Steven Stamkos' next chapter is with the Nashville Predators. Get to know Stamkos before he was drafted to the NHL as he climbed the ranks with his friend John Tavares.
One of the biggest acquisitions in the NHL world this summer was the Nashville Predators’ signing of star forward Steven Stamkos. And in this cover story from The Hockey News’ 2008 Draft Preview edition (May 1, 2008, cover date) writer Ken Campbell profiled Stamkos as he prepared to make his mark on hockey’s top league.
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After Stamkos was selected first overall by the Tampa Bay Lightning in the 2008 draft, he immediately made a major impact for the Bolts, posting 23 goals and 46 points in 79 games. But before that, he had to prove he could be in The Show right away.
“If I could have it my way, I’d like to be in the NHL next year,” Stamkos said before his rookie season. “I think ultimately it is going to be up to me whether I play there or not. I don’t only want to stay there, but I want to be an impact player right away.”
One of Stamkos’ childhood friends growing up in the Toronto area was fellow phenom John Tavares, who was selected first overall by the New York Islanders one year after Stamkos was drafted. And their friendship was part of the respect Stamkos had for Tavares’ all-around talents.
“We’re totally different players,” Stamkos said of comparisons to Tavares. “From the blueline in, he’s the best player I’ve ever played with or against. I’m a guy who likes to skate more with the puck and maybe I’m not as flashy, but I’ve got a pretty good shot and I just like to use my speed and my shot, whereas he likes to protect the puck and work it down low.”
Here's the full story.
BELIEVE IN STEVEN
May 1, 2008
By Ken Campbell
It’s all so, like, 21st century. Long gone are the days of Slap Shot lore when, “Dickie Dunn wrote this so it’s gotta be true.” Now all you have to do to obtain irrefutable truth is to go to YouTube.
And when you do that, you’ll find out that this really did happen. First, type in “Hockey player hits the boards during speed skating.” Then type in “Steven Stamkos – ridiculous goal.”
Then put the two of them together and you have the essence of Steven Stamkos, NHL superstar-in-waiting and consensus choice for No. 1 overall in this year’s NHL entry draft.
What you might not realize at first is the two events occurred only a few minutes apart at the 2007 OHL All-Star Game in Saginaw.
In the first clip, Stamkos is taking part in the fastest skater competition. As he rounds a corner, he catches a rut in the ice and goes sprawling into the boards.
In the second one, he’s making a mockery of the breakaway competition. A right-handed shot, he comes in on the goalie and pulls the puck behind his left leg, then still using his forehand, roofs the puck over the goaltender with such authority that it stays lodged in the top of the net.
Stamkos had watched frame-by-frame video of Robbie Schremp’s attempt at the same move and had been working on it in practice. He had no intention of trying it during the skills competition until he went hurtling into the boards. The embarrassment of picking himself up and completing the lap around the ice convinced Stamkos he had to do something spectacular.
“I just couldn’t leave everybody with that impression,” Stamkos said. “I didn’t want to be remembered as the guy who fell during the fastest skater competition.”
That it all worked out for Stamkos is no surprise. It always does. If this kid has ever had a bad day in his life, the memory of it certainly isn’t very fresh in his mind. He answers the door in the standard young athlete’s garb – sunglasses perched on a ball cap, American Eagle T-shirt, blue jeans and flip-flops. Ironically, there’s a book on his kitchen table titled The Complete Player, a hockey psychology book by Dr. Saul Miller. Psychology aside, Stamkos might be the most complete player in this year’s draft, drawing favorable comparisons to the likes of Joe Sakic and Steve Yzerman.
He smiles almost constantly during the interview, almost as though he leads a charmed life.
“For the most part, I’m a pretty laid-back guy,” Stamkos said. “My parents, I think they did a pretty good job raising me. They’re not into exploiting me as a player.”
In 2006-07, Stamkos won the Bobby Smith Trophy as the OHL’s scholastic player of the year and would probably have a career representing millionaire athletes if he weren’t about to become one himself.
When he’s not playing for the Sarnia Sting, he lives in a quiet tree-lined suburb of Toronto in a big house with a Pathfinder and an Altima in the driveway. He probably could have played major league baseball had he not hitched his wagon to hockey. Both his parents work from their home, his father a corporate sales manager with American Express and his mother a consultant. His younger sister is an accomplished dancer and honors student, too.
“It seems a little too perfect to be true,” Stamkos said. “But I certainly didn’t have much trouble growing up.”
That’s largely because of his parents. Chris Stamkos is a first-generation Macedonian whose parents came to Canada in 1959 with almost nothing. His mother, Lesley, came with her family from Scotland as a young girl and the two met while they were working in the credit department for the head office of a large department store.
