33 years old and he’s officially retiring as a Cane

I saw the news last week that Derek Stephon was retiring after 13 seasons in the NHL. By the way, the NHL tweeted it out with a picture of Derek in his Carolina Hurricanes black uniform, so we like that because I felt like Derek really was part of this, almost the core of this team. He fit in so well for the last couple of years and Derek joins us on the Adam Gold Show. You're 33 years old, Derek.

Why are you doing this? I know the twins are good, but that's taking it a little too far. Yeah, you know what? The honest truth of it is, and probably the hardest thing to accept is sometimes the game gets a little too fast. And for me, that's going to be the case. It was something that, unfortunately, the feet didn't go as fast as the brain did because if the brain went fast, I think I would be still playing. But if the feet went as fast as the brain, I'd still be playing. But the feet slowed down and I'm ready for the next chapter and I'm really excited about it.

I think Derek Stephon is joining us here on the Adam Gold Show. You obviously sound like you're at peace with it and that's cool. Is there part of you, first of all, when did you make this decision? Because I know it was just announced the other day, so when did you come to this decision?

I don't know. I don't really have a solid answer for that because there's always a chance if someone called, I'd be ready to play. So it's hard to say when I made the final, final decision. Obviously, as camp came really barreling down and the phones, you know, I didn't get many phone calls. I think it, you know, I started to, I started, my training started to slow down a little bit and then I kind of made the decision, well, I don't think I'm getting a call. So, yeah, I don't know when the exact date was.

Probably relatively close to when they announced it. So are you done done or could you be persuaded and then how long would it take you to ramp up? I mean, I don't think that if somebody called and said, hey, we want you, I don't think, I do think I'd be a crazy person to say no. However, I think it's done done.

I don't think that anyone's calling. I think we exercised all the spots that were possible. And I think everyone's kind of going in different directions. Derek Stepan is joining us here on the Adam Gold show, newly retired, even at the age of 33. You've had a great career, 13 seasons in the NHL.

I enjoyed watching you here. So let me ask you now as an unbiased member of the, I guess, of the Minnesota wild front office crack staff there, Billy Garon has done a dynamite job in the wake of some very serious salary cap restrictions. So kind of an unbiased look at a couple of players or so of this team. What are your thoughts on Sebastian Ajo as, I mean superstars are kind of a different, we throw those things around. He's a great player. I don't know if he's a superstar around the league.

I think people know him, but he's certainly not the Austin Matthews, Connor McDavid level, Sidney Crosby level. But what is, when you look at him as a player, what's, what jumps out to you? Well, I think the thing about Sebas and what I loved about Sebas is his competitive level. You know, he just loves to compete. He hates losing, which I, you know, I've seen before in a guy like Henrik Lundqvist and Sebas has that, I just want to win.

That's all I care about. And you know, he wants to win and he walks the walk with the way he plays because every single night he's the guy, you know, driving the bus. Offensively, defensively, and bringing the compete level. So, I mean, listen, he's a guy that I would want on my team every single day. I think he's, he's an elite talent. He's competitive and he wants to win and he really cares about the group.

And that's, that's something that is, you know, special and rare. Derek Stepan is joining us here. Same question about Andrei Svechnikov. Yeah.

And again, I'm not going to, it's going to sound like a broken record. He loves to win too. I just think Svechnikov has this, this, this, this, I don't even know how you would explain it. He's, he's just a beast.

I think that's the best way to explain it. He's an absolute beast. And again, he cares about winning. He cares about the guys so much and, and he's just a force and he loves the game. Very similar guys, in my opinion, in the sense of teammates and good people.

And then caring about the group and all that stuff, all the same there. And then just two different types of players. You know, you got the, Steve Ash is going to have a lot of, a lot of areas that he's got to play in. Svechnikov's got a different component that he's got to bring too.

So you got two really good pieces there. All right. Two more players I want to ask you about, and then we'll, we'll let Derek Stepan go about the business of potty training their youngest. And by the way, I'm glad you, you offered with our youngest at the end of that sentence, because people might've thought that you were going through potty training.

And I don't want people to think that of you as an early, like an early retiree. Jacob Slavin, I just saw a list of the top 50 players in the NHL. There were 12 defenseman on it, and I'm not disparaging any of those.

