Official Site of Darcy Hordichuk

I can’t believe this is my last blog already, has it been a year already?

Coming in here at the beginning of the year, I kind of knew that Vancouver was a big hockey market but I didn’t really know what to expect because of the hockey markets I came from but it was very different but a good different. To be honest, I was a little bit nervous but I think the fans made that go away because they’ve all been incredible.

My experiences this year with the team and personally have been great and so memorable. Playing at GM Place with a sold out crowd every night, it’s just something you don’t forget and something I’ve never had in my career playing in the markets that I did. . I wish every player has a chance to be part of a team and organization like this, we get treated so well I’m just fortunate to have had the opportunity to play in Vancouver. I can’t wait for next year already.

Everyone here is so opinionated because they’re so passionate about the team. It’s fun to be a part of something like that. When things are going great, it’s really good but it’s also one of those things when times are tough you have to bear down because there are so many people watching you.

In Nashville, there’s maybe one or two stations covering hockey but here, it’s all over Canada and exposure here so much greater. The organization, the way they’ve taken care of all the players and the work Mike Gillis has done with the team, I really couldn’t ask for anything more.

Obviously one of the most significant things in my life this year was Braden and everyday is amazing how much he grows and changes. It’s been a lot of fun because we get to go home now with two little dogs and a baby. We’ve got quite a full house now with all of them around.

We’re looking forward to being able to spend some time with the little guy this summer because it’s been tough with us on the road so much in the last bit of the season. Now he can get to know me and I have time to be there more as a dad.

He’s getting bigger everyday – he’s about 13 pounds now and he keeps growing out of all his clothes. He’s such a quiet baby (something he gets from his mom). A couple weeks ago, he was getting up every few hours and lately he’s been putting in 6-7 hour shifts of sleep and hasn’t been getting up.

He’s starting to develop his personality – he smiles when you talk to him, he’s more responsive to our voices now, he’s starting to talk (not real words but noises). It’s fun to come home to him and I’m just excited to get a few months here to really get to know him better.

We’ll be in Vancouver for most of the summer, we’re moving right now so we’ll have to settle into the new place and get all of that figured out. We’re going on a trip to California for my wife’s grandparents 50th anniversary for a little bit. We’ll go back to Nashville and Saskatchewan for a little bit but we’ll be back in Vancouver for August and start the on-ice training again.

I want to say thank you to the fans all year for their support and coming out to all the games. Personally, it’s been fun blogging for the website and share my perspective, which might be different than some of the guys on the team so it’s been great. And finally, thanks for keeping up with the blog and giving me such a great support. Have a good summer!

With a bit of a break here, I’m going to catch up on some writing. There are two questions that I saw were asked quite a bit in my blogs so I’m going to try and answer them.
First, some of you were wondering about our equipment and how we choose what we use and what works or doesn’t. Well, unfortunately, there’s no real concrete answer for that. It’s such a personal preference and everyone is different.

When I first got into the League, I didn’t have any one brand preference but right now I’m head to toe in Bauer, which I switched to in the last couple years.
Reps from different companies are always trying to get players to wear their stuff and so we try it out and see if it fits what we need. There’s really no formula or right or wrong way to do it – it’s just about feel when you use it. They’re always coming out with new equipment so they’ll bring you things that they’ve created or readjusted and get you to try it and see if that’s a fit. It’s a constant process.

For sticks, we have our own patterns like what kind of flex you want, how stiff you want it, what kind of curve you want and sometimes you try different guys’ sticks to try and find something that works. Most guys have their pattern that they’ve used since junior. Everyone has their own preference on the way the stick should be made – it can be pretty much designed however you want but every stick has a different feel.

The difference between my stick this year and last year is maybe the difference between a BMW and a Porsche. In my case, I’ve been trying out equipment all year, trying to find that stick that fits but I actually went to a Burrows pattern in the last three months and see how that works (it’s working for him pretty good). He’s using it in Warrior and I’m using it in Bauer and obviously, it looks like the Warrior is having more success – it couldn’t be the person at all (haha).

I’m going to stick to this pattern, I like this pattern a lot but I’ll probably just make some changes in the summer: try to get a lower line so there’s more blade on the ice but everything else is good.

