Ice Capades

by Sean Avery

  As I sat on the tarmac waiting for my flight to leave for New York, I felt shame and relief. I felt like shit for embarrassing Elisha, which was certainly not my intention. I was in love with her once, and it didn’t work out, but she’s a great person and we had a wonderful year and change together. Just to make it clear here, I am very sorry for causing her any distress at all. That was never my intention. I was just trash-talking Phaneuf. But I missed the target.

  I also feel a heavy burden of shame and disappointment in myself that I let my childhood idol down. Brett Hull was a guy who did nothing but good things for me when he didn’t have to do anything. Other than my parents, nobody has done more for me than Brett Hull, and now I’d embarrassed the team he managed in a way that could affect his life.

  On other hand, I was so relieved to be on a plane home, back to the place that feels safe and that inspires me every day. It’s funny how, even more so today, if I haven’t done my workout-shower-shave-and-then-dressed by 9 A.M. I feel so guilty and embarrassed because by 9 A.M. in NYC the streets are filled with people who’ve been on the grind for three hours, and I think if they see me walking to the gym at 9:30 it makes me look weak, like I have nothing to do. It’s a bit crazy, but I love it.

  For the next few days, my comments were the talk of the sports world—more so than if I had murdered someone (NFL), beaten my wife (MLB), been drunk and brawling with the public (NBA), sometimes with guns (all of the above).

  I had many conversations with my agent, Pat Morris, and the NHLPA about just what the fuck I was thinking, and of course I hadn’t been thinking, I’d been reacting. All our conversations were about interpreting the rules, in case Dallas wanted to void my contract, which they couldn’t do. They could suspend me, but we all thought it would be for a game or two as a kind of public relations gesture. I mean, I hadn’t put a guy in the morgue. But no, the NHL suspended me indefinitely, “in accordance with the provisions of By-Law 17 and Article 6 of the NHL Constitution for conduct detrimental to the League or game of hockey.” They set a hearing date where I would throw myself on the mercy of Bettman and his court.

  And I had little support from the Stars.

  “I completely support the league’s decision to suspend Sean Avery,” Stars owner Tom Hicks said. “Had the league not have suspended him, the Dallas Stars would have. This organization will not tolerate such behavior, especially from a member of our hockey team. We hold our team to a higher standard and will continue to do so.”

  Marty Turco got in on it, too. “It’s just so disappointing for guys who have been around here for a long time and have taken a lot of pride in how this organization has been perceived. The disrespect of this morning and other things over the course of the season have been extremely disappointing for us. It’s a slap in the face.”

  Even John Tortorella said I was an embarrassment to the league, a comment that would soon be a very rich piece of irony. But right now, this was the perfect opportunity for everyone who hated Sean Avery to crush me. You’d think I was a repeat offender of some crime, but actually I had not been suspended by the NHL prior to this incident.

  Despite what my agent and the NHLPA said, there was still some talk that the Stars were going to try and tear up my contract. But I knew the NHLPA would never let that happen, because setting that type of precedent would change sports forever. I mean, if they could rip up my deal because I said something vulgar then the owners might as well just put us all on golden leashes because no contract would be safe.

  I had my friend Billy Durney, head of security for the Olsen twins, pick me up at my West 19th Street apartment and drive me to the NHL offices and walk me into the hearing, just in case anyone was out front to cause me a problem, but mostly to put on a show.

  Basically, the NHLPA said that my only shot at escaping the guillotine was to kiss the little man’s ring, the little man being the second-most hated person in hockey after me, Gary Bettman. I told Brett Hull to stay in Dallas and let me do this, because I wanted Brett to distance himself from me as much as he could. Brett is a loyal motherfucker and really doesn’t give a crap what anyone says about him. He’d also scored 700 NHL goals and was NHL royalty, so he came with me.

  We walked into the fancy conference room at NHL headquarters and everyone took their seats. The NHL’s minister of justice, Colin Campbell, played the clip of me saying what I had said to the media in Calgary. He must have played it twenty times. He played it in slow motion again and again like they were trying to find the second gunman in the JFK assassination.

