Guys Read: The Sports Pages (8 page)

Then they were outside of the hotel; the security guards yelled at them for a while. Molly's big green eyes looked so confused, and Max wanted to help her, protect her; but he could not because this was all his fault.

And then they were alone, and silence settled around them like dust. And tears rolled down Max's cheeks. And he turned to Molly and began to speak.

“Molly, Molly, look. I'm sorry. I can't take it anymore. I lied. I lied about the whole thing. I just wanted to impress you. I wanted you to like me. It got out of hand. I'm so sorry. You're so tough and brave and amazing and—”

He couldn't go on. Molly was staring at him coolly. Her Catwoman eyes looked suddenly as if they might be capable of terrible things.

“I'm so sorry,” he said again.

And then one corner of Molly's mouth drew up. “Oh, Max,” she said, her voice suddenly feline. “I knew you were lying the whole time.”

“Wha—?”

“It's the stupidest story I've ever heard.”

“Then what …?”

“Because you expected me to believe it. I wanted to see how far you'd go. How stupid you thought I really was. Turns out pretty stupid. Why, because I'm a girl? Or because I'm good at baseball? Or both?”

“No, I—”

She tossed her red hair, and it looked like fire. “You're just like everyone else. All you care about is being cool. Nobody cares what a person's really like.”

“No, no, that's not—”

“And besides”—Molly took a step closer. She stared him down. Max could not move—“now you'll never ever say you throw like a girl again.” Her eyes narrowed. She leaned in and hissed, “You
wish
you threw like a girl.”

Max stared. His mouth hung open. Molly seemed six feet tall all of a sudden, and her eyes took your secrets from you. And Max felt what it was like to step into the batter's box and see her staring at you, to look into those eyes as she probed you for your weaknesses. And he knew without a doubt that he, like every sixth grader in the city who would face her that season, had just struck out.

D
ustin Brown plays right wing for the Los Angeles Kings of the National Hockey League. He is also the Kings' captain. Dustin was named captain at the age of twenty-three, becoming the youngest captain—and the only American-born captain—in the history of the Kings' franchise. Dustin has also played for Team USA in the World Championships four times. He was a 2009 NHL All-Star and served as an alternate captain of the silver medal–winning United States Olympic Team for the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics
.

Drafted thirteenth in the first round of the 2003 NHL draft, Dustin grew up in Ithaca, New York, where he started playing hockey at age three. From the moment he started playing, it was clear he had skill on the ice—but so did lots of other kids. What made him so great that he was able to
become the All-Star captain of an NHL team? Talent plays a huge part in his story. So does determination and commitment, by him and by his parents, who backed him up every step of the way
.

Here is his story … so far
.

YOUTH HOCKEY (1987–1999)

ITHACA YOUTH HOCKEY ASSOCIATION

More than 350,000 kids (boys and girls) play hockey each year as part of USA Hockey, the system in charge of amateur hockey in the United States. From 1987–1999, Dustin was among them
.

When I Was Really Little …

I started playing hockey when I was three years old because my big brother Brendan was playing, and I wanted to do everything he did. I learned by pushing a chair around on the ice. Funny enough, my dad can't even skate. It was just a result of the fact that my brother played hockey, and I wanted to do everything that he got to do.

My early years as a hockey player were probably a lot like everyone else's. Though I guess I was maybe a little bit crazier about the game than the other kids. Once I got into it, it became my favorite thing to do in the world. That's been true from the time I started playing, even to this day.

I believe I started playing organized hockey around age five or six, which is the Tykes level. The one thing I remember—and it's a vivid memory; I have a photo—is my very first hockey jersey. It was green and white, and I had all red equipment, so I basically looked like a Christmas decoration. I remember the jersey because my father's restaurant sponsored my team, which was Bryan's Landing; the logo was an open-cockpit two-seater plane. I also remember it so well because my grandfather was there to watch me, which I believe was the last time he saw me skate. The other thing I remember was how thin the jersey was. It was a meshlike material. Pretty cheap stuff. The reason I remember that is because I played on an outdoor rink and the jersey wasn't like the ones I wear now, which are nice and thick. This jersey was thin … very thin … which means I was freezing.

As cold as I was, though, it didn't matter to me. I always had a ball on the ice.

Squirt and Peewee (Ages 9–12)

When I was between nine and ten, I was a Squirt. Then I was a Peewee when I was eleven and twelve. I've got some great memories of those years. The Squirts and Peewees were each divided into two levels in my town. One level was called Travel, which was the more or less “elite” team. The other was called Snowbelt. Both teams got to travel, but the Travel team was on the road a lot more, going a lot farther away and playing against tougher competition.

You had to try out for the Travel team. I did, and I made it. My dad and I began to hit the road, and it seemed like that was what we did every weekend for years.

Once I got to be on a Travel team, things got a little more serious. I couldn't skip practices or games. If I wanted to play any other sports, I had to fit them in around my hockey schedule. I worked hard on my schoolwork, and I never needed to be told to do it. Ever since I was a little kid going to tournaments on the weekends, I could get most of my work done in the car or on the way to the hockey game. So once I was there, I could kind of have fun.

