| Kevin's Blog |
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6/26/2009
Hey guys, hope everybody out there is enjoying their summers so far! So much to say, please bear with me: Congrats to the Pens for finishing such a tough journey and becoming Stanley Cup Champions, I've played with Peter Sykora, Matt Cooke, Pascal Dupuis, and Equipment Manager Dana Heinze was with me in Tampa. It's always nice to see somebody that I know carry the cup around the ice. I tip my hat to the Wings as well, for continuing to be the high water mark that all of us other teams strive for. Their yearly success makes you likely the most dominant franchise in pro sports over the last 15 years. Since our playoffs hopes ended I've been quite busy doing some guest analyst work on TV for the NHL Network's NHL on The Fly, The Grill Room, and some NHL XM Sirius satellite radio shows and other radio and print media interviews as well. I've really enjoyed this and had some great fun with in addition to gaining some more valuable experience. This media platform has also provided great exposure for my community and charitable endeavors and causes that I support. It's nice to be back home in Toronto for the off-season and to spend time with family and friends that I don't get to see enough of during the season. Training is coming along well, my knee has healed 100 % and I'm exactly where I want to be in this phase of my training. The seasons are a Tour De France on the body regardless as to what role you play. In the role of a backup goalie as you're on the ice for every practice and pre-game skate and seeing anywhere from 150-500 puck per session + gym work for me, so it's always been important for me to put in my training work prior to every upcoming season. This upcoming season will be my 15th professional and parts of 12 in the NHL, that's a long time and I'm truly blessed! Because of my commitment to training I feel much younger than 34 and look forward to extending my playing career as LONG as I can. I finished second in the league in saves percentage with % 920 with backup goalies that played 10-30 games and that's a career high for me and I'm very encouraged by that and hope to continue improving because even the best can get better! A sample of my community /charity work thus far this off-season: Attending Shoot For A Cure's Fundraiser, providing an academic scholarship for Future Aces Foundation, meeting Harry and Kevin from the Newark Street & Ice Hockey Program at the NHL Store in NYC, attending Steve Rucchin's Face-Off For Charity Golf Tournament in London, ON to raise funds for Cancer Patient Treatment and Care Assistance, sponsoring and attending Barbados Charity Ball Canada Aid, Sky's The Limit's fundraiser/ appreciation night, as they are my Canadian beneficiary of choice for my upcoming Golf Tournament and Celebrity Weekend in Barbados... My tournament is almost here, wow. My wife and I leave for Barbados this Sat (can't wait) to spend some time with family there and connect some loose ends ahead of our North American guests and participant arrival on July 2. A tournament of this scale is truly a massive undertaking financially, logistically, etc. and I'd like to thank the following sponsors for your kind donations to our event and the causes it supports: The Barbados Tourism Authority, Steven Conville of Blackmont Captial, Big Five Tours, Strata Public Relations, Bert's Bar and Eugene Melnyk (Owner of Ottawa Senators and Barbadian Resident), Nautica, EcoTerra, The Score Sports Network (especially Cabbie & Dave Krikst),The NHL, Banks Beer, ET Canada, GreatBarbados.org and Chickmont Foods. This will be a blast for guests and participants, with golfing @ Royal Westmoreland and every party, gala, yacht cruise etc.! We hope to raise as much awareness and funds as possible for Sky's the Limit and Phoenix Academy of Barbados, this is the most gratifying part of the whole experience, please check back over the next 10 days for updated pics and stories from my event in Beautiful Barbados! Good luck to all the young men in this year's NHL Entry Draft! It was only 16 years ago in Quebec City that I was in your shoes, man.... LOL!!! Happy Canada Day and 4th of July! Barbados, here we come!!!