  The NHL had at least a six-pack of lawyers in the room, and they walked us through all my prior incidents. There was the recent game in Boston (I scored a goal, made some hits, got in a fight) and the time I scuffled with Darcy Tucker in warm-up, and the time I called out visor-wearing French players for running guys, and the time I told Brian Hayward that he was a hack when he played and a hack on TV after he said he’d like to see me beaten to a pulp. (That’s right—a TV commentator advocated extreme violence against a professional athlete.)

  I mean, in the history of the NHL, there had been far worse things than this, but that wasn’t the point. They wanted me gone.

  It was a kangaroo court. These guys had been blowing hot air, and the only way I could get out of here with a job in the NHL was to blow some back. The difference being, what I said was true.

  Cue the music. I talked about being the small kid on the team, the guy who was always told he was too short to play in the NHL, and how, when I finally made it after clawing my way in, I started to become a man who had interests away from the rink, catching up on all those things that junior hockey takes away from you.

  I told them I liked to read, and to listen to music at home and at concerts, and that I liked art and design and fashion. And because I liked these things and was different from your typical NHLer, I had endured years and years of abuse from NHL fans and opposing players. They called me a “faggot” and held up signs in visiting arenas that called me a fag, and when I’d bang on the glass and point out the offending signs to the game officials, they did nothing.

  Cue the tears, which were real, because I was feeling frustrated by this sham of a hearing in which I wasn’t being heard. But I told them that certainly, yes, the words I used to taunt Phaneuf could have been chosen better.

  Then I tried to flip the script on the NHL, and blame them for not protecting me against this abuse directed at my assumed homosexual preference (even though the women I dated were regular tabloid fodder). Did the NHL suspend star Eddie Belfour when he had to be pepper-sprayed in a Dallas hotel and offered the cops one billion dollars? What about Kevin Stevens, who was arrested with crack cocaine and a hooker? What about Dany Heatley, who was convicted of vehicular homicide after killing my friend Dan Snyder? What about all those players who called Willie O’Ree, the first black man to play in the NHL, the N-word?

  Nothing.

  I was trying my best to not get the death penalty. As I walk out of the NHL offices I have no idea what fate awaits me.

  And then I get the call. I’ve been suspended for six games and sentenced to thirty days in a Malibu, California, rehab facility. Hold on a second—did they just say rehab? What the fuck could I possibly be going to spend a month in a rehab facility for? I hardly ever drink, and other than the occasional joint, I don’t do drugs. Is this a joke?

  No. The NHL’s council of wizards have determined that I have anger issues, and so I will go to rehab for “anger management.”

  19

  DOWN AND OUT AND BACK AGAIN

  The few days I had to wait before flying to Los Angeles—business class, paid for by the NHL, but still, to rehab—were just like waiting to go to the Big House. I had lost my liberty—just for a month, but even so, I was worried that I would lose my livelihood. And what would await me in rehab? People who should be there, most likely. Unlike me.

  I land in
LA and my old friends Lawrence Longo and Cody Leibel pick me up at the airport and we all head to In-N-Out before we make the drive to Malibu. We’re cracking jokes and the mood is light. I’m not really nervous. My fate has been decided, so now it’s time to embrace the ride.

  We wind our way into a canyon in Malibu and I think about the first time I came to this part of the world, to Chris Chelios’s beach party, which seems like an age ago. Finally, we pull into a driveway—no gates or barbed wire—and park in front of a beautiful house with a pool in the backyard. I gave the guys a hug and they drove off.

  Rehab has a name and it’s called the Canyon. It opened in 2004, and it’s big—a 4,000-square-foot main house with clusters of cottages spread over 240 acres. It has a cool view of the surrounding Santa Monica Mountains and the Pacific surf beyond. There are two eight-bed facilities, one for women and one for men. You have a roommate, but the rooms are big, have fireplaces, four-poster beds, and sheets with a very high thread count. And so it should be a little deluxe, as it costs $58,000 for a thirty-day visit.