The second question that has come up frequently is has having a baby changed my approach to fighting in the game. But I don’t think either of those really relate because there are a million people after my job and I have to go out there and do my job to the best of my ability. When I’m on the ice, that’s my office and I have to work and when I’m at home, I’m a dad – they’re completely separate things so I don’t think it’s fair to compare those.

Like I’ve written in a previous blog, I’m not out there to just fight to hurt someone, I have a role to play. If there are certain guys getting run, I have to call them out and let them know, it’s just doing my job and I think that’s why I’ve been in the league as long as I have.

I think what a lot of people don’t understand is it’s tough to get a fight sometimes and in the post-season it’s definitely changed. For example, in the St. Louis series, I fought Wincester last year and had a pretty good fight with him and now I don’t think he’d want to fight again. Jackman, a few years ago, I broke his jaw in a fight so I got a lot of respect from these guys. With Crombeen, I called him out 5-6 times a game and he just didn’t want to fight.

It’s tough and the guys that you can fight aren’t playing, you need two people to fight. A lot of the tough guys don’t play in the playoffs and the nice thing is I can bring the energy and physicality to calm down the guys that usually play tough like Oshie, Crombeen, Wincester, who would give us a little more respect for the team when I’m on the ice because they know I can call them out. But I’d rather be effective bringing energy than starting a fight, if that’s more successful – essentially, it’s just doing what is best for the team.
But while we’re on talking about playoffs, as you know, the playoff beard tradition is strong and in our room, it’s no different. I think most of the guys do the beards and I ‘m doing that this year so the day before our first playoff game, I started growing out my beard. Hopefully it can get as big as Chris Mason’s.

I never let it grow out on a daily basis but when we won the Turner Cup when I was in the IHL, I didn’t realize I could grow a beard like that. It was really big but not quite as big as Chris Mason’s but for me, it was enough to look like a bush man.

There should be no trimming in between, what you see is what you get, you can’t trim it up. Some guys will trim it up but I’m a believer that it’s playoffs and that you should just let it be.

It’s been a while now since I last wrote but I mean, it’s been busy with the road trip but while I have a chance, I’m going to check in quickly. I’ve been away for two weeks on that last trip and Braden’s grown a good four pounds – he’s very quickly growing into a man and it’s so fun to see how he changes everyday.

He’s starting to make faces and become more responsive when he hears our voices and he gets a little bit of smile. He’s starting to recognize things and even start to get into a sort of routine – mostly – and that’s nice to have right now.

Our dogs have responded very differently to him. Frankie, our girl, was really protective at the start and she wouldn’t even let our other dog, Chandler, near him. She had protective instinct in her and he’d be growling whenever he came near. She’s not as protective any more but she still thinks of Braden as her baby. Chandler, our boy, on the other hand, could really care less about little Braden so it’s funny how different they are. They normally get along but when Frankie’s next to Braden, Chandler can’t come too close to her because that’s her baby.

On the hockey side, everything is so exciting right now at this time of year and with just two games left and a division title up for grabs, there’s just a lot of buzz around the arena and the city. I know when I was in Nashville, we made the playoffs a couple years in a row and it’s pretty fun to be part of something like this. I think everything’s just magnified that much more when you’re in a hockey city so we’re just focusing on these last two games and try to play well as a team and keep the momentum in the playoffs.

Speaking of everything being magnified though, I’ve heard about the media intensity that happens once the post-season starts and being in Vancouver, the media’s already huge during the regular season so playoffs will definitely be big. But luckily, I don’t let anything really get to me. Everybody will have their own opinion and I can’t make everybody happy in this world but as long as you go out there and continue do to give it all in what you do, work hard every game that’s all you can do.

My favourite playoff memories would have to in Orlando when we won the Turner Cup that year. It was a special team and a special moment for me coming out of juniors because I was supposed to go back as a 20-year old and the next thing you know, I’m on a championship team. I still keep in touch with a few guys from that team and it’s all good memories so that was definitely a good time in my life. I still have the ring but I think I’ve only worn it once and it’s secured my safety deposit box.

