December 23, 2009
No regrets, Boston
by Kirk Luedeke/
Brian Leetch
With a Hockey Hall of Fame resume built on more than 16 years as a New York Ranger and one of the NHL’s greatest defensemen of all time -- and a Stanley Cup winner -- one might assume that Brian Leetch wishes he’d chosen a different path than finishing his outstanding career on a poor Boston Bruins team.
“I don’t have any regrets whatsoever,” Leetch told hockeyjournal.com recently, as he prepared for the Hall of Fame induction festivities. “The experiences I had as a Bruin by and large are good ones.”
The Cheshire, Conn., native and former Avon Old Farms and Boston College standout will be only the eighth American player and second New Englander (Rod Langway of Randolph, Mass.) to make it into the Hall when he is inducted on Sunday. Although his time with the B’s seems more of an afterthought given how much of an integral player he was for so many years on Broadway, Leetch contends that he had a great time despite the disappointment of that last NHL campaign.
Injuries and an underachieving Bruins team (gutted by trades and injuries) derailed his hopes for one final run at a championship in 2005-06 after he signed in Boston as a free agent, but he stands by his decision to play in The Hub over several other lucrative offers he had at the time.
“To sign in Boston was exciting,” Leetch said. “Out of the teams (who fielded offers), I was interested in Boston because I felt that signing here afforded me an excellent opportunity to win another Stanley Cup. Joe Thornton was the captain, Andrew Raycroft was the reigning rookie of the year, and they signed Alexei Zhamnov.
“I was excited about that team; the previous Bruins team (2003-04) had put up 100 points and was successful, so it was a situation that I found very appealing.”
Unfortunately for Leetch and his new teammates, things didn’t work out anywhere near as well as they hoped.
“Joe got traded pretty early on, Zhamnov got hurt and never played another NHL game, Raycroft never found his game and then I got hurt and missed a lot of time as well,” he said. “What looked like a good situation at the start didn’t end up as well, but it wasn’t for a lack of trying.”
Leetch, who had won the 1989 Calder Trophy as the NHL’s top rookie, a pair of Norris Trophies (1992 and 1997) and the Conn Smythe Trophy as Stanley Cup MVP for the Rangers in 1994, was dealt to the Toronto Maple Leafs in 2004 and played extremely well for them at the end of the regular season and playoffs.
“Leaving the Rangers wasn’t my decision, but I had a good time in Toronto,” he said. “The lockout took another year where I would have been competing there for that team and their great fans, so who knows what might have happened?”
The B’s brought in Leetch after they lost their own late ’04 acquisition, Sergei Gonchar, to free agency. Although he saw himself as more of a supporting player on defense going into the 2005-06 season at age 37, the team’s makeup and changing roster forced him to play a much bigger role. He got banged up and never really found a groove. Leetch finished the season with five goals and 32 points in 61 games.
After the Bruins ended with the fifth-worst record and went on to draft Phil Kessel the following June, Leetch quietly called it a career.
“I really enjoyed my time with the Bruins,” said Leetch. “When the season ended, I didn’t feel like chasing teams. I thought about going back to New York, but decided that was it.”
These days, Leetch, 41, lives in Boston where he spends much of his time with his family. His sons are actively involved in hockey and baseball, he genuinely enjoys his time as a dad more than anything else. He also plans to do some Rangers television broadcasts as a color commentator this season, with no definite plans to expand his workload at present.
“Boston is a great city,” he said. “Being a part of the hockey tradition here was a privilege.”