  I can tell that the people running the Canyon—very professional and welcoming—are confused by my situation, since they don’t run me through the normal search before check-in. It’s 10:45 P.M., and as it’s been a long day, I head to bed.

  My roommate is already sleeping. He wakes up in the middle of the night, coming down from whatever substance has landed him here, and is jumping up and down on his bed. I have to try to calm him down until staff can arrive. He’s older, pushing seventy, and he’s won Emmys and an Oscar, and I didn’t know who he was until the fourth day when one of the workers told me. He was in for an addiction that he’d been trying to manage for many years, and he was certainly a calming influence on me over the next while. Why I’m here, I still can’t figure out.

  Life at the Canyon is all about routine. I wake up early, around 7 A.M., and have breakfast. The food is great except there is NO sugar and that is something to which I am definitely addicted. I have a trainer from 9 A.M. to 11 A.M. every morning in the gym. Then I take part in group therapy and it’s heavy shit—crack addiction and sexual abuse cases.

  I share my story and everyone looks at me like I’m making a joke of this place. No, I wasn’t raped by my uncle from ages four to fourteen, and no, I don’t cut or starve myself. I’m not an alcoholic and I’ve never tried cocaine, and I’m taking up the place of someone who might really need to be here, like the people in my group. Was the NHL out of its mind? The only contact I have from the outside world is via NHLPA doctors, who observe the process. I knew that I was going to have to do my time here, but I also knew that once all the smoke cleared, it would all work itself out. I realized now that subconsciously, when I made the “sloppy seconds” comment, I was trying to get myself back to New York. I wanted to make something happen. I wanted to get traded. I had just picked a very hard way of going about it, and as I said, I’m very impulsive, and don’t always think things through. This was certainly an awakening for me, for while I thought the reason I was in rehab was ridiculous, and demeaning to the people who really needed to be here, my journey at the Canyon did help me to understand myself better as a person.

  The focus of treatment, mindfulness, ends up being a wonderful tool that I still use. Mindfulness is about controlling your impulses, using your breath, just hearing your breath as you inhale and exhale. And just remembering to breathe. It really works.

  I have been in the Canyon for twenty-one days, and Christmas is a week away, and I’m starting to lose it. I feel that the people who are here really need to be here, and I feel sorry for many of them, who have none of the outside support that I have. But I am done.

  Dr. Dan Cronin, who is a clinical psychologist and the NHL’s substance abuse expert, and Dr. Brian Shaw, the NHLPA’s guy, are the joint decision makers in this process. I think both psychologists know I’m at my breaking point and that I’m starting to think about packing my bags despite the potential consequences. I think both guys know I’ve done everything they asked during my time here, and clearly I don’t have a problem that would put my health at risk by leaving early. So they cut me loose.

  On my way out the door I’m hit by a cool blast of reality. It’s clear that I’m not going back to Dallas. Modano and Turco and coach Dave Tippett (who hated me) have issued an ultimatum to Hully, and it’s three against one, at least. I’m done in Dallas.

  And yet I’m still the NHL-caliber player that I was a month ago, and when you take a step back and look at this fairly, you realize I didn’t break the law. I made a distasteful comment, it’s true—though if the NHL is worried about levels of distasteful, the execs should hang around dressing rooms more. As my plane takes off for Manhattan, I have one question bashing around inside my head: How do I get back into a New York Ranger jersey?

  I know I will make this happen. And after a month in California, I need to go back to boot camp to make my NHL return a success.

  Pat Manocchia is a former hockey player from Brown University who owns La Palestra, a gym on Central Park West. It’s based on the ancient Greek idea of the gymnasium, and with its elegant colonnades, it is a thing of beauty. Pat trains Madonna, Howard Stern, Julia Roberts, John McEnroe, and Liam Neeson, and has a magic touch with people who need to look good for their jobs.

  I need to look good for my job because sooner rather than later I’m going to get the call.

