The Rev Speaks: Ode to Mo

October 2, 2009 by Matthew Fuller

He was a center nonpareil blessed with both a wicked slap shot and devastating accuracy. He had ridiculously flexible hands that forcefully wrapped around the hockey stick like a hungry boa constrictor squeezing the life out of a helpless rabbit. (Sorry, PETA people, but this here is a PC-free zone. Besides, in Genesis 1.26 God rewards mankind with unchecked dominion over all living creatures. So present your complaints and criticisms to the Creator . . . good luck with that Sisyphean task. Let me know how it turns out.) He had redoubtable vision and a lofty hockey IQ, allowing him to assess the entire rink and anticipate plays seconds before they became reality. Indeed, the physical and mental powers of one Michael Thomas Modano, Jr. were preeminent. But for all his envied gifts, perhaps the most significant is the most trivial: he had 98 speed. The naysayers may contend that one’s quickness cannot be measured quantitatively, but these cynics will only prove themselves fools. These skeptics obviously never played NHLPA Hockey ’93. Released by Electronic Arts on New Year’s Eve 1992, the wildly popular and revolutionary video game thoroughly redefined the sport of hockey. A freshman in high school at the time, I was a mere NHL dilettante. However, with news circulating from Minnesota that the North Stars’ owner was seriously considering relocating the franchise to Dallas, my older brother Chris and I eagerly plunked down two weeks’ allowance to purchase NHLPA Hockey ’93. We began to feverishly prepare ourselves for the new addition to the Dallas sporting landscape. We spent hours on school nights developing calluses playing the game. (Although, as a senior and the BMOC, Chris was rarely home for the prime playing time during weekend nights since he was, you know, dating girls.) Therefore, I frequently recruited my buddy Reid to join me—we couldn’t drive yet so our social lives were somewhat stunted—and nearly caused the poor Super Nintendo to overheat on several occasions.

Reid’s favorite team was the Chicago Blackhawks, who were quite deadly with Jeremy Roenick and Steve Larmer up front and Chris Chelios and Eric Weinrich manning the defensive blue line, as well as (future Dallas Cup hero) the indomitable Ed Belfour in net. Meanwhile, I cast my lot with thoroughly mediocre Minnesota in an attempt to study up the team that might be moving to Texas. While Reid frequently pummeled the hapless North Stars, I was quite proud of the fact that he never made Modano’s head bleed. (One of the best qualities of the game, now sadly defunct from all current versions, was the violent and strangely intoxicating fisticuffs. In 1996 the cult classic movie Swingers devotes two minutes of Vince Vaughn trying desperately—and hilariously—to make the avatar Wayne Gretzky’s head bleed. [Owing to the steady stream of strong language I will not link to the movie clip. Make Google your friend.] This iconic scene perfectly sums up my heated battles with Reid. We frequently ended up fighting ourselves as a result.) Anyway, my strategy was quite simple: win the faceoff and push the heck out of the turbo button on the controller. If done properly, Modano and his 98 speed were virtually unstoppable. Sure, I may have lost games 7-2 and 8-4, but #9 always made his presence felt, ensuring that my anemic North Stars would never be shutout. (I eagerly accept moral victories, much like the naïve buffoon that is Wade Phillips.) And, most importantly, nobody ever made Modano’s head bleed. It’s hard to hurt that which you can’t catch on the ice.