Maybe I’ll have to pull it out for some inspiration but that’s IHL and now it’s time to get an NHL ring. So it’s time to focus and get ready for the last two games

Braden’s just about 3 weeks old now and it’s amazing how quickly he’s growing everyday. Watching him get bigger everyday is one of the best parts of being able to come home every night. When we went on that last road trip, he was 6lbs, 5oz, and now he’s 7lbs, 10oz so it’s nice to see him fill out and become a (little) man.

Lisa’s mom has been in town the last couple of weeks and I think we got through the tough part. The first couple weeks are the hardest bring your child home from the hospital but my wife’s done just a tremendous job. In the first while, you have to breast-feed every three hours so there’s no sleeping through the night.

He’s sleeping three-four hours now, which is great so both Lisa and I get some sleep but there’s been an adjustment. It seems like Braden’s in more of a routine and he’s certainly enjoying his baths just before he goes to bed, so that helps.

As Braden figures out his schedule, we try to help each other out and figure things out but we’ve also got two dogs so I’ve been put on dog-watch. I’ve been trying to do the fun things with them and trying to keep them happy so they don’t feel excluded.

Frankie, our smaller dog thinks that the baby’s hers so she’s very protective and everywhere we go with the baby, she seems to be laying beside him, so every picture that we have, there’s a picture with Frankie in it.

My mom and some of the other guys’ moms came on the trip with us to LA and Anaheim and now that I’m a parent, it makes me appreciate trips like that so much more. It’s pretty neat having my mom with me on the trip. She’s from a small town and she’s never been down to LA so I think the ladies from the team that organized the trip just did a tremendous job keeping them busy and the moms all got to meet each other, which I know they enjoyed.

They have tons of stories from the trip and I’m sure some that they didn’t tell us but she was talking about how much she loved everything. From coming on the plane and coming to the games to going to the beach, they just enjoyed it so much.

This life’s about memories and those provided a lot of special memories for them. All the moms got lost one day and they were trying to find a cab, which almost made them late for the game – that was pretty funny.

I think I speak for a lot of the players, that our moms are very important in our hockey careers even though you hear more about the hockey dads. With all of the games and practices and a busy schedule there wasn’t enough time in a day, with my sister too, my mom was good enough to be a stay-at-home mom and raise us and take us to practices, make sure we had food and everything in between.

They were both pivotal so it’s nice to get to bring them on trips like that last one and let them see what all that hard work means at this level.

I’m not sure what Braden will turn out like when grows up or if he’ll be more like myself or more like Lisa but I think that I’m like both my parents. I think I get my good looks and interviewing skills from my mom – she likes to talk and she’s good at it. I take some of my dad’s personality, his wheeler and dealer characteristics, and his stubbornness but those aren’t always bad things.

Last night was my very first Dice & Ice event with the Canucks and I must say I am very impressed with the way everything was run.

The theme was “Hockeywood” and it was great, they couldn’t have done it any better. You’ve got to give credit to everyone who was part of the event props – it’s definitely one of the better events I’ve been a part of. I know how hard the community crew worked on the event here and it showed because everything went so smoothly.

I think it was fun the way they had it set up. Having the Blackjack tables set up was a good way for us to interact with fans, which was different that what we did in Nashville last year, where we had a “Queen of Hearts” theme and I did some magic tricks on stage so it was different.

It’s so great to be part of an event that is part of such a good cause and raised almost $300,000 for children’s charities around the Lower Mainland.

I ran a Blackjack table at the beginning of the night in the VIP (or highrollers) section of the “casino”. I think I probably gave away the most purple chips, which is the $10,000 chip, of all the tables. We had some big winners last night so maybe there will be more people looking forward to going to Vegas after getting a few tips and pointers – they’ll have better odds.

A lot of people would win money at the other tables then they’d come to the VIP area, which was our area, and so if you want to win big money, you’ve got to play with big money. That’s exactly what happened last night. Paul and Jeff were probably the two biggest winners of the night and they were from my table. My job is to go out there and deal the cards and put money in people’s pocket and give them advice and that’s exactly what we did.

Every player puts together a baskets for the silent auction and my wife and I did a baby basket because we’re expecting so it just made sense. We’re going through that whole process and know what expecting parents would need and what to put in the basket. I’m glad we were able to do something like that and help out.

Because of the movie theme, every player was introduced accompanied with a movie and I got “Fight Club”. So I decided to try and show a little personality out there, I rolled up my sleeves and got into character. Why not, right?

