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Brind'Amour has thankful houseguest
Submitted by chipalexander on 09/02/2008 - 13:00
The Canes' Rod Brind'Amour has had a houseguest the past few weeks and gave him a few basic house rules for his stay.
"I told him I had a room, he could crash, don't bug me and stay out of my way," Brind'Amour said, flashing a wry smile.
Casey Borer got the message. The young defenseman, invited to the Canes' captain's house during "Camp Brind'Amour" at the RecZone, has tried to be the perfect guest.
"It's unbelievable," Borer said. "He offered it to me and I took him up on it. I thought he was just being nice at the time but I later took him up on it and he said, yeah, it's still fine.
"It was very generous for him to open up the door. I couldn't be staying with a better guy to take notes from. I try to bring what I can to the table, which hasn't been much."
What can you learn from a veteran like Brind'Amour?
"Everything," Borer said. "He's the tops, from what I've heard, in the whole league as far as training goes. His work ethic, his discipline, is unbelievable. You just try to take as much as you can. You can't emulate what he does. I'm sure you could try but it's hard to keep up with him.
"He's one of those guys where just staying with him a little while, you can pick up little things that can help you, hopefully, be not just a better hockey player but just a better guy."
The one taboo subject in the house: bad knees. Both are coming off major knee surgery last year.
"Once it heals up, you don't want to rehash any of those stories," Brind'Amour said.
Chip Alexander
A Raleigh native, Chip has worked at the N&O since 1979 and is in his second season as the Canes beat writer. He can be reached at chip.alexander@newsobserver.com. You can follow him on Twitter at @ice_chip.
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Comments
Borer's got potential
Wed, 09/03/2008 - 10:03 — buffalo66th (not verified)I thought Casey did a nice job coming up last year. Let's hope he is fully recovered and plays some significant time with the big club this year.
House guests
Wed, 09/03/2008 - 08:16 — Anonymous (not verified)Oh, it's more than a long standing tradition, it's part of hockey culture, going back to most of these kids playing in Junior hockey and billeting with local families in the area that they get drafted to play at.
The league is littered currently with young guys who have lived as houseguests with an established NHLer- Patrick Marleau of the Sharks lived with then Sharks goalie Kelly Hrudey, Jordan Staal has lived with Mark Recchi and his family for 2 years; Evegeni Malkin lives with Sergei Gonchar & his family, and Gonchar's daughter is teaching Malkin English, Patrick Kane & Jonathan Towes in Chicago spent time in former Hurricane Kevyn Adams' home with his family; and of course the most famous houseguest in the League is Sidney Crosby living with Mario Lemieux for the last 3 seasons. It's a great thing for young players to have that guidance and someone to bounce things off of. Especially when you're talking about 18 and 19 yr old kids playing in a league of men.
I'd even be interested in hearing about those local families that have taken in hockey players- Joe Vasicek when he played here lived with a family who helped him through life in north america; Joe Thornton lived with a Boston family for the first 2 years he was in the league, Patrice Bergeron of the Bruins did the same thing, as did Marian Gaborik in Minnesota. A totally unique culture of players and people helping a kid find his way in professional hockey.
Home visits...
Tue, 09/02/2008 - 20:05 — Paul (not verified)Here's a story idea for you. There's a pretty long tradition in the NHL for the established, older stars in the league, usually those who are married with kids, to take in the really young guys. I'd like to hear more about it.
I think I've read that Ron Francis did this with a few of the young guys for their first year in the NHL.
If my 19-year-old kid was going to the NHL, I'd want him living in that kind of situation.