0307220383
DETROIT FREE PRESS
030722
Tuesday, July 22, 2003
METRO FINAL
1A
Photo
Steve Yzerman
HELENE ST. JAMES AND MITCH ALBOM FREE PRESS SPORTS WRITERS;
The Associated Press contributed
Copyright (c) 2003, Detroit Free Press
YZERMAN BACK FOR 21ST YEAR WITH WINGS
FAN FAVORITE IS CLOSING A 1-YEAR, $6-MILLION DEAL WITH INCENTIVES
Steve Yzerman's 21st season with the Red Wings is all but signed, sealed and
delivered.
Yzerman told the Free Press late Monday that he hadn't signed a contract yet
but "negotiations on the major issues are pretty much done. There's just some
details that we have to work out."
Hockeytown's Captain is so close to signing that a close friend, TV analyst
Darren Pang, reported on EPSN.com that Yzerman and the Wings had agreed to a
one-year deal with a base salary of $6 million. If incentives were reached,
the contract would equal the $8 million that Yzerman made last season, when
off-season knee surgery limited him to 16 games.
How would Pang know? For starters, he is close enough to Yzerman that after
the Wings won the Stanley Cup in 2002, he left Joe Louis Arena in Yzerman's
Range Rover. Yzerman drove; his wife, Lisa, rode shotgun; and Pang, a former
goalie for the Chicago Blackhawks, sat in the backseat, next to the Cup.
On Monday, Pang was at Yzerman's elbow again. The Captain told the rest of the
story:
"It's kinda weird the way this all happened. I'm up vacationing in Canada and
I was golfing with Darren Pang and he got a phone call from someone at
ESPN.com saying there was a report that I had signed a contract. They didn't
know he was sitting right next to me. He turned to me and said, 'Is that
true?' And I said, 'No.' But the report had a lot of details about the
contract, so I figured somebody told somebody something.
"Anyhow, I haven't signed anything formally yet. Logistically, it's a bit
difficult since Kenny (Holland) is out West and I'm up here and other people
are elsewhere. So we're just faxing each other."
General manager Ken Holland did not return a call, but Wings spokesman John
Hahn said: "We're making progress, but agreement on a contract has not been
completed."
Asked when his contract could be finished, Yzerman said: "Anytime between the
end of this week and September. It's just the logistics. The language just
needs to be worked out. And it will be."
Holland, in an interview Sunday with the Free Press, sounded as confident a
deal would be completed soon. "Steve and I have talked personally over the
past week, and we've made very good progress," Holland said. "We're going to
get it done."
Yzerman, who turned 38 in May, had two goals and six assists last season after
missing almost five months recovering from realignment surgery on his right
knee. His comeback, which yielded one assist in four playoff games, earned him
the NHL's Bill Masterton Memorial Trophy for perseverance, sportsmanship and
dedication to hockey.
His return for next season -- which never was in doubt even though he became
an unrestricted free agent July 1 -- helps shore up the Wings at center. They
lost Sergei Fedorov via unrestricted free agency to the Mighty Ducks over the
weekend.
Yzerman said he wasn't shocked that Fedorov left after 13 seasons with the
Wings. "I thought Anaheim was a possible place," he said, "even before they
lost (Paul) Kariya, just because Bryan Murray is the GM there and he knew
Sergei from his time here."
The Wings would like the option of playing Yzerman on the wing because it's
easier on his knee, and they remain hopeful of acquiring a center for one of
the top two lines in return for trading goaltender Curtis Joseph.
Yzerman has spent his entire NHL career with Detroit, scoring 660 goals among
1,670 points in 1,378 games and leading the team to three Stanley Cups.
Contact HELENE ST. JAMES at 313-222-2295 or stjames@freepress.com. The
Associated Press contributed to this report.
THIS ELECTRONIC VERSION MAY DIFFER SLIGHTLY FROM THE PRINTED ARTICLE.
STEVE YZERMAN;2003;CNTRACT;SPT;HOCKEY;RED WINGS