Gig: Americans Talk About Their Jobs Part 24

ELVIS PRESLEY INTERPRETER.

Trent Carlini.

I've always been into music. I was playing the guitar and singing professionally when I was ten years old. But it wasn't until I was in my early twenties that I really got into performing the Elvis music. And the way that happened was I got introduced to rockabilly when I moved back to the States from Europe where I was raised. This was in maybe 1987. And just like out of nowhere, I really dug the whole rockabilly sound and look, and I really related to the Elvis part of it in particular. So that's how it all began.

I was born in Chicago, but I grew up in Italy-where all the wild women are! [Laughs] When I came back to the States, I moved to Florida, began performing in local clubs, doing the Elvis stuff more and more, until things just took off. I started playing all over-doing outdoor festivals. I won some contests, some talent searches. And then this producer of the show Legends saw me, flew me out to Las Vegas, and he hired me to headline for him. Legends is a show they do at one of the hotels here that's a collection of impersonators. There's a Tina Turner, a Madonna, an Elvis, et cetera. It's a big deal, but it's just straight impersonation and that bugged me. It's very constrictive-the same six songs, night after night. I did it for four years and I got really tired of the monotony of it.

But during the months that Legends was down I went on tour doing my own shows. And that was great, and out of those shows, I started this show that I do now-The Dream King. I've been doing it for the last two years here at the Holiday Inn Boardwalk Casino. It's my creation-a representation of the King's musical career, image, and style without characterizing him, impersonating him, trying to be him during the show. Never.

I call myself a Presleyan artist, or an interpreter-not an impersonator. If you see the show, you'll notice that at certain times I kind of act like him and then I don't. That's planned. I will do an impersonation just for, like say, a refrain or even a beat, just to show you the difference being a Presleyan artist and being an impersonator. People appreciate that. They automatically see the beauty of it. That's why they keep coming back. Because it's different. It's fresh. I do the songs in their original key and tempo, but I do them my way. So everyone's happy.

I always describe myself as "graced with a curse." And I truly am, because it kind of put the ropes around my career, but it's allowed me to do this. It's like almost saying, "Well, you can be an entertainer, but you have to be this." Sometimes I get upset about it. I mean, it's a little unjust, you know? I feel the music industry gives this type of entertainment a very hard time. They don't respect it, they look at it as an impersonation. They don't see the great quality to it, and I think a lot of the industry needs to really pull their head out of their b.u.t.t, you know? Get real and not be so blind to what's beautiful out there.

When I first started this show, no one opened the doors to me. They would say, "Sorry, we don't have room. Sorry we don't have this, sorry we don't have that." I had to struggle like you wouldn't believe to get Dream King going, especially after I left Legends. It was fierce. But there was a handful of people that really believed in it-and now I have a marquee, I'm established. People know about me and demand me. I'm making noise.

And I love it, I really do love it, because the Elvis music is just so immortal, it's so legendary. Tonight I had people from the Netherlands, people who are Hispanic, Americans-people from everywhere. They come together to take a break, to just watch and enjoy this. And it's amazing how it affects all audiences, it's awesome.

I do the show once a night, five nights a week. n.o.body plays with me. I sing to a tape of music of my band and the Jordanaires, who sang with Elvis. The room is small, it's intimate, about two hundred people. Tickets are thirty dollars. It's really wonderful. And I'm constantly changing things, developing the act. About every six months I change the songs and the staging. I've added new segments to the show-the sit-down segment, a gospel segment. I'm going to add a country-western segment. It's a huge variety because that's what you can do with the Elvis music. The man had thirty years of great songs. It's just amazing.

When I'm performing, it's crazy. Sometimes I get educated crowds that appreciate me musically. Sometimes it's just crazy people jumping all over, trying to grab you, waiting for you outside after the show. It's crazy craziness. When I go out, I try to play it down, but the look is there, I can't do anything about that. I guess some people have that kind of face, it just grabs the attention. Like I said, I'm "graced with a curse." I've learned to live with it.

I have created a mini-empire and it's growing very rapidly, to the point where I kind of miss how it was in the beginning. Because now it's so demanding. Promoting companies are trying to book me all the time. It's amazing. I really have two shows now-the intimate show here in the casino and then my touring show, which is worldwide. In the summertime and in January, I go on the road. I do a big production show-an entire orchestra along with people like Joe Esposito, Charlie Hodge, the Jordanaires, D. J. Fontana-almost all the people that worked with Elvis who still work pretty much work with me. In five years I will have the biggest show in Las Vegas because I'm constantly being pressured to bring the production show here and everyone is going in that direction. I'm not one to fight it, you know? I'll probably miss the intimate show a lot, but it's inevitable. I'm growing bigger all the time. I've been on television-Nightline, Letterman, on Oprah, Leno, Entertainment Tonight-it's out of control.