The best movie-player pairing had to be Alex Burrows – he got Bambi. I think it describes him 100%, him coming out with Bambi and Thumper, that’s the way he is sometimes on the ice. He was a good sport about it, so it was good.

From what I hear, traditionally, rookies would have to do something on stage and this year was no different. Mason Raymond and Steve Bernier teamed up against Jannik Hansen and Alex Edler to re-enact a scene from Jerry Maguire – I don’t think I need to tell you which one… They each did the same scene and competed to see who would do the best.

The winner was decided by out had guest judges, Kevin Bieksa, Ryan Kesler, Alex Burrows to critique kind of like Idol a little bit. For the most part, the judges were hard on those guys.

Bernier pulled it off even with his French accent, nobody understood but with Burrows being one of the judges, I’m sure there was some politics and favouritism. Mason came away with the Oscar performance, I think he kind of pulled it together for Bernier and they beat the other two.

I think these guys maybe stressed a little bit more than they had to over the six lines that they had to say and it just goes to show you that practice makes perfect. They practiced all afternoon and they pulled together at performance time.

I never had to do anything like that on stage but I’m sure I could’ve matched their work. Overall, the event was great and I’m glad I was able to be part of something like that.

I know you’ve all been waiting for this one and I’ve been kind of excited to write this too. Obviously, you know that I get into a lot of fights but that’s my role and I love it but like most things, I had to earn respect doing what I do and I think the first time I really made a statement was when I was 19, back in the IHL.

I was sent down to the Solar Bears from the Thrashers camp – I was 19 and should’ve gone back to juniors – and I was used to guys who were 16-19 and I wasn’t sure what I was in for as far as fighting and how tough guys were at that level. Now, I was fighting men when I was used to fighting kids. So in a game against the Manitoba Moose I was running around being physical so pretty much the whole team wanted to fight me but having just come out of juniors, nobody knew who I was.

I didn’t really have the respect in the IHL at the time so I just asked who their toughest guy was and they ended up throwing him out the next shift. It was Mel Angelstad. We were just teeing off for maybe a minute and at the end of the fight, I looked like I was dragged on the pavement and he looked like I dragged his nose from one side of his face to the other.

The coaches pulled me aside after the game and were just laughing and said ‘You probably just took on one of the toughest guys in the league, not every fight’s going to be like that.’ I went on pace that year and got in 27 more and fought him a couple more times too.

After being in almost 100 NHL fights, the fear of squaring off with someone starts to go away but I mean it’s only human to be scared when you’ve got a big 6’5 220-plus pound guy running at you with fists. It’s like swimming towards a shark when you have a bloody nose – scary, right?

The best way I can describe it, I guess is that I feel like I almost blackout in a fight. I don’t really remember too much what happens when it’s happening, I just go in throwing them – almost like I’ve done it so many times, it’s like a routine that I’m just comfortable in. I always so something different in my fights but there are definitely those things that you continue to do just because it’s familiar – I guess that’s how I feel about what I do too.

I grew up fighting since I was 13 years old so my parents are used to it although my mom sometimes jokes with me and says ‘Try to score some more goals’. That’s good advice too – I’ve already got more than my last two seasons so she should be happy. It’s like anything else, the first couple fights in juniors or in the NHL, my parents get worried but they understand I can handle myself out there. They’re just excited that I’m in the lineup and playing.

My wife, Lisa, is really great about it too but I think she probably has to deal with it more than anybody because I ask her to massage my hand or my neck – sometimes it feels like you have a little whiplash and she’s been wonderful through it all. But what’s great about all of them is that they understand that’s my role and that’s why I’ve been in the league for as a long as I have because I know my role.

I train really hard at what I do and I’m always researching and watching other guys’ fights to see how I can improve and to watch what they’re doing. I’m told that my summer training with Chuck Liddell created some buzz and here’s the story. Lisa’s best friend was getting married in Lake Tahoe and we had another wedding in San Francisco but there was a three-week span between the two so we just stayed on the coast, and The Pit is located between the two.

Lisa’s friend, Joey, trained there at the time and asked would you mind working with a hockey player and he said he’d love to work with an NHL player. I think the biggest thing that I took from that was he just told me to relax a little bit more because when I used to go into fights, I was really tense. The more relaxed you are when you go into a fight, the quicker and harder your punches are going to be. It was fun but it was so short – just two and half weeks.