The trips were fantastic. Since I was always with the same group of kids, it was like we were hanging out in our fort. I loved the hockey, but I think my best memories were off the ice, playing minihockey in the hallways and then running from the security guards.

We really traveled a lot. We usually left Thursday night or Friday morning, depending on how far away the games were. We would have two games on Friday, two games on Saturday. If you were on one of the better teams and playing in the semifinals and finals, you'd have two games on Sunday too, so it was pretty busy. But at that age, we could play six games in three days and be fine. We'd play minihockey, we'd go out to dinner, and we'd just hang around with one another. I played with the same group of seven or eight kids from the time I was eight until the time I was about fifteen. I really created a bond with those guys.

When I wasn't playing hockey, I played baseball and lacrosse. I always loved hockey, but it was great to have time to play other sports too. Sometimes, today, I think parents push their kids to specialize in one sport. You've got kids that are, like, eight, nine years old who are one-sport athletes, which I don't think is in anyone's best interest. I also liked to read … sort of. My favorite books were the Goosebumps books by R. L. Stine. Each book was numbered. I liked collecting them, trying to get every single one.

Support System

My dad owned a restaurant in my hometown. It was right by the airport. He worked hard, but now that I look back at it, his main job was just carting me around. He worked Monday through Thursday, and then we would go on our hockey trips.

Even though hockey was expensive, my dad always found a way for me to be able to play. It's not only the cost of the Youth Hockey Association fees, it's also the travel and renting motel rooms.

I remember coming back with him from a game one time. We had an Isuzu Trooper, and I took a picture on the way home because we had just passed two hundred thousand miles on the vehicle. That was pretty cool. A whole lot of those were Travel team miles.

Early Mornings

I love to play hockey. But I don't always love to work out. When I was a kid, I sometimes had to get up at 4:30 in the morning for practice. I can't say I was overly excited about it. I'd be half asleep, but I'd get dressed—everything but my skates—and my dad would put me in the car and we would go. When I was a Peewee, I had two practices a week. One would be Monday morning at 5:30, and the other would be Wednesday afternoon at 5:30. I got used to it over time. I got into a rhythm. Once I was in the rink I was fine and ready to go.

Bantam (Ages 13–14)

Things started to change by the time I got to be a Bantam. For one thing, some of the kids who started out really great found they weren't so great anymore. I played against a kid from a nearby town when we were ten years old. He was like Wayne Gretzky back then. By the time we were fourteen, he wasn't any good at all. What happened? If he was so much better than me when we were ten, how come I'm playing professional hockey and he's not?

Did everyone just catch up to him? Or did he not put in the work? I don't know; but I do know that at age twelve or thirteen, some kids will grow a foot in a year, and others won't grow until they're eighteen. Even at my level, I see guys who, for their first couple of years, don't seem as if they're going to be players and then all of a sudden they figure it out. They get stronger physically, they get bigger, they refine parts of their game they weren't focused on before, and they become great players. It's hard work, and it takes a lot of drive. For most of us, we've been at it our whole lives.

When you're twelve years old, there is a big gap between the really good players and the other players. There's still a gap at the NHL level, but it's a much smaller gap from the worst player to the best player on the ice.

When I was about twelve, thirteen, fourteen, I'd be going to the rink and skating when most kids were probably going and hanging out with their friends. It was something I enjoyed. I played other sports too—I kept on playing baseball until I was thirteen. I played lacrosse most of the way through high school. But it was at this point where I kind of needed to pick one sport if I was going to be serious about it. And hockey was my passion, so I stuck with hockey.

The last year I played in Ithaca, I had my first big disappointment. I tried out for the New York State Select 15—a team of the best fourteen- and fifteen-year-olds in the state. I made the central New York team. But I got cut from the twenty-man statewide team.

It was a surprise. But I learned from it. It's one thing to be the best player in a small town like Ithaca. But then I got dumped into a bigger pond, and there were more fish. I started to realize that there're a lot of really good players out there. At fourteen, I wasn't even in the top twenty players my age in New York. That opened my eyes a bit.

JUNIORS (1999–2003)

Of the 350,000 kids who play Youth Hockey, only 30,000 make the cut to play on an official amateur basis by the time they get to the Junior Hockey level (ages 17–20). Junior Hockey is the step between Youth Hockey and NCAA College Hockey or, in some cases, the NHL. From 1999–2003, Dustin was one of those players, starting with the Syracuse Stars in 1999 and moving up to the Guelph Storm of the Ontario Hockey League (OHL) in 2000
.

I was upset when I got cut from the Select 15 when I was fourteen. But things got better the next year when I joined the Syracuse Stars. They are a Tier III Junior team—Tier I being the most competitive in the country—but the play was still plenty competitive. It was a big jump up for me from Ithaca Youth Hockey.

Some of the guys on the team were far from home and still in high school. So they lived with “billet families”—families who were paid to house and feed Junior Hockey players. I lived close enough to Syracuse that I didn't have to billet out there. I was pretty busy with hockey by then, but I still kept up with stuff at home.