But I keep a cool head. I separate my life from Elvis completely. I have a very strong personality all my own. I don't wander around my house thinking I'm Elvis. If at times certain things happen that are similar to what happened with Elvis-it's all subconsciously. I'm not aware of it if it does happen. Like the fact that I have a Cadillac-well, I like Cadillacs! Lots of people do, not just Elvis. Or like I eat peanut b.u.t.ter, but I don't eat it with bananas. I eat bananas, but I don't eat them with peanut b.u.t.ter. I like peanut b.u.t.ter and jelly with rye toast and I like bananas with lemon juice, but I've never had them together, especially fried. I think that's more of a country thing. See, I'm Italian, and I'm very picky for Italian cuisine and good cooking and stuff like that. Elvis was country. I'm Italian. People say my house looks a little like Graceland. I just think it looks like Las Vegas. Okay? It's not intentional.

I do do many of the same things that Elvis probably did as far as makeup goes. A little bit of touch-up, dye your hair, sideburns, that kind of stuff. But I dress differently. For instance, this suit is a suit that Elvis never had. I designed it. I call it "Chinatown." Or when we go on tour, I've got this suit that's called the "World Tour Suit," which is a suit that Elvis never had. Of course, it's in the jumpsuit style, the Elvis style, but it's my design. That's the advantage of being a Presleyan artist as opposed to an impersonator, people that just completely emulate what Elvis did and said. I have the freedom to be my own entertainer and perform his music in the style of Elvis Presley. The fact that I resemble him physically and vocally is the "plus" that takes it to the next level. It's what makes me so successful.

And, you know, I've talked with Joe Esposito and other people who were close friends with him. I never really ask them much about Elvis personally, but every now and then, they themselves let out a comment, bringing my resemblance to Elvis out-the height, mannerisms, and that kind of stuff. Of course, we're different in a lot of ways, but there are a lot of small similarities that put me in that category and allow me to do this successfully.

I don't know what's gonna happen in the future. According to my financial records, things look great. [Laughs] I'm sure, like everything, it's going to die out. But, I mean, look at Jesus Christ-he's still going strong after two thousand years. Who's to say that Elvis won't last two thousand years? Because a lot of people think he was the son of G.o.d that came to Earth to deliver people through his music. I think there's even a cult out like that. [Laughs]

Personally, though, for me in ten years, I don't know. You know? I kind of live in the moment. I have two corporations and I'll probably get into a lot of producing and maybe filmmaking. We're scripting a film right now that portrays Elvis's illegitimate son in a situation. I'd just love to do that, and then do a whole bunch of films with the Elvis persona. Like remake certain movies and have a character in the Elvis persona. I'm not talking about remaking G.I. Blues, or anything-I mean something new-doing original stuff in the Elvis style. Like as if Elvis were alive and doing more stuff. That's what's important to me.

Like, I'm going to record "Sweet Home Alabama" with the Elvis persona because I think Elvis would have sang that song. "Sitting on the Dock of the Bay," "Purple Rain"-I'm going to do an alb.u.m like that. I think that the Elvis persona would just kill with it. I'm very excited.

The priests come to the games. Everybody.

They all f.u.c.kin' like winning.

HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL COACH.

James R.

I teach history and I'm the head varsity basketball coach at a Catholic high school in Pennsylvania. Teaching goes with coaching-the hours coincide. When the school day is done, that's when you practice. I'm not certified to teach or anything like that, but anybody can teach. You've got the book there-you just read it the day before and you memorize it and you-teach it, you know? I mean I graduated from college and stuff, so it's not hard. It's fun actually, I like it a lot. But what I'm here for is the coaching. The basketball.

I'm twenty-five. I went to high school in this area. Just a couple of towns away. Played four years of basketball and finished as my school's all-time leading scorer. I was all-county and then I got a full scholarship to a Division II school, which is a step down from Division I, but still it was a pretty good program. I did real well my freshman year-I was the first guy off the bench-backup point guard. I averaged about eleven points, four a.s.sists. Then my soph.o.m.ore year, I became ineligible because of grades so I had to sit out a season. I ended up with like nine hundred and sixty career points, so I would've broke a thousand if I'd played all four years. And my senior year, I finished top five in the country in a.s.sists.

