Pavel's really been dogging it this season for his KHL team. 7th on the team in points (only 5th in P/G because we all knew he was bound to miss some games.)
I know, right? It's so strange, what could possibly cause a professional athlete who relied on his strength, quickness, shiftiness and reflexes to become one of the best players of his generation to decline into a player who isn't as strong or quick anymore as players ten/fifteen years younger than him, and statistically regresses? Hmm, it's so weird, what could cause that...
It certainly couldn't be a natural process that eventually effects all humans, and certainly not athletes. Because we've got some real iron men world-class athletes posting in here, think because they can jog a couple miles at a medium pace without puking their guts out that we can safely assume hockey players just don't get old and wear down. When they don't perform to our unreasonable expectations, it must be because they're selfish, lazy, mercenary ruskies, and not because they're, you know, old and have incurred physical damage to their joints, caused by the repetitive, violent motions required to perform the necessary work to play a thousand or so professional hockey games.
Anecdotally though, as an an asthmatic and only semi-athletic 18 year old with relatively short legs, I could run a respectable 4.5 minute mile; I was a decent baseball player with a low 90s fastball and a curve that fell off the table at 15, was the only 14 year old on a 14-15-16 tournament team that produced a couple of guys who managed brief minor league careers, could actually hit a baseball with regularity despite having only one well-functioning eye, and I even threw out a guy at home plate from the left field fence with a Bo Jackson-esque laser in a tournament game as 12 year old. I'm Pavel's age now, take far better care of myself than I ever did in my youth in regard to diet and conditioning, and would count myself lucky to crack a mile in 6 minutes; my shoulder, despite not having seriously thrown a baseball in 20 years, feels like there's a section of cruel violinists in there plucking and sawing at the muscles and tendons whenever I raise my arm; my knees are arthritic and accurately indicate barometric pressure by the pitch of their creaks and pops when I crouch and stand. But I'm probably just dogging it. Maybe I'll try to walk-on down at Tigers camp next month, I'm sure I'll make the team if I just put in a full effort. Because I was a decent ball player twenty years ago in my prime, surely it should be no problem for me now to be the Tigers best player and win them that World Series they've been chasing.
Seriously, it takes a very warped perspective to point to a guy who at 36 was one of the few players in the best league in the world to put up more than a point per game that season over a reasonable sample size, and at 37 playing on one tired knee still nearly lead the team in points despite playing 16 fewer games than the player who did, and say he was not giving something near a full effort. If this year is any indication, Datsyuk was literally the only skater keeping the Red Wings within shouting distance of relevancy. If the price of getting him to stick around as long as he did was allowing him the occasional indulgence of his patriotic spirit, then the drama queens throwing hissies over every loss and every poor play this year should be thankful for having their current misery stayed for such a small price. The end of Datsyuk's tenure was indeed ugly, but the account of that falls to Holland and Co., for not doing more to give Dats, Lids and Zeke one last legit shot at a cup before the band broke up, or providing worthy successors for them to pass the torch to and letting them take a backseat to enjoy the sunset of their careers. They knew Datsyuk had a foot out the door, and offered the contract anyway. It's ridiculous that anyone, the GM especially, would expect that an aging Datsyuk should have to carry this team on his back, let alone that he could. And watching broken down Datsyuk carry this inept bunch to another four-and-out would have been worse for all-concerned. It's pathetic to see any Wing fan carry such petty and misguided bitterness for a player we (and the whole NHL) were fortunate to have and enjoy at all.