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Call 1-888-SOTIK-TU to learn more. Yeah, I mean, I think one great thing about him is he's not really talked about a whole lot. I think it's a nice little hidden gem that the canes have. He's an elite defender. He's a guy that is going to play forever because he takes care of himself. He understands the game. He thinks the game at a high level as a defenseman. And he has an offensive side to him that is sneaky. And I think that's what's great about the list is no one's really talking about him and just how good he is.

And you can just kind of keep him a secret. He just dominates. He's just, he has as good a stick as I have seen.

I mean, just before you know, like, oh, I have the puck now. That's what Jacob Slavin does. Maybe as good as, as good as anybody. I thought Seth Jarvis was better last year than he was the year before, even though his production went down. What kind of growth did you see in his game? Well, I think he's got a guy that plays, that he plays a lot with that is pushing them. And I think that's where he's growing. And Sebas is going to stay on Jarvie to make sure that he's doing things the right way and he's competing the right way. And then let his offensive talent that, that, all that stuff will naturally take over and learning this part of the game. And I think you're right. I think, you know, maybe his production was down, but I think he took big strides last year, learning how important it is to do X, Y, and Z. And how about Sebas in certain areas of the game where maybe, you know, you didn't really notice as a young kid, like, well, why, why does that matter? Well, it does.

And so I think he took big strides last year and I think, you know, I think the centerman's really, really helping them, you know, take some big strides. It's funny. I talked to Seth about just the year, the year last year. And he said, you know, he doesn't want to get, doesn't want Aho to yell at him. That's what he said to me. It's like, I just don't want Sebas to yell at me.

Although I think he called him fishy too. All right, final thing. The Hurricanes are the favorites, according to the markets, for whatever that's worth. Do you see them as essentially not the team to beat, but a team to beat? Yeah, absolutely. They're definitely a serious contender every season, mostly because of the points that we kind of hit on.

I got some great pieces there. It's, you know, it's hard to, I think there's probably a handful of teams that could have this, you could have this conversation about a lot has to go right. But, you know, in order to be in this conversation, you got to have a lot of pieces in the right spot and, and you got to do things the right way. And they have. So they, they get to, they get the right to be talked about the way that they've been talked about this year. And I, you know, I, I, I love that group of guys and I hope they can do it for sure. Cause, um, you know, the pieces are there and I know they can, you just gotta, you just gotta find a way to, you know, there's a lot of things that go to it, right? You gotta, you gotta stay healthy and you gotta get, you gotta get some bounces and you gotta have some things line up at the right time. So, um, yeah, I wish them the best luck and I think they've definitely earned the right to be talked about the way that they are. Stay in shape.

Don Waddell just might need a, uh, uh, you know, a veteran center slash forward to, uh, to kind of guide him through, uh, March, April, May, June. So just, uh, just stay in shape, sir. Uh, appreciate it. You tell him that you said that too. Okay.

You say, Hey, I got the guy for you. I'll do that. Uh, I appreciate your time. Good luck with the potty training. Uh, that is the first time I have said that at the end of a conversation on the radio, but there you go.

Uh, appreciate all of it. Let me tell you something then you don't know how, just how much intense work goes into making sure that he's on the party all day. What, wait, hold on. Was that a question for me? Like, uh, for, cause, cause I've been there. No, people that are in the interview, they don't understand if they, if they haven't gone through it and they're giggling that, Oh, look at, stop working on it. You know how much work it is and how you're, they are constantly being asked.

I'm sure he's sick of me asking them. This is the biggest break he's got is this 15 minutes that I've been talking to you. Hey man. Thank you very much for the time, Derek. I appreciate it.

We'll be hopefully we'll be in touch. It's like serious dad enough, enough. Yeah. I can only equate that with Biff. My fur baby, body training is a pain. Oh yes, yes it is. Yes it is. With a man with puppies. It is not, it is not easy.

I like it. It's the debate whether or not it's easier with a human than it is with a dog. Yeah. You can at least put diapers on babies. You can. Well, you probably could on a dog too, but you could, we actually tried not because of that. But the other thing is you can't put a baby in a cage. True. You could.

That's frowned upon. Theoretically you could. And you could argue that a crib in some ways is a cage. Yeah. Just an open one. An open air cage. Yes.