I thought about playing pro ball. [Laughs] Sort of. I mean, my coach talked to me about trying to go play in Europe and stuff, but I really didn't want to go over there. And I didn't want to play semipro. It's funny, but what I wanted to do-I just always wanted to coach. I think it was because, growing up, the people that I was always around and close with were coaches and I looked at what they did and thought, you know, I just want to be like that.

So after I graduated college, I moved back home to my parents' house and I got a job as the JV basketball coach at a public school near here. I was there one year and we did pretty well. Then I got lucky. 'Cause the next fall, the head coach of the varsity at this school I'm at now quit in September, which is two months before the basketball season starts. He was sick and had to retire. So I applied for the job. And I got it. I was only twenty-three at the time, but it's all about, you know, this is a pretty serious basketball school. They knew me from playing around here and I guess they liked me. [Laughs]

I think the kids were very happy to get a younger coach. I can talk to them about stuff. Like I know what's going on, I listen to all the same music they do, you know? At the same time, when we're on the court, everything I tell them to do they listen, because a lot of them, when they were younger, they saw me play. So they respect me basketball-wise, so it works out pretty good. I mean, who would you rather play for-some sixtyor seventy-year-old guy who's got his own philosophies built in from the 1940s, or a young guy who's got some new approaches, some sharp drills, and is into the same stuff you are and knows exactly what you're going through with all your high school problems, you know what I mean? Like, I'll know when a kid comes in and is having a bad practice because he just got in a fight with his girlfriend in the hallway. So I won't go nuts on him that he's playing bad. I'll just say to him, "Hey look, I know you got problems with your girl or whatever, but you gotta put that aside for this time." Stuff like that. And kids respond.

My first year we finished fifteen and six. And we had some good players-I started some soph.o.m.ores over some seniors, actually, which didn't make the seniors happy at first, but we won with those soph.o.m.ores. We had the school's best record in four years. And it was fun because it was my first year, and I was kind of like just learning new stuff, but we didn't win the league, and I was thinking to myself, we were fifteen and six, which to me is average. We came in second in the league. We didn't make the Jamboree, which is the county tournament, we didn't make that. And I was like, you know, f.u.c.k this. We're a Catholic school-we can go and get whoever we want.

Because we can recruit, sort of. I mean, as a Catholic school, a kid can come here from anywhere. So I said to myself, there's no reason we should ever be bad. And I didn't think these soph.o.m.ores were that good. So this year, I was like, f.u.c.k this-I went out and got a foreign kid from Finland, who is friggin' real good. Six-foot-two guard. A junior. And he really made an impact. We were twenty and five. We won the league-and we won a county tournament game for the first time in the history of the school. And I won coach of the year for the league, and area coach of the year from the local sportswriters a.s.sociation. Youngest guy ever to do both. Twenty-four years old.

The kid from Finland, he wants to play college ball in America. I knew him from a camp that he was at. I work at basketball camps in the summers, and I met him two summers ago. The first time I saw him play, he caught a pa.s.s on the wing-and he's only like sixtwo-and he drove past two guys and dunked on them. I was like, "Jesus Christ!" because he's just like this skinny white kid. He shoots threes from like thirty feet. I struck up a friendship with him. And we kept in contact. I'd call him at home in Finland. And I'd say, "You should really come over here if you want to play college basketball." So he was like, "Okay, I'm gonna do it." Because, you know, he's good, he's incredible, but [laughs] he knows that no college recruiter is, like, going to be in Finland one weekend to see him play-he has to be here.

So I talked him into coming here. And then, you know, I had to find someplace for him to live. So I went to one of my a.s.sistant coaches and said, "You gotta f.u.c.kin' just take this kid and tell your wife to just be quiet and don't worry about it-he's moving in with you." So he moved in with him. But then the guy's wife got sick of him-they had a teenage daughter and she thought it was weird-so we had to find a new place for him to live. So he moved in with my JV coach. He doesn't have any kids. He and his wife are in their, like, mid-forties, no kids, so they love him.

We wrote a letter to the state saying that the kid's over here staying with a family friend for academics, and he's gonna play all these other sports and this and that. We went through all this bulls.h.i.t. And the state called and they asked one question-they asked, "Who pays for him to go to school?" And we said the parents pay. And then they wanted to see proof of payment. But we have an alumni guy that's paying for him, so the alumni guy just pays with money orders, and we signed the parents' names on the bottom of the money order. Because that's how the state checks on it. And it worked.