My trainer, John’s been able to watch some of my hockey fights so now we’re going to focus more on hockey stuff as opposed to UFC stuff. Those guys are great, they definitely know how to make me a better fighter. It’s different on the ice than what they do because it’s so fast and it’s 30 seconds of you throwing as fast as you can and guys are off balance.

I think that people don’t realize that a lot of these guys that we fight, we definitely know each other and we respect each other. A guy like Chris Neil, who I grew up fighting because we were both trying to get to the NHL, I’ve fought him maybe 7 or 8 times now. It was funny, in Nashville, we went to dinner the night before the game and then the second shift of the game, we ended up fighting.

In a game like last night, where we’re up 3-0, I normally wouldn’t fight but I owe it to a guy like that, where if we’re in their building and I need to get my guys going, maybe he’ll fight me too. Let’s face it, you won’t have a job in this League very long if you can’t get your team going so you kind of need to pull favours once in a while even if you don’t want to fight a guy because the timing’s not right but you do it because you’re going to need that favour one day.

Still with me? That’s just a little insight into hockey fights but this is just the surface, maybe I’ll reveal more another time.

We’ve got two days between games and seeing as I have a little time, I might as well get some writing done.

Even though we’ve been at home for most of the last month, it seems like we’re on the road quite a bit because our trips so far have been quite lengthy. I don’t mind road trips but being away from my wife and my dogs can be difficult too.

As much as travel can be a toll on the body, getting to hang out with the guys on the road and getting a chance to do things together makes it much easier. I mean, we don’t always all go out together but there’s always a good number of us at one time so it’s fun.

Being with Vancouver is different than, say Nashville, because we’ve got such long road trips, we get more time on the road and a little more time to see the cities (but between games and practices, it really is just a little more time). In Nashville, we’d get to St. Louis or Detroit, we’d get in at around dinner time, eat, and then play the next day.

I think starting out on the road like we did definitely helped with the bond of the guys and we’re a really tight-knit group and it shows on the ice too.

My roommate right now is Mason Raymond and I’d like to spill some secrets about him but he’s really just a good kid. He’s got a lot of energy and he’s an easy guy to get along with so I can’t complain.

Although I’m sure if you ask him about me he’d complain about my snoring. I’ve caught him a couple times trying to wake me up when it happens but when you get your nose broken a couple of times, it’ll happen. If I do catch him trying to wake me up though, I come out swinging – good thing it hasn’t happened too many times (so far).

But sometimes I think he’s walking on eggshells around me and maybe he’s got to step up to me once in a while and say no to me but I think the intimidation factor just overwhelms him – just kidding! We get along great, right Mason?

Thinking about it now, Mason reminds me a little of Alex Radulov, who I played with in Nashville because they’re both really young. When Alex first came over from Russia, he said he had never been to Disneyland so when we were on a trip to LA, I took him there and we spent the whole day there. Our hotel was pretty much right next to it so we did all the rides and saw the characters – he was like a kid in a candy shop. I think he was maybe 19 or 20 at that time. Having grown up in Canada (or for anyone in North America), I think we take for granted moments like that and he really appreciated getting to go there.

Next week will be my first trip back to Nashville and I’m excited to go back there to see some old teammates and friends so it’ll be good. Vancouver’s a great city and believe me, I have zero complaints but I miss some of my friends and my neighbours. We had a nice house with a firepit in the backyard with a bocce ball court so that was nice.

I think our dogs, Chandler and Franklin miss the backyard the most. There’s no backyard where we’re living right now, just the street and a little landing strip of grass on the side walk but luckily there are a lot of good dog parks for them.

My dogs were named after cities that we lived in, so it’s Chandler from when we were in Arizona and Franklin for when we were in Tennessee. I‘m not sure if we’re going to continue the naming tradition for little boy, it might be hard. We’re not too sure about Van or Couver for a name but we’ll see.

I know nicknames are a much talked about subject amongst fans but the one that’s stuck with me for the last little while has been Hordy. I just recently heard HordichukNorris, which is definitely creative but a little long, if anything. I think the guys are pretty good about not giving me a funny nickname because they know I’ll come after them. Some of the guys here have started calling me Hordini because I’ll do a magic trick once in a while and the guys like to call me that. Other than that, as far as nicknames for me, that’s all I’ve got.

