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<\/p>\nThe days leading up to NHL free agency are always a whirlwind. When the market officially opens each year, at noon ET on July 1, teams, players and agents alike all have to be ready to make major life decisions in a matter of hours.<\/p>\n
So as that day approached this year, former Coyotes, Red Wings and Blue Jackets winger Christian Fischer noticed that he had a couple of missed calls from his agent, Craig Oster of Newport Sports Management \u2014 who was no doubt wanting to plan for those decisions.<\/p>\n
What Oster didn\u2019t know was that Fischer\u2019s decision had already been made: he is retiring from the NHL after nine seasons and 523 games, at the age of 28.<\/p>\n
At his age, Fischer could have had plenty of good professional playing years ahead of him, in his role as a trusted checker, penalty-killer and locker room glue guy. But increasingly, he had found himself being pulled in another direction.<\/p>\n
\u201cOver the last couple years, I think I just look at my life and what makes me happy, and being around family and kind of my life in Scottsdale \u2014 some of my friends here are really close with me, and I have a pretty small group out here, and honestly it\u2019s just more so a decision of moving on into another chapter of my life,\u201d Fischer said on a phone call Thursday night. \u201cI wish there was a big reasoning why, but in the end, I\u2019m very thankful for the career I had, but just personally I think I know it\u2019s time for a new chapter in my life.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fischer wasn\u2019t ready to share specifics about that next chapter publicly just yet, beyond that he\u2019s moving on to a business opportunity in the golf world with a close friend in Arizona.<\/p>\n
Fitting for an NHL role player, Fischer would have been content to simply fade into the background as he moved on from the sport. But in making this decision \u2014 \u00a0an uncommon one for a player so young \u2014 he also wanted to say \u201cthank you to all my teammates, and trainers and coaches.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m very thankful for all the people I\u2019ve come across, and I\u2019d tell you right now: I didn\u2019t get here on my own,\u201d Fischer said. \u201cIt makes me look back and just appreciate the whole journey, and it makes me very thankful for it all.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fischer grew up in Chicago and played for the U.S. National Team Development Program en route to being the 32nd pick in 2015 NHL Draft. He made his NHL debut for the Arizona Coyotes at 19. The following season, the 6-foot-2 forward scored 15 goals and 33 points in a breakout campaign at age 20.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Christian Fischer celebrates a goal in 2017. (Christian Petersen \/ Getty Images)<\/p>\n
Soon, though, Fischer realized that his path to carving out an NHL career was probably not going to be that of a goal scorer. He viewed himself as a player of average skill, average skating \u2014 \u201cpretty much average in everything,\u201d Fischer said. \u201cYou had to work your butt off, and you had to find a way to impact the game in whatever way.\u201d<\/p>\n
He looks back on his younger days in Arizona, and the lessons he took from Coyotes\u2019 veterans, such as Brad Richardson and Derek Stepan, in guiding him to what eventually became his calling card as a pro.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey kind of sat me down after my second or third year and just said, \u2018hey, listen, everybody wants to score 20 goals, everyone wants to be on the power play, but if you\u2019re not doing that, your time in this league\u2019s going to be cut short pretty quickly,\u201d Fischer said. \u201cI remember being young, just going into the (penalty kill) meetings in Arizona, I wasn\u2019t even PKing, just to learn the systems just in case that opportunity ever called. And wouldn\u2019t you know it, a couple years later, that was my role, that was what I loved to do. Just the little details of the game, and just being a good teammate and just doing the little mucky things.\u201d<\/p>\n
That side of the game doesn\u2019t come with much glamor. It also doesn\u2019t come with the biggest pay days. But Fischer was OK with all that.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s never why I played hockey,\u201d he said. \u201cThat had no meaning to me, and that\u2019s probably why I was very OK with making kind of that career move and career adjustment, to just once again finding a way to make an impact in a game, and have a career.\u201d<\/p>\n
When he left Arizona in 2023 as a free agent, he signed in Detroit and became a relied-upon matchup player for the Red Wings, often on a line with Michael Rasmussen and Andrew Copp. He was a natural fit, and drew praise for what are often unheralded contributions in that role.<\/p>\n
\u201cWinning seems to always look the same: you need the top-end guys, but you need those guys in the trenches. And he\u2019s one of those guys in the trenches,\u201d former Red Wings coach Derek Lalonde said of Fischer in 2024. \u201cHe\u2019s the best energy we have: vocal, very positive. \u2026 You need that.\u201d<\/p>\n
For all those reasons, it made sense that Oster was once again prepping to field offers for Fischer in the lead-up to July 1 this year. But when Fischer finally got back to him on June 30, he broke the news to his agent that he was ready to embrace the parts of his life outside of hockey.<\/p>\n
Certainly, Fischer has loved being in the NHL \u2014\u00a0\u201cthe road trips, and the dinners, and grinding with the boys, games, practices, whatever it is. I love that, and I\u2019ve always been happy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
But playing the sport professionally is also not the entirety of how he sees himself as a person.<\/p>\n
\u201cProbably in the last year or two, I\u2019ve really thought about just kind of what I want to do with my life, and what makes me happy, and spending time with my friends and family,\u201d Fischer said. \u201cAnd obviously, listen, I know if I were to play another five or six years, I could do that when I\u2019m 34, 35, I understand that. \u2026 It\u2019s what makes me happy, and it\u2019s what I want to do, and I\u2019ve got a great business opportunity to (pursue) and be around my family more, and just basically move on that way.\u201d<\/p>\n
There are all kinds of small sacrifices that NHL players make during the season, but now, Fischer said, he will be able to spend holidays with his family every year. His sister is pregnant, and Fischer is looking forward to being home and seeing his second nephew come into the world. He can spend more time with his parents, and take his dad to play in golf tournaments.<\/p>\n
His dad made a hole-in-one earlier this week, Fischer said.<\/p>\n
When he sat his family down in the last couple of months and let them know what he was thinking, \u201cthey were ecstatic,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Of course, there are things he will miss about the NHL. He\u2019ll miss playing the games, and being in the locker room after a win. He\u2019s always been one to prompt the team group chat to get together before dinner on the road, and will miss the camaraderie, whether the team was winning or struggling. He might miss that part even more. He\u2019s proud that he reached (and then surpassed) the 500-game milestone in the league this past season.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you told me that when I was 10 years old, \u2018you\u2019re going to play 500 games in the NHL,’\u201d Fischer said, \u201cI would be the happiest kid you\u2019ve ever seen.\u201d<\/p>\n
And now, 523 games later, he\u2019s at peace with his decision to walk away.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust very, very thankful,\u201d Fischer said. \u201cI think that\u2019s the biggest thing is just thanking all the people that have been involved, all the way from media to trainers to coaches, players, family, friends, everybody. \u2026 I\u2019m so, so grateful to have experienced this with so many people. I guess that\u2019s my biggest wish, is that I got to make a lot of people happy and smile, and when they got to see me skate on the ice, I hope I made them proud.\u201d<\/p>\n
(Top photo: Dave Reginek \/ NHLI via Getty Images)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The days leading up to NHL free agency are always a whirlwind. When the market officially opens each…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":38338,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[3110,2993,293,62,67,132,68,2082],"class_list":{"0":"post-38337","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-columbus-blue-jackets","9":"tag-detroit-red-wings","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-unitedstates","14":"tag-us","15":"tag-utah-mammoth"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114795582572237558","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38337","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38337"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38337\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/38338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38337"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38337"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38337"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}