The one thing is-and this is a pain in the a.s.s-because it's such a different culture, he's always homesick, and I gotta like-all the time, when he's homesick, anything, I'm the first person he goes to. It's like sometimes I'll be getting ready to go somewhere, and he'll call: [Finnish accent] "Oh coach-I am missing home." And I'm like, ah s.h.i.t. Half-hour conversation, and I'm gonna be late where I'm going. And I gotta convince him-I always tell him that he's gotta remember why he's here-if he goes to a good Division I school and goes back home, he'll play professionally. So he looks at it as a bigger picture-he comes here and plays college basketball and then he goes home as a top-paid European player. So I always bring that up. And, you know, he's staying here.

Most of the time, he's so psyched about it because he really does want to play college basketball-it's his dream. And he'll do it. He's a Division I player. He could play at just about anywhere except your very top, top schools. He's hands down the best player in the county next year.

I brought this other kid on too last year, another junior, this kid from Philly, he's like six foot three, a black kid-so we brought him over, too. And he started and he played great. He's a real good student, so he wasn't fitting in too well over where he came from, 'cause that's just a wacked-out inner-city school. So I talked to him a little bit about coming. And he was easy. I said, "Hey, you'll get an opportunity to play, you'll end up going to college to play basketball, we got contacts." And he was just like, "All right, I'm definitely coming." But he had no money either, because his family was dirt poor, and he lives with just his mother. So we got him two in-school scholarships, and that pays for half, and then this other alumni guy pays the other half of his tuition. The two scholarships are straight-up-he applied for them, and he's a good student, so he got them. But the alumni guy, that's, you know-I don't even know if that's illegal or not. I don't think it would be-why would that be illegal? It's just helping a kid out by paying for his school.

So, you know, I brought in these two guys, these ringers, and we won like crazy. The other players were fine with it because they just want to be awesome. They all work their a.s.s off, so they didn't have any problem with that. I don't know how the parents reacted because I don't talk to any of them. Parents are f.u.c.ked up. They are. Because, like, everyone thinks their son is an All-American, right? So they all just scream at me during the game. They all think their son should be playing all the time. So they're yelling at me, "Why you taking him out now?!" They're yelling at me all the time. They never look at it fairly. It's always their son, their son, their son. But think about it- my team was twenty and five-we won the league! Obviously the people that are playing are getting the job done.

Actually, one set of parents did complain about the ringers specifically-the mother said to me-'cause her son was one of the soph.o.m.ores that started my first year and got benched this past year-she said, "They had a perfectly good team and now you came and you gotta bring these two new players," and this and that. I was just like, "Well, things happen." But I should've told her, "Yeah, well it's because your son can't get it done at the level that I want him to." That's what I felt like saying. [Laughs] "Tell your son to make a jump shot and I wouldn't have to bring in these kids from Finland."

The school, the administration, they know about these ringers. They know how I got them. Everybody knows. I mean, because the people in the office, when I was coming in before school started last year-they were joking, saying like, "When are the ringers starting?" So everyone knows, but what are you going to do? It's what you've got to do to win. And everybody comes to the games. The priests come to the games. Everybody. They all f.u.c.kin' like winning.

The public school coaches, they all hate us. Catholic schools playing against public schools. "It's no fair-you guys can recruit kids-" This and that. But I say, you know what? Give me your job, then. Because I think public schools should have the advantage- because they already have all the kids in their town, and if they would just take over their recreation programs and start the kids out when they're young, then they could have kick-a.s.s teams every year. Just start making those kids good from the time they're in third grade. And then your teams will be good, they'll have played together for years, they won't ever want to leave your town, and you won't have to worry about it.

But that's not the way it goes. So they hate us. I mean, there's a coach in this town who was my Catholic Youth Organization coach when I was little. The guy was like a brother to me. He's now coaching near here at a public school. And one of his kids comes up to me and asks me about my school. Asks if he could play. He approached me. And my friend, his coach, goes nuts, telling me I'm trying to steal his kids and ruin his program-that I could get kids from thirty towns, that I've got no loyalty to him, that I'm a douche bag, this and that. We haven't spoken to each other since. And we were tight since I was like nine years old. And now we don't even speak a word to each other. I saw him two weeks ago at a weekend tournament, and we walked by each other and b.u.mped shoulders.