“My parents were pretty typical immigrants,” Chris said. “Make 20 dollars a week and save 30.”
Because his parents didn’t have enough money, Chris Stamkos didn’t start playing organized hockey until he was 13. But he turned out to be good enough to make his community college team and had his son on skates by the time Steven was two.
Ever since then, it has been championship after championship and something of a dynasty in the town of Markham, Ont. In fact, Stamkos played almost all his minor hockey with the Markham Waxers organization along with fellow first-round candidates Cody Hodgson and Michael Del Zotto.
In two years in the OHL, Stamkos has accomplished just about everything short of a championship. He has 197 points in just two seasons, helped Canada to a gold medal at the World Junior Championship and led what was once a moribund Sarnia team back to respectability. This season was the first time in 11 years the Sting had advanced beyond the first round, in large part due to the 11 goals Stamkos scored in the playoffs.
Stamkos finished second behind Phoenix Coyotes prospect Brett McLean in the CHL in goals this season with 58, but he seems just as proud that he managed to accumulate 88 penalty minutes without a single fighting major or misconduct. Despite not being assessed a fighting major in two OHL years, Stamkos did, however, get into a scrap in the CHL Prospects Game after taking an elbow from Saint John Sea Dogs first round prospect Yann Sauve.
Being a skill player, Stamkos sometimes has to overcome the perception he’s not a physical player, but the reality is he likes hitting and being hit. Most of his minors were legitimate ones, but he acknowledges, “there were a few lazy hooking and tripping calls in there, too.”
Realistically, there is little left for Stamkos to accomplish in major junior. And all he has to do is look at what Patrick Kane did this season in Chicago to realize that a wildly talented young player can make a difference and develop as an NHL player without going back for a season as a 19-year-old. In his mind, Stamkos thinks there’s no reason why he can’t accomplish next season what players such as Kane and Sam Gagner did this season.
“If I could have it my way, I’d like to be in the NHL next year,” Stamkos said. “I think ultimately it is going to be up to me whether I play there or not. I don’t only want to stay there, but I want to be an impact player right away.”
It’s difficult to describe Stamkos’ sense of bravado. It’s not quite a quiet confidence because Stamkos is not afraid to express it, nor does he waver on it in any way. It is a confidence and it’s firm, but it’s also delivered in a way that is so sincere that it doesn’t make him look arrogant.
Whether Stamkos was the best player in junior hockey this year is certainly open to debate. But it does bring up an interesting question. If both he and wunderkind John Tavares were eligible this year, would an NHL team take Stamkos first?
You might be surprised by the number of scouts who would go with the Sting prodigy, largely because Stamkos has the speed and skating ability that Tavares lacks. Both are premier offensive players – Stamkos is more of a two-way pivot and playmaker who is actually as fast with the puck as he is without, while Tavares is a power forward with an uncanny ability to find open spaces on the ice and behind goaltenders.
Stamkos is more likely to blow past a defender while Tavares will power his way past with one hand, protecting the puck and holding off a defender with the other.
Tavares, meantime, faces a perception issue. He has been around the OHL so long some hockey observers are wondering whether he’s bored at that level. He may be falling victim to the great-build-up syndrome that places unfair and unreasonable expectations on teens. Whatever the case, more and more scouts believe Tavares has been usurped by Swedish defenseman Victor Hedman as the top prospect for 2009.
Expect scouts and others to continue to attempt to locate warts in Tavares’ game throughout next season.
The funny thing is, Tavares and Stamkos are good friends. They played together for three years on a summer hockey team called the Ontario Blues – along with 2008 top draft prospects Hodgson, Del Zotto, Alex Pietrangelo and James Livingston – and were linemates at the World Junior Championship last year. Ironically, had Tavares not scored with one second left in the Oshawa Generals’ final game of the 2005-06 season, the Generals, and not the Sting, would have finished last in the league and been able to draft Stamkos.
“We’re totally different players,” Stamkos said. “From the blueline in, he’s the best player I’ve ever played with or against. I’m a guy who likes to skate more with the puck and maybe I’m not as flashy, but I’ve got a pretty good shot and I just like to use my speed and my shot, whereas he likes to protect the puck and work it down low.”
Who knows? Perhaps one day soon Tavares and Stamkos will be reunited. If the Tampa Bay Lightning takes Stamkos with the No. 1 pick, it’s not outlandish to suggest the Bolts might be bad enough again next season to be in a position to get Tavares, too.
“I’ll do whatever it takes to get to the next level and I’d like to think I can have a successful career,” Stamkos said. “There are so many young guys who are stepping in and being impact players and I’m hoping I can follow that trend.”
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