How's everybody doing? Hope you're all recovering from 'Spring Forward' for the forwarding of the clock by 1HR,I was a bit tired after but love the brighter extended evenings for sure! We're now officially in the homestretch of the regular season - just 10 to go. I hope we can gobble up as many W's as possible to get a nice seed for the playoffs-it's going to come to the game 82 (last of regular season ) to finalize the playoff matchups in both conferences. Off the ice I had a great time with my Dad as attended the new Late Night Show with Jimmy Fallon, what a great experience! I believe he's going to continue to be a success with this show, he was very humble and appreciative of not only my Dad and I but the entire audience. He's a got a GREAT house band: The Roots! Those guys are some of the most talented musicians I've ever seen. We were fortunate to attend that show as the guests were: Donald Trump, Serena Williams and Ludacris-crazy huh? What a week as far as accolades and accomplishments go, watching Marty make history ironically in Montreal (he's from there and Patrick Roy played there) and then at home in NJ is something I'll never forget. can tell you it's almost statistically impossible to make the NHL, hen win one game, let alone 553 and counting - Congrats Marty! As promised, we've put up a web page for my Celebrity Charity Golf Classic in Barbados with all info and registration information. This being the 5th tournament, we promise to make it the best yet, please take a look at that part of the site when you stop by. By the way, if you're in Boston and want a good steakhouse, I highly recommend Abe & Louie's. If you're in NYC and want the same - Del Frisco's is the spot! Thanks for stopping by, Kevin
So, now we're in what many of us call the 'dog days' of the season but it certainly doesn't feel like it. We've had mostly a mild winter in NJ (being that I'm from T.O), the days are getting longer with more daylight and our team is doing quite well and that makes things much more enjoyable at this time of year. As it turns out, she came down by our bench where I was sitting and said hello and give me a nice box of Ghirdelli chocolate (Thanks Ms. Z) with a nice note saying she was at the game with her nephews. I wonder if she remembers how skinny I was, and how I was always in the cafeteria trying to eat any and everything to help gain some muscle, LOL!!!! It's a small world and these little things mean so much and keep me grounded by bringing me back to life before I was in the 'Show.' It also re-connects me to so many people that were a part of my life from that period of time, which In turn, just makes life and the fact that I'm living my ultimate professional goal, that much sweeter. Charles in based in Texas and is a trucker who's a HUGE hockey fan. He loves the Dallas Stars but developed some love for the Devils too. He even drove up to NJ for games and we also saw him in Atlanta! Talk about a hockey fan! We appreciate Charles and fans like him that support us and our game all over the world-thank you! Kevin The holidays were great, but they flew by, hope you all enjoyed yours wherever you were! We are now past the forty game/halfway season mark and as of this posting, we're in first place in our division and third overall in the Eastern Conference! There's a long way to go until the end of the regular season, but we've exceeded expectations and more importantly, put ourselves in a good position. We just had a HUGE road trip! From L.A to Anaheim to Vancouver to Columbus to Long Island to Nashville and finally back to NJ- that's a crazy amount of miles right there. We went 5 for 6 on this very tough trip and could've beaten Anaheim to go 6 for 6 with a little luck and a disallowed goal against that was ruled a goal... The trip was great as far team bonding too! We took care of business and had lots of fun; the bus, the plane, lunches/dinners, etc. lots of laughs and jokes that took our team chemistry to another level. In the end we enjoyed being around each other and playing hard for each other, that's what it's all about. I just got back from All Star break and although we didn't go to Barbados,we went to Turks & Caicos and had a great time! Aside from the fact that I have Barbadian roots, it's always great to be anywhere in the islands; the people, the vibe, the food and the energy just help to put you in such a relaxed and positive frame of mind. On that note, stay tuned for more details for my Celebrity Golf Classic in beautiful Barbados this off-season that will benefit two charitable initiatives, one in Canada and one in Barbados. As we speak, we're planning and strategizing for this massive undertaking to ensure all participants, sponsors and beneficiaries will once again enjoy this unique and world class event. Thanks for taking the time to stop by! Kevin