So, I don't know. But I really do think they should have the advantage. Think about it-if all public schools had good programs, then any kid I went to in another town, he wouldn't even want to go. I could talk to him until I was blue in the face, but he'd be so psyched to go play for his town's high school that it wouldn't be a problem.

With Catholic schools, you're never gonna have that hometown loyalty, you know? You gotta recruit. So I'm recruiting all the time. I'll probably go every Sunday night during the season to the local rec league games to see the seventhand eighth-graders play. Then I'll probably go to three or four other games on Sat.u.r.days, over in Philly. It's nice-you just sit there and watch the games. The one kid that I wanted from Philly this summer, we got. He'll be a freshman this year. For him, I'd go to his games, and then I invited him to our open gyms and he came, so that's how we got him. This kid Josh-he's gonna be f.u.c.kin' good. This tough, five-ten Spanish kid, guard.

If I see a kid I like, first thing I do is try to find out who the parent is, and talk to them first. I'll say, "Hey, I coach at so-and-so high school. Your son's a very good player." And they'll say thank you. And then you've got to be careful, you don't want to screw yourself. So you've gotta say like, "Are you considering sending him to a Catholic school?" And if they say no, then you've just got to be like, all right. But most of them say yeah, because-to be honest-they kind of like it that somebody's coddling them a little bit. That's what I find. And the kids love it. They act like you're a college recruiter.

You can't be overt. You're recruiting, but you can't say that you're doing it, and you've got to do it in a way that's like-like you can't send a kid a letter or anything like that. That's off the deep end. It's like, you'll get in trouble, I think. Actually, I don't know what the rules are. I have no idea. I mean I'll go up to kids and tell them that they're good and that they should come to-like we had a kid at camp this week, he's going to be an eighth-grader. I was hanging out with him for two weeks, and I'm trying to get him to come to our school. Because he said he might go to this other private school near here. And the kid's good, so I told him straight out, "f.u.c.k that-you ain't going there. You don't wanna go there." He's black, and I was like, "There's no black kids there. You'll be hanging out with all Jewish kids and stuff like that, but we've got Spanish broads at our school, and everything else." [Laughs]

These kids think that's cool-they're like, "Oh yeah, yeah, yeah!" Then they go home and keep saying to their parents, "I want to go to-" you know, my school. So it gets to a point where the parents agree to come check us out. Then we'll show 'em around, and we've got a kick-a.s.s development director who they'll have an interview with, and she'll lay out all the academic stuff. Because I don't know anything like that.

The one thing the parents always ask me, and I should learn it so I could give them an answer, is, they say, "What is the average SAT score?" I've got no idea. We had a kid on our team that got like a 1060 like two years ago, so I just always bring that up. I just say, "Well, we regularly have kids that are in the thousands on our team, like 1060, 1100." [Laughs] That seems to impress them.

It's tough, though, because if you get caught you're screwed. My athletic director here has warned me not to get caught. Repeatedly warned me. And I don't know what will happen if I do get caught, but I take him seriously. And I've never gotten caught.

But it's intense and, you know, I've gone overboard. I've f.u.c.ked up some recruiting. I had a kid, a f.u.c.kin' kick-a.s.s point guard from Philly. Eighth-grader, I saw him in a rec league last winter. And I go to like ten of his games. Sitting there right in the front, sitting behind the bench, everything. Talking to his parents all the time. And he signs a letter to come. Registers, pays his fee, everything-he's in. I go to call him this summer, to come play in the JV summer league, and I get a recording-the number has been changed. They moved to a town that's like an hour away. He's going to school on the other side of the county. And I went berserk. I was like, "Are you serious?" I mean, I put a lot of effort into this kid-he was probably my major focus last winter, recruiting-wise. And it was probably wrong, I shouldn't have said this, but I flipped out. I called the father and I was like, "Bad move, because you'll never win the county championship as long as I'm coaching! You're never gonna beat me! I'm always gonna have better players!" And this and that. "You better send that kid on a train every day to school." And the father's like, "Whoa, whoa, who you talking to? You better calm down. This is only an eighth-grader." And I was just like, "Ahh, well yeah, well, he's never gonna be any good! Might not have started on the freshman team anyway!" And I hung up. So he's not coming. And that was f.u.c.ked up on my part.