As one of only six Americans ever drafted first overall (Brian Lawton, 1983; Bryan Berard, 1995; Rick DiPietro, 2000; Erik Johnson, 2006; Patrick Kane, 2007), Modano clearly had the God-given talent to dominate in the NHL from the start. Flashback to that idyllic June afternoon in Montreal, when a nervous and baby faced 18-year-old wunderkind from Livonia, Michigan walked onto the dais after North Stars GM Lou Nanne called out his name. At that moment, Modano certainly did not look like he would eventually mature into a Cup-winning future Hall of Famer. Looking more like a horrible cross between Vanilla Ice with a mullet and Dolph Lundgren’s Ivan Drago character from Rocky IV, Modano looked like anything but the face of the franchise. While it would be an insult to compare a hockey savant like Modano to the boxing palooka Drago, Modano unequivocally adhered to one of Drago’s most well-respected monosyllabic mantras: “I must break you.” (Thankfully, Modano did not also live out another of Drago’s stoic threats: “If he dies, he dies.” Mike, as a perennial Lady Byng candidate, has a little more respect for the game and its players than that.) In fact, the only injuries Modano (who has only been in one fight, against Rod Brind’Amour) causes are unintentional: he has been breaking ankles with aplomb while he skates gracefully and rapidly up the ice. As the only remaining North Star on the Dallas Stars’ current roster, Modano, entering his 20^th season, is one of hockey’s finest ambassadors. He was the driving force behind the hockey heyday in North Texas, starting with that first season in Dallas in 1993-94 when he scored his personal best of 50 goals. In an age when players kowtow at the altar of the Almighty Dollar, Modano is a sweet aberration. He is one of the rare players who are loyal to team rather than chasing a buck. (Granted, he’s been paid handsomely these past 19 years.) There was only one brief moment when Modano even hinted he might leave Dallas: after the 2005 season when, amidst contract negotiations with then Stars GM Doug Armstrong, he visited both Boston and Chicago. (Interestingly, it was the oft-ridiculed Tom Hicks who at last stepped in and convinced the franchise player to stay in Dallas. Sadly, this act was the last good thing Liverpool Hicks has done as owner of both the Rangers and Stars. The next good deed will occur when he sells both teams. Or hires me in some capacity.) Ultimately, the Stars resigned him to a below market five-year, $17.25M deal. After Brenden Morrow was named Captain of the Stars in September 2006, Modano was visibly perturbed for a few days, but he soon accepted the slight change in team structure. This demotion from Captain to Alternate, coupled with the somewhat prolonged contract negotiation, remain the only instances of Modano displaying what could be defined as “diva” behavior. (He doesn’t get in trouble off the ice, either. The only time his name shows up in non-hockey headlines is when he is donating his time and checkbook to charity and/or a lascivious blonde model. Of course, now that he’s married those “single rich guy” nights are over.) For 19 seasons Modano has been a true role model. Professional athletes and ethics usually make for strange bedfellows. Modano is a much-needed exception to that maxim.

2009-10 is the final year of Modano’s contract and, quite likely, the end of his hockey career. There are only 82 more regular season games and then Mo will almost assuredly be gone. He will retire as the all-time leading American scorer (currently with 543 goals and 786 assists), a Stanley Cup champion with seven career hat tricks, a seven-time All-Star, and a 2002 Olympic silver medalist. (He’s also a movie star, logging a brief cameo in 1992’s guilty pleasure The Mighty Ducks, starring Emilio Estevez. I couldn’t find a clip for this online, which is probably for the better.) After this season he may join the Stars’ front office like his good buddy, former Stars co-GM, current “Ambassador of Fun,” and fellow future Hall of Famer Brett Hull. The Stars open their season Saturday night at the American Airlines Center against the hated Predators (Jordin Tootoo, anyone?). So come on down and properly fete a living legend. If you don’t like hockey, I encourage you to pop in an old copy of NHLPA Hockey ‘93 and try to skate fast enough to corral Modano and make his head bleed. I dare you not to be captivated. I don’t do bobbleheads (they jumped the shark about a decade ago), but of the three I own (Modano, Dirk Nowitzki sans Crystal Taylor, and CHiPs superstar Frank Poncherello) it says a lot that Modano has remained relatively unscathed from the hyperactive and sometimes explosive clutches of my 20-month-old daughter. Even she recognizes Modano’s greatness.

To quote 99% of all inane sports commentators, “Mike Modano is a hockey player.” That he is. He may be 39 years old, and he may have lost some of his preternatural speed, but Modano remains passionately in love with the game. (If he’d only return my voicemails I’d be able to provide a quote as proof.) He definitely exemplifies the message of Jesus in Luke 9.62: “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God.” Modano, hockey stick in blessed hands, plows passionately and looks back rarely as he careens up the ice, sweater flapping recklessly behind him. He serves the game of hockey well, and his eyes are always fixed to the net in front of him. Minnesota native F. Scott Fitzgerald encapsulated the essence of Modano best in his classic The Great Gatsby: “So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Today, nearly 17 years after my brother and I ripped open that cherished copy of NHLPA Hockey ’93, I remain firmly fixed in yesterday. I am no longer a high school freshman with a total inability to charm the ladies (just don’t ask my long-suffering wife), but to me Mike Modano will always be the transcendent blur with incomparable 98 speed and an uncanny talent to be head-bleed proof. And no, this is not a man-crush. This is man-respect.

Here ends the lesson. And all of God’s people say . . . “Amen!”