The Redemption Of Jeff Carter: Part One

Nov 12, 2014; Anaheim, CA, USA; Los Angeles Kings center Anze Kopitar (11) celebrates with center Jeff Carter (77) after a Kings goal in the first period against the Anaheim Ducks at Honda Center. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

“The Start of Jeff Carter”

As I was thinking about an opening for this article on Jeff Carter, I couldn’t help myself but write this fabricated story about the Los Angeles Kings forward’s youth.  Yes I admit, I made this whole “I got this” story up and it was fun to do so.   Maybe it is due to me reading a large amount of  hockey biographies lately.  The first I read was of the recently deceased and beloved Jean Beliveau, a Montreal Canadien legend that had an extraordinary life and career.  A man who was a winner his whole life and won a record 17 Stanley Cups! (10 as a player and 7 as a Canadien’s executive!)  Hungry for more I then read biographies on other NHL legends such as “The Rocket” Maurice Richard, “Number 4” Bobby Orr as well as hockey’s King of all Kings himself (and Los Angeles Kings Legend) “The Great One” Wayne Gretzky.  All of these biographies are full of wonderful stories of these legends growing up,  having an unbreakable passion for hockey and were discovered early by coaches and scouts to have exceptionally above average skills and great potential to not only make the NHL but achieve greatness.   I am not saying those books had any fabricated stories as my article started with, my point in bringing these names up is because of a fascination I developed while reading them at how confident these young men were but never realized it or understood it, until later in their lives.  To them, they just wanted to play the sport they loved and were driven to win at all levels but not only win for themselves but for the ones they loved most.  They wanted to win for their parents, for their family and friends and most importantly of all, for their teammates.  Teammates that would become “brothers” while on the sport battlefields of the ice.  Their biggest fear was failure, but not to themselves but to failing the ones they loved.  Fear of failing their “brothers”. This reminded me of the brotherhood that many hockey experts and analysts now credit with the current Los Angeles Kings.

A Los Angeles Kings team who became ‘brothers’ and achieved greatness of their own (twice in 3 years!) Within the Kings stand out many interesting and personal stories of players (many of which, I will write about in future articles) but the first one I wanted to tell was the story of Jeff Carter.  I honestly do not know if coaches and scouts felt the same way about a young Jeff Carter as they did with the likes of Beliveau or Orr or Gretzky but it is known and obvious that they felt he had the potential to make the big leagues (which he did) so many scouts kept an eye on him as he progressed and grew up but to be confident that he would one day achieve the same level of greatness as the names I mentioned before in the world of NHL hockey would simply have been just anyone’s best guess.   Unlike Beliveau, or Orr or Gretzky and despite his talents, Carter had many critics when it came to his overall work ethic.  In some cases this theory could be justified but in many other cases (especially in the last 3 and half years) I find this very untrue and unfair.