I'm just really into it, I guess. I'm into it all the time. Right now, in the summer, I work at a basketball camp in Philly-I do that from nine to four every day. And then my team plays in summer leagues, so at night I'll run to our summer league game. I get home at like tenthirty every night. I talk to people, and they're like, "You're f.u.c.kin' crazy," this and that. Because in the summer I don't get paid by the school-I get paid by the camp, a tiny bit, but I coach my team at night and on weekends for free. But that's what you've got to do for your team to be good. Some people are like, "I don't understand why you do that if you're not getting paid for it." But you can't look at it that way. You have to look at it like coaching is always a full-year, everyday thing, if you want to be good.

And you have to want to be good. You have to want to win. I don't know what the point of playing is if you don't want to win. I mean, people talk about playing for fun. But what's fun is winning, you know? You're not doing anybody a service by losing. The kids sure as s.h.i.t don't want to lose.

I win. And I work my a.s.s off to win. That's probably why, f.u.c.king, I don't even have a girlfriend. 'Cause it's like, during the season, if I have an early practice, then at night, I go to a game, scout a team. Even if it was a team that we don't have on our schedule, I go scout them 'cause maybe we could play in the county tournament, or in the state tournament. And I won't have a chance to scout them later. So during the season, regardless, I'm not home until ten o'clock. Then during the spring, same thing. I coach track, and a lot of my guys run track, then we have summer league, either practice or games every night. Plus all the recruiting. So it's definitely a committed thing. It's my commitment.

There's some coaches that don't do it. They're just there for the season-after practice, that's it, good-bye. That's why their teams f.u.c.kin' blow. And think about that for the kids-I mean, in one of our summer leagues, some coaches show up for like one game a week, and they'll have their a.s.sistant or someone else do the other games. And, you know, what is that? You're telling the kids to be there every night, but you're not there every night? Like how the f.u.c.k do they react to that?

The thing is, if you're into it and you put the time into it, kids notice. One of my kids said to me one time this summer, "You know, you're here every night, and none of these other coaches are here every night." And he said, "That's why we all come every night, because we know you're here." So you might not think that they notice, but all kids notice that stuff. It's almost like you have to look at it like a player-there's that old motto that every athlete has heard a thousand times: "Every minute you're not practicing, your next opponent is." It's that way for a coach, too. Every minute you're not preparing for your next opponent, that opponent is preparing for you. That's the way I look at it.

Some days, of course, I think it's bulls.h.i.t. I get overwhelmed. All this effort I'm pouring into this and it's like, I think, like, I coach in this two-bit Catholic high school with three hundred kids. In one sense, I look at it as I'm twenty-five years old and I've been doing this since I was twenty-three, and where can I move up in the job ladder? Like if you get a job in a business when you're twenty-five years old, most people can always move up and do things. But where am I going to move up to in the life of being a high school coach and teacher? There's nowhere, because I'm already the varsity coach and I'm already a full-fledged teacher. So that's it-I can only stay the same for the next thirty years. So sometimes I think about that and I'm like, you know, what am I doing? Other people are out there working to move up the corporate ladder and stuff like that. And for me, at twenty-three years old, I maxed out, I peaked out. I could get more money, but I'd never get another type of job. Because this is all I really want to do. And sometimes I think that sucks. But more often-much more often, you know, right now, I just love what I'm doing. So as of now I just think about it like, I love it, so as far as I'm concerned, this'll be it for-forever. I don't care. I love it.

Any way you can score is a good way.

PROFESSIONAL HOCKEY PLAYER.

Shawn McEachern.

I'm a hockey player. I play left wing for the Ottawa Senators. I'm an offensive guy.

My thing is, I'm a fast skater. That's what I do best. You see me- I'm not that big. [Laughs] I'm one of the smaller guys probably on the ice. But I'm just a little bit faster than most.

Hockey, you play on what's called a line. It's like a shift. What happens is I play on my line with a center and a right wing. We're on the ice maybe nineteen, twenty minutes a game-out of the sixty minutes. And we go out to score goals, basically. We're a scoring line. There's guys that go out and play tough and fight and there's defensive lines that go out and try to protect a lead-try to keep the other team from scoring. We go out to score. And that's fun. It's like-that's what everybody wants to do-score. [Laughs]

I love it. You know, it's what I've always done. Just play hockey. I grew up in Waltham, Ma.s.sachusetts. My brother is three years older than me and I started playing on his team when I was five. I don't know how good I was then. [Laughs] You know, I probably wasn't all that good. But as I got older, I did pretty well on each team I was on. I was one of the better players all the time.