But you’re probably wondering about the Hordini thing. Magic isn’t exactly something you just “pick up” or learn in school. Here’s the story behind it: when I was younger, my friend used to do some magic tricks and I always thought it was really neat but he never revealed how the trick was done but of course, I wanted to know.

So when I was in the minor leagues going out on road trips, I would go and find videos and practice some magic tricks while we were on the road trips. I got good at some tricks and it’s fun. I’m still a work in progress, that’s for sure.

The one I like to use the most isn’t really a typical trick that you would think, it’s called NLP, which stands for Neuro Linguistic Programming, where you can kind of read people’s minds. That’s the one I’ve picked up from somebody in Dallas, who was a magician.

Here’s what I do: I’ll ask someone to think of a person, someone so famous that when they walk into a room, everyone in the room knows this person, male or female, white or black, dead or alive. I’d say words that would help me figure out who this person is and the way I would figure it out is by reading the person I’m talking to.

So I would look in their eyes, if they twitch to the left, it’s a female and if they twitch to the right it’s a male. Sometimes I’ll say if the person’s dead or alive and they’ll nod their head so they’re giving it away with their body language. There are certain things you can tell with body language and how old you are. Sometimes I’ll use subliminal messages depending on what I say, like if I say someone coming down a black carpet as opposed to just a carpet that will influence what people choose. You plant different things into people’s minds and it often makes a difference in who they choose.

There are certain traits amongst different people and the way people carry themselves, and their tendencies are clues that signal to me who they’re thinking.

For example, when you’re driving and you get pulled over and people’s reactions are natural because their bodies are trained that way, so they get fidgety or really nervous, it’s kind of the same thing. When I try to figure out if they’re lying or not, they’ll look up and when they lie, they’ll look towards one side and you just know.

A lot of people tend to lie when they’re face to face so if I asked you if you’ve ever stolen a chocolate bar, you would of course, answer no. If I had a piece of paper and I were to write down from 0-10, on this piece of paper – 10 is yes and 0 you’ve never stolen. They’ll more than likely (almost always) change their answer because now they’ve got a wider range or net to cast their answer and they’ll give an answer that’s not completely a 0 but somewhere in the middle. Now I’ve got on paper that they’ve lied and because people can’t lie on paper, I end up knowing that you’re guilty.

I like to try to break down people and find out their tendencies and you can kind of throw people off by reading their minds a little bit and doing little tricks like that with NLP. It’s really neat what you can find out and what you can do with it.

This is why I’m pretty much dominating at poker this year on the plane. You can just read people and you know when they’re lying – I mean that’s really what poker players do, right? They’re really good at reading body language and people’s eyes (some of them wear sunglasses) and that’s how they’re good, it’s not all about the cards, all the time.

I don’t want to brag but right now, I’d say that I’m the uncontested frontrunner in poker this year. Roberto Luongo’s supposed to be the best poker player on the team and in 12 hands that we played, I won 12 straight. You can verify this with a few of the other guys but I’m sure they all know because I was cheering all the way through the plane. He said I got lucky but when you go 12 for 12, there’s got to be a little bit of talent there.

If I were to say the early rankings, I’d probably say I was first with Daniel/Hank (I can’t tell the difference when one wins and one doesn’t so I just put them together) in second and… I’ll give Roberto third.

I’ve heard rumblings that Kevin Bieksa’s one of the heavy favourites from last year but that was last year and you’ve got guys like myself, Pavol Demitra, and even Kyle Wellwood added to the team, he’s now bumped down to the “B” table. I mean Kevin’s good to a certain extent, when you’re at the “B” table – it’s like when you’re playing hockey and you’re the best skater in your town, how do you rate against the rest of the city or the city next to you? Right now, Kevin’s the guy in the hometown, where he’s in his little bubble, but once he’s ready to step out to the big city and come to the “A” table (where I play), he’ll see some tougher competition.

We’ll see how it goes for the rest of the year but I may step away from the table soon and let some of the other guys move up but we’ll see. But like I said, it’s still only November, we’ve got plenty more of the season left to go.