  In warm weather, Central Park is a runner’s paradise, but in January it’s a nightmare; some paths would be better navigated on ice skates. The distance from La Palestra around the upper reservoir of the Park is two miles. Some parts of the loop are open to the major winds that whip through the canyons of Manhattan, and other than the odd winter warrior out running, the only company I have are the tips of the skyscrapers lining the perimeter of Central Park.

  I use them as motivation. I’ve just witnessed what happens when I don’t have this city. So every time it feels too cold to continue, I look at the buildings and I dig in. Every time I look around and think there’s nobody here to see if I do only one lap instead of two, I look at those buildings staring down at me and I do two laps. I will not let this story have a bad ending.

  I finally get the call that I’ve been willing the universe to make. Glen Sather wants to meet for lunch, and obviously this is not because he’s hungry. Glen is sniffing out a deal and Dallas knows that they have no leverage. The only option they have is to send me down to the minors and recall me when they have word from a team that wants to claim me on re-entry.

  Dallas played its hand when it sent me home, and the Stars’ righteous owner, Tom Hicks, has said he doesn’t want anyone of my low character on his team. (Hicks would default on more than $500 million in loans a year later; in 2011, he took the Dallas Stars to bankruptcy. In 2016, his son Tommy Junior was one of Donald Trump’s biggest fundraisers. Yes, a family of top-notch character that I was a fool not to model mine on.)

  I feel bad for Hully that I’ve put him in this situation, but Dallas management put him in an even worse one. The reality is that the team that claims me can get me at half-price, and Dallas will be on the hook for the other half. Glen Sather gets me cheaper than what he offered me as a free agent, and I’m back in New York making twice as much as I would have had I taken Glen’s original offer. It’s starting to look like I’ve pulled off a fucking miracle.

  Glen Sather loves the action, and he loves the art of the deal. He loves doing things that others won’t do. He’s what you call a players’ GM, because for the most part, he doesn’t bullshit you. Glen is wearing his usual dapper sports coat with sweater and shirt to match. He reportedly makes $8 million a year, but like all rich people, he loves free stuff. He’s started to get free stuff from a men’s clothing company called Robert Graham, and he’s rocking the shit out of these duds. He also has his signature piece—a cigar he never lights but holds in his mouth till it disappears. “Where the fuck did it go?
” the guys have asked hundreds of times before.

  Glen has been given the keys to the Rangers by his longtime friend, and in my opinion the best owner in sports, James Dolan. Sure, Dolan inherited his money, but he’s actually aware of that and he’s great to his players in terms of providing a climate that allows us to do what we do to the best of our abilities.

  I know my new message is change, and I will hammer it home to Glen. I will be honest that I fucked up but that I need to get back to New York and help his team win. The amount of love I have from Ranger fans is immense, and I also have support from the face of the franchise, Henrik Lundqvist. Part of what makes Hank great is that he’s a little bit oblivious to what goes on in the world around him, so he hasn’t really been following my public whipping in any great detail. When I said to him, “If I can get it to the point where they’ll take me back, will you stand up for me?,” he said, “Yes.”

  Glen doesn’t call Hank before he makes a move, but he and everyone else in the organization know that my relationship with the star goalie is strong. We both have a love of fashion, and we initially bonded over that. We play the game at the same level of intensity, and respect that in each other. We were also the only Rangers who had their names chanted at the Garden. And I admired the fact that he was the most well-endowed teammate I had ever seen, by a considerable margin.

  I think Glen had already made up his mind before we met at Nick & Stef’s Steakhouse, right next to MSG, because otherwise why would he meet me in the middle of the day in a busy NYC restaurant right next to the rink where everyone knows my name? He knew I was going to say all the right things and he also knew I was still the same guy he’d offered a multi-year deal to six months earlier. I think it was a bonus that the guy he was meeting with had changed a bit, and the only thing that was different about this convo from most of the others I had with Glen was when he noticed the new tattoo on my forearm: “YOU/USED TO BE ALRIGHT WHAT/HAPPENED?”