When I was a junior in high school, I got drafted by the Pittsburgh Penguins in the sixth round of the entry draft. This was 1987. I was the one hundred and tenth pick overall. And I was excited, but that's not like a real high draft pick, you know. I mean, if you're in the first round, that's a big deal. But after the first round, it's not really that big of a deal. Because as long as you're eighteen, you can be drafted. So they'll draft anybody. Russians, guys from Europe- anybody. And once they draft you, they own your rights. That's all it is. It doesn't mean you're gonna play for them. They can trade your rights to another team. Guys get traded before they even play a game. And guys get drafted and never play a minute in the pros.

So it was nice to be drafted. But, I mean, I never thought about actually going and playing for Pittsburgh at the time. I just went on with what I was doing. I played one more year of high school, and then I got recruited to go to college. I got a full scholarship to Boston University. And I had a three-year career there, and then I left to go play for the U.S. National Team, which is the Olympic team. I played in the Olympics in '92. And around that time-when I was at B.U.- you know, scouts start coming to watch you play and things like that. And guys from your team sign contracts to play in the NHL. And that starts getting pretty exciting, you know. You start thinking about where you fit in, if you could play in the pros.

It ended up, right before the Olympics, I signed a contract with Pittsburgh to play with them once the Olympics were over. So I joined them and played from February till the end of the season, and then we won the Stanley Cup that year. Which is-that's the championship. I mean, that's like, you were playin' street hockey when you were eight years old and you pretend you're scoring goals to win the Stanley Cup. And then actually being on the ice and, you know, carrying the Cup around and being involved in the whole thing, it was amazing, you know. I mean just touching the actual Cup itself-it's just this big silver thing-but even just touching it was awesome.

And I actually got to play in those games and I scored goals during the playoffs. I got my first pro goal then. I scored against the New York Rangers in game six in the second round. It put us up three to one to win the game. And win the series. That was so much fun. I mean, I can't even tell you, really.

But it's weird, because that was my first year, 1992-not even my first full season. And we won the Cup. And then it's been eight years since then, and I've played on some good teams, but I haven't even gone back to the finals since.

My career-I played with the Penguins for like a year and a half. And then I was traded to Los Angeles for a guy by the name of Marty McSorley. And I played fifty games with L.A. And then I got traded back to Pittsburgh for a guy by the name of Marty McSorley. [Laughs] Actually there was two more players involved on it-but McSorley and I were the main guys.

I don't know why they traded us back and forth like that. No idea. You just get traded and it's-you know, one team doesn't want you, another team does want you. It just happens. I've been traded twice again since then, so I'm kinda used to it now. Pittsburgh traded me to Boston in 1995. And I played one season in Boston, my hometown, and I liked it a lot, but then I got traded that summer to Ottawa. And I was very surprised but, you know, my contract was up and Boston didn't want to pay as much as-whatever. I don't know how it works. They didn't want to pay that much money or something. And then I got traded to Ottawa. So I've been all over the place-East Coast, West Coast, Pennsylvania, Canada. It's a lot of moving, you know. But you meet a lot of new friends each place you go.

All the teams I've played for, I've been on a scoring line, that's been my role-just score goals. So my game hasn't really changed. I've played center sometimes, and left wing, like I do now. But my role is really always about the same. You know? Try and get the puck in the net.

And-it's hard to talk about the game. It's like you need to just watch us play. Everything happens very fast. It's just a lot of instincts. It's not conscious decisions. I come down the ice-I get the puck and there's the goal and the goalie-and I just try to score. If I could score off my head, I'd do it off my head every time. You know? Any way you can score is a good way. You don't think about it, you don't talk about, you just try to do it. Like you wouldn't say, "Oh, should I take my wrist shot or I take my slap?" You know what I mean? You just shoot the puck. There's no time for anything else. If you're near the goal and you've got the puck, you got a second, maybe two or three seconds to do what you need to do. A lot of it is just positioning, being in the right place-knowing where the right place is.

It's very mental. I mean, everybody playing pro hockey is a pretty good player. Everybody's got good skills. When you're younger, you work on your skills all the time. You work on your hockey. You do anything you can to be better, you know what I'm saying? You physically work out all the time. I still do that-all summer, I'm in the gym- but I think as you mature, you also realize that mentally you have to work out too-because it's so mental the whole game. It's something actually our team works on. We have like a mental skills coach. We go talk to him and he tries to keep us positive.

Because there's always stuff on your mind-distractions. Losing, you know? Or like if you have a bad game or something like that, you're in a rut and you're not scoring. It affects your mood. Because, obviously, it's your life and your work, you want to do well. But you have to be able to focus and try not to let it affect you.

