NHL Executive Andrew Ference Skated In Seattle Pride Classic Tournament
"What's the definition of success?"
For Andrew Ference, the man posing the question recently at Kraken Community Iceplex, the answer would appear to be simple. Ference reached the peak of a 16-year, 907-game NHL career in 2011, when his Boston Bruins won the Stanley Cup.
As the NHL's Director of Social Impact, Growth & Fan Development, Andrew travels across North America, building enthusiasm for the sport. "A big part of my job is developing street hockey and leagues, and breaking down barriers, so that more people try our sport, and become hopefully fans of our sport through participation."
During his own participation in this month's Seattle Pride Classic tournament, Ference stressed a balanced life approach.
"What makes a lot of athletes really good is that ability to do something repetitively over and over and over, obsessively. Professional athletes in general probably skew a little bit more towards that type of personality, right?
"But to me, the healthiest professional athletes have extended lives beyond sports. That helps them post-career with confidence that they can be involved in other things, and have worth outside of their sport. Even during your career it helps tremendously, because it gives you confidence.
"If all you have is hockey and the only people you hang out with are hockey players, you're going to have a roller coaster of emotion. Your entire mental well-being is going to be based on the whims of hockey. That's a bad place to be.
"Let's say you're constantly thinking, what does my GM think? What does my coach think? What do my teammates think? There's probably a bit of a misconception that if you have a lot of other stuff going on, that can be pointed at as a reason why you might be going through a slump.
"I would argue the exact opposite. I'd much rather have players that were well-rounded. Give me the steady Eddie every day of the week. You become the Steady Eddie by having perspective and keeping things a little bit more real. At the end of day, we're hitting a rubber puck.
"There's very few hockey players that will be so good that they will be remembered for their play. So why not take advantage of the position that you're in? You're given the keys to the castle for a short amount of time, where you can meet incredible people, do incredible things, travel North America and go see things.
"At the end of the day, I have some really good memories on the ice. A few - but not many of actual things that I did with the skates on during a game. I have a ton of great memories from off the ice, and things in the community. That's life."
Returning to the theme of "success," Ference talked about generating support within hockey for the LGBTQ+ community.
"Some people think the definition of success is that you're going to have 22 loud advocates for the issue. I think that's unrealistic on any issue. If one or two people think differently, so what? Does that mean we've all failed?
"Just because you're not up there making a lot of noise about it doesn't mean that you're not supportive. Especially in the hockey world, with the realities of what it's like to try to stay in the NHL - play, not ruffle feathers, keep your head down and work hard, and perform on the ice for a very limited part of your life.
"To a certain extent, success can be a shrug of the shoulders. A teammate stands up in the locker room and says, 'I just want you guys all to know I'm gay.' I honestly think that a lot of players, it's a shrug of the shoulders and it's like, 'All right.' And then they go back to taping their stick because they don't give a s**t. They really just don't.
"I think that the overwhelming feeling is that, 'Yeah, great, make sure you're going hard tonight and backing me up.' I just don't think that people care that much, and that's in the most positive sense."