-Be a good person.
-Take care of your family.
-Have fun.
I'm not going to lie. The news I got this morning made me sick. And the
feeling has followed me through the entire day with no signs of fading.
The news?
That a player I respected, a player I liked, and one of the handful of
players that I on this blog have used the word LOVE in reference to - well
today he became the lead character in a horrible story.
The worst of it - we don't know for sure what kind of genre this story
falls under.
Fiction or non-fiction.
In his short time with the NHL, I've always been quick to say good things about Kane because frankly, he did nothing to deem them untrue. More than that, he was the kind of player you wanted to root for.
Small. Young. Likeable. Talented. Very talented.
And he was...American.
I say that not because I root for players based on country of origin - I have made it clear here that, despite affinity for certain Czech players, I do not. It was just cool for me that he, in addition to all he was, happen to be American, because after the reign of Leetch, Richter, and Modano, the Americans I felt drawn to became fewer and far between.
So not only was it nice to have a young player be such a good story. It was just a little bonus to know that he was American too.
Now, this morning it came to light that the story he was writing may have changed - changed from a feel good tale of a young hockey player with promise, to an ill-inducing story of a player that may have to watch it all disappear.
Granted none of us have what I would call solid facts, and I outright refuse, until more information comes to light, to crucify a player I have grown so fond of. A lot in the reports seem odd and I am sure none of us know the whole story.
Only three people were in the cab yesterday morning. And, it seems perhaps likely that only one was sober. So we may never know.
But until we do get more information, I am not going to judge. They are, at this point, all merely allegations of potential crimes.
However, for sake of the reading communnity, let's say the story is true or
even partially true.
It's not the underage drinking that bothers me, because I'm know he is not the first nor will he be the last.
It's not the argument over 20 cents, because even though that's what everyone seems to be throwing around - that is such an insignificant part of the story. Seriously - substitute $2.00. Does that really make it better?
No, it's the violence that bothers me, the seemingly unnecessary violent acts. And it's the overall sad fact that it happened at all.
Again, if it did indeed go down the way described.
Then, of course, it's the sad realization for me and for countless others that the young, golden Blackhawk has a chip in his seemingly perfect perfection.
I'll be honest here; if the allegations are true, I do hope he is punished as is deemed fit.
But more importantly, I hope that everything is righted as much as it possibly can be.
I think we've all had moments of stupidity, at least one moment we can look back on with a measure of regret. A moment we look back and say - that was not my proudest.
Look, I had mine recently enough and I'm much older than Patrick Kane is.
I'm not defending - him or me. A bad moment, one slip in judgement - they all have consequences. And try as you might, you can't take them back.
I hope that if the alleged is true that this was an isolated incident. It'd be harder for me to argue for him if it was not. But I can argue we all have a moment, perhaps not as disturbing as this, but a moment nonetheless that we did something out of character. In Kane's case what has been a moral and upstanding character, as much as we have seen him.
Of course, I hope more than anything that it isn't true at all. That it was a misunderstanding blown way out of proportion.
A young kid's rise to the top merely slowed by one mis-step, and not a young kid's rise haulted completely by a fall.
So, again, until we all get all the facts straight, and until this becomes crimes instead of alleged, I am going to sit tight. I'm going to sit tight and try to make the sick feeling I have had all day go away.
I'm going to try to believe the smart, young, and talented kid whose mantra was -
-Be a good person.
-Take care of your family.
-Have fun.
I'm going to try hard to believe he still exists.