Going on the ice, sometimes you don't feel good. It's a long season. It wears you down. I mean, in college, you probably play forty games. But in the NHL, the regular season lasts eighty-two games. And if your team goes deep in the playoffs, that's-to win the Stanley Cup it's four seven-game series. So you could end up playing more than a hundred games a year. [Laughs] It's a lot of hockey. And you practice every day. You get maybe one day a week off. Maybe. It depends who you have for a coach. So it's tiring. But you still have to concentrate. You gotta be able to just shake it off and focus.

And there's bullies out there. [Laughs] Oh yeah, I mean-when you're like me, you're not enormous, a lot of times the teams will come after you. They'll have big guys they send after the scorers. To try to get you off your game. There's nothing you can do about it except just play hard and, you know, take some abuse. Get cut and banged up and still come back and play hockey.

It's a rough sport-everybody knows that. A lot of injuries. I've been pretty lucky, but I've had my share. I took a slap shot in the face and broke my jaw my first year in Ottawa. I was skatin' and this guy shot the puck and it kinda went the wrong way and caught me in the face. I thought I got elbowed. I didn't even-you know, it kind of stunned me, knocked me down for a second. And I got up, and my face was cut through to-right through, you know-I was kind of spitting [laughs] blood comin' up like this. [Laughs] Just coming out of the side of my face, straight out. A lot of blood and stuff. That was my worst injury, probably. Had to have my jaw wired shut. And I was out- I missed like-I don't know, maybe five weeks, something like that. And this year I had this torn abdominal muscle, so I had surgery for that. I tore it just from playing. The way I skate and shoot the puck. You know, it's an injury you get right in here. It's real low. And you get, you know, you get facial cuts a lot and stuff like that all the time.

The average career is probably about six years. Some guys play a lot longer. I played with a guy in Boston and Pittsburgh by the name of Joe Mullen who's a very good player, a great player. American guy. He was forty when he retired. But the average career, I'd say is maybe five or six years. Not long.

I could see myself playing for ten more years possibly. I hope so. But honestly, I don't really think that much about when I'm going to stop or what I'm gonna do after I stop. People tend to ask me that more now since I've turned thirty-which is weird. You know? I'm thirty and people are like, when are you gonna stop playing? I had one of my best years last year, I scored thirty-one goals. That's the most I've ever had in a season. I would enjoy playing until I was forty. You know, that'd be great if my body could put up with it. If it can't put up with it then-I don't know what I'll do. I'll coach. Maybe. It's not something that's pressing me right now.

Right now, I'd just like to win another Stanley Cup. That's the main goal. When I got traded to Ottawa, we were the worst team in the league. But they'd just brought in a new coach, a new GM. And they brought in new players. And we ended up making the playoffs the first year I was here. And ever since then the team's gotten better. They've had so many draft picks because they came in last so many times that they had a lot of first picks overall-so we have a lot of very good players who're very young. We're the youngest or the second youngest team in the league, I think. And I'm one of the veterans here. I mean, I'm playing with a guy who's nineteen right now. [Laughs] It's a weird feeling. But we're good. And it's fun.

I think I'm lucky. I mean, obviously, I'm lucky. [Laughs] I'm going to make over a million dollars this year playing hockey, doing something I love. I don't think of it as a job for me. Like I don't think of it as I go to work, or anything like that. I don't say to my wife, "I'm going to work now." I say, "I'm gonna play hockey." And, like, I've been going to play hockey since I was five years old. You know? [Laughs] It's just that now I drive myself. My parents don't drive me anymore. And now they pay me money to do it. But it's just like a lifestyle. And it's so great. I mean, I still play with guys I've been playing with since I was a kid. You know, there's guys like Joe Sacco, who's playin' for the Capitals this year. I played against Joe when I was like seven years old in the town teams. And we went to B.U. together, and then Joe and I played together on the Olympic team, too. And now we play against each other in the NHL. And there's other guys I know the same way. Since I was seven, eight years old. Playing hockey. There's a lot of guys like that, you know. It's pretty wild that way.

I don't feel like it's lost anything for me over the years. I still get excited when I go on the ice. I think the older you get the more you appreciate that you can still play and have fun at it and go into the rink every day, hanging out with twenty other guys, joking around, and stuff like that. I think that's the type of thing you miss when you're not playing. You know? I think I'd play forever if I could.

We're not like the Mountain Dew guys,

or the Spicoli character in Fast Times

at Ridgemont High.

PROFESSIONAL s...o...b..ARDER.