tried to ask him a question, he brought it back to my future, which I really appreciated. He was just a proud dad who wanted to talk about his son.
After the interview, I was thrown into a media scrum backstage with the rest of the drafted players. The first person I saw was my buddy Bo Horvat. I went over and gave him a big hug, saying, “Dude! Congrats!”
“I can’t believe we’re both wearing NHL jerseys,” he said, his grin never leaving his face.
I couldn’t stop smiling all afternoon, either. When my obligations were finally over and I was able to see my family, though, I was drained. I didn’t want to talk to a single person, but people kept dropping by—Nick Kypreos stopped by to catch up, and then Ken Daneyko dropped by a little later. I was so thankful they’d taken the time to visit, but it was all I could do to keep myself from falling asleep.
I managed to get some food, which rebalanced my blood sugar levels and gave me some energy. It was a good thing, too, because I still had to meet with the Coyotes assistant coach, Jim Playfair. Jim came into the Phoenix Coyotes suite and chatted with my parents for a bit before delivering the real news.
“Max, we’re going to be having a development camp in a few weeks,” he said. “We’re excited to have you there. I hope you like the heat.”
It was the best news I’d had all day. Being drafted to the NHL was one thing, but there was always the chance I’d spend years in the minors waiting for my chance to start with the team. The development camp wasn’t the same as making the team, but it was the next step. I couldn’t wait for a chance to prove to the coaches that I had what it took to play in the big leagues.
When my obligations were finally over, I was able to meet up again with my mom and dad, and we headed back to the hotel. When we got there, my sisters and extended family were waiting, ready to celebrate. The day had taken so much out of me physically and emotionally that I just wanted to get some sleep. But I also wanted to savour the moment with my family, so I enjoyed every minute I could with them until I just couldn’t stay awake any longer.
My mom walked with me to the elevator.
“I’m so proud of you, Max,” she said. “You’ve worked so hard for this. It’s everything you’ve ever wanted.”
“I have you and Dad to thank for getting me here.”
“You have yourself to thank for it. You’ve earned it. I can’t wait to see what you’ll do next. Congratulations, bud.”
I crawled into bed, ready to collapse. The emotional roller coaster of the day, the lack of food, and the high-stress situations had me completely fried. Just before I went to sleep, I checked my phone. I had a ton of text messages from all of my friends who’d just been drafted. They were all out celebrating their big day with family and friends, having the time of their lives. But while their night was just heating up, I was out cold.
* * *
Two weeks after the draft, I found myself in the dry Arizona heat, standing outside an arena called the Ice Den. When I walked into the dressing room, I couldn’t believe the sight of an NHL locker with my name on it. Even better, it was filled with a whole set of official NHL equipment. I was like a kid in a candy shop. My helmet, pants, and gloves—every piece had the NHL and Coyotes logos on it. As I laced up my skates for the first time, I felt like a pro.
The camp itself was fun and challenging at the same time. The point wasn’t to figure out who was going to make the team—that would come in training camp later in the year. This was a chance for us younger players to become familiar with the organization, the facilities, the staff, and each other.
I’d finally recovered since our Memorial Cup run, so I was ready to get going. At least, I thought I was. I had been gradually easing back into training the past few weeks, but we skated our asses off in that camp. Each night, I had only enough energy to shuffle back to my hotel room and collapse into bed, wondering if I would be able to recover enough to stand out the next day. And each morning, I would haul myself out of bed and get ready to go all-out again.
The coaching staff knew how to balance things out, though. They wanted to see we could work hard, but they also wanted us to know that the Coyotes weren’t just a team, they were a community. So they organized fun outings in the evenings for us to take part in. A couple of nights into the camp, the team even arranged to have me throw the first pitch at an Arizona Diamondbacks game.
I tested my blood sugar when I got to the park that night, and it was a little low. It’s just the nerves, I told myself. My palms were so sweaty—something that I dealt with frequently as a person with type 1 diabetes—that I could barely hold on to a baseball. How was I going to throw it?
The other guys on the team had come to the game, and they were chirping me nonstop. “Remember not to bounce the ball,” they said. “Don’t throw it in the dirt.”
“Excuse me,” I said to one of the Diamondbacks staff. “Exactly how far is it from the mound to the plate?”
“It’s a little over sixty feet,” they said.
That was way farther than I’d thought. I was so scared I would mess up that I asked the team’s backup catcher to come out so we could warm up my arm. We threw the ball back and forth underneath the stands for a while, and I gradually began to feel better.
But then we stepped onto the field. When I saw the distance for real, all I could think was, Holy shit, that looks far!
A PR rep from the team walked me out to the mound, and as we crossed the outfield, the announcer read out my name and the crowd gave a cheer that made my stomach churn. The last thing I wanted was for my new team’s fans’ first impression of me to be that I couldn’t even throw a ball. I leaned over to the PR rep beside me and asked, “I don’t have to go all the way to the top of the mound, do I?”
All of the other rookies on the team were lined up along the first base line, watching me. I kept telling myself not to look at any of them, because they had all promised they’d do everything they could to make me laugh.
I picked a spot that I figured was close enough to the mound that it looked like a respectable distance but also where I knew I could make the throw. When I watched the video afterward, though, I saw that I was only ten steps away from home plate. I then proceeded to make the feeblest, most awkward throw to the catcher you could imagine. People watching it probably couldn’t believe I was an athlete.
The catcher was nice about it. “All right, good job, man,” he said as he jogged over and returned the ball to me.
My teammates waited until we were off the field to start laughing. “Dude, you were only a few steps away and you still lobbed it in there!” I laughed along with them. It looked like my baseball career wasn’t going to start anytime soon.
The rest of the summer was a blur of camps of one sort or another. I we
nt away for a week to the World Junior camp in August. Then, right after getting back from that, I had to leave for the Coyotes rookie training camp, which—if I made it—would be followed by the team’s main training camp and then NHL exhibition games.
First, though, I had to earn a spot on the team. The training camp was a lot different from the development camp a few months prior. That had been a guaranteed weeklong event for just the rookies. This time, I had no idea how long I would be there. If I made the team, I’d be living in Scottsdale full-time. But I could also be sent home after the first round of cuts.
At first I didn’t know how to interact with the older guys on the team, which was odd for me. Thanks to my dad, I had basically grown up in an NHL dressing room. But I’d only ever been there as a visitor. Now I was there as an athlete, and I was stuck in the disbelief stage.
My roommate during camp was Jordan Schwartz. He was a young guy, but he’d been in the organization for a few years. He was veteran with the Coyotes’ AHL affiliate team, and he knew the lay of the land. Jordan took me under his wing, and he introduced me to some of the older guys who were then playing in the AHL. We ended up hanging out together throughout the week. They took me and the younger players out to meals, showed us around town, and we played pickup games of volleyball to kill the time. It was kind of like being at summer camp.
Of course, at summer camp you’re not competing against your cabin mates and you don’t have an underlying risk of being sent home early. Trusting Jordan as my guide and distracting myself by hanging out with the other guys helped me from dwelling on those thoughts. Without those supports, I would have driven myself insane just sitting around the hotel every day, wondering whether I was about to be sent home.
But even when I was hanging out casually with the guys, I realized that playing hockey at that level was a job. There was a clear difference in mentality. The older guys were working so hard because they were trying to make a living. I was just a kid who was happy to be there. That sort of outlook is great for maintaining a positive attitude, but it doesn’t get you far in the NHL. Every single second—whether it’s in camp, in the dressing room, or on the ice—mattered. I quickly realized I needed more of an I-need-to-be-here mind-set if I was going to stick around.