12/24/2008 So it’s (almost) Christmas/Hannukah. I can't believe they're actually here! I remember being at the C.N.E with my wife and family looking for a candy on a stick and hearing my dad’s annual line, "Now that the C.N.E is almost closed, hockey season and Christmas are just around the corner,'' and again like every year, he was right! Where have the first 30 games of our season gone? Wow! It’s no secret that our team has been ravaged by injuries right from the beginning of the season, but through teamwork and resilience, we've endured and now we're excelling. I just finished my Xmas shopping yesterday by taking advantage of our day off, how about you guys? Unfortunately, we won't be able to make it home to Toronto for Xmas at my parents' house, it'll be only the second time ever that I wasn't home for Xmas, but at least we played in Toronto last week and I had the chance to visit them. We will enjoy our first Xmas in New Jersey. My hope for any of you taking the time to read this: You are able to enjoy you're family and friends, have fun, eat great food and watch as much sports as possible! By the way... my Celebrity Charity Golf Tournament has been approved and will be taking place in beautiful Barbados sometime during this off-season, stay tuned.... Happy Holidays everybody! Kevin 7/15/2008 As you all know, we like all of you hockey fans, were so excited for the playoffs. In an ironic twist - we played our cross-water rivals, NYR. For whatever reason, they've had our number this season even though each game was a nail-biter! In the end, they were our only dance partner and the dance didn't last as long for us as we would have liked it to. We played hard, tried hard but in the end we tipped our caps to them as they moved on. The NJ / NY is really unique for sports and it's great that both our team and the Rangers made the playoffs, as well as matching up in the first round. All of the teams that qualified played hard, competed and sacrificed a great deal to get into the playoffs, never mind advance! There were so many great and entertaining games to watch all the way until the end. On that note, congratulations to Pittsburgh and Detroit for a great Stanley Cup Finals - The Red Wings’ continued dominance is something to marvel at and respect, I feel very fortunate to be a member of and organization of that caliber here with the NJ Devils. Good luck to all the minor hockey / junior and college players out there. I hope you're enjoying your off-season by spending time with family and friends, training hard and working on your game. Thanks for taking the time to stop by, Kevin Weekes
4/10/2008 From the last off-season, through training camp, a grueling and at times gut-wrenching regular season, every workout, cold tub, stretch, video session, bus ride, late night flight, and practice, are intended for one team goal: earning our ticket to the Dance - The Stanley Cup Playoffs. This year, maybe more than ever, was the tightest race in both the Eastern & Western conferences to qualify for the playoffs in NHL history! That says everything right there. In many cases, teams didn't know if they had even EARNED a ticket until the last week of the regular season, and in some cases they didn't know their fate until their 82nd and final game! Talk about suspense and drama. We didn't know our own fate until after a hard-fought game against the Rangers that ended in us winning in dramatic style in a shootout, earning us the privilege of home-ice advantage. It was quite a feat for our ownership and fans - OUR first playoff experience in our bar-raising arena, the ''Rock" or Prudential Center (its formal name). As it turns out, our dance partner for the first set (series) is our cross-town rival - the New York Rangers. Having been on both sides of this rivalry, I can tell you hockey fans and the league couldn't ask for anything better. It's great for our game. Although they've gotten the best of us in the season series in the win column, the games were basically decided by a goal and were all entertaining for both teams and fans alike. Stay tuned as it promises to be a heck of series. I felt it best to wait for this time for my first blog entry, as this was my first season as a Devil. I wanted to observe and absorb as much as possible and find my comfort zone here, which in turn makes it much easier to share my experiences with you. For hockey fans, regardless of who your team and or player of choice is, this is a great time of year and your support makes it that much more special. We, as players, coaches and team staff, all appreciate your enthusiasm and backing! You are the "Seventh Man" on the ice for us and that makes a great difference. For the young players and any of you not playing (YET) at the NHL level: Pay attention to the sacrifice, intensity of each shift. Notice the skilled players’ hitting, blocking shots and backchecking more than normal. See the unsung guys make big plays, score big goals and become heroes before your eyes. Above all, recognize that no player is above or below doing anything that is or isn't asked of them. It’s about TEAM. It's not about whom you dance with, but how you dance. We'll try our best. This is the Stanley Cup Playoffs. Thanks for taking the time to stop by. Kevin Weekes |
