Kyle Keefe

The 2-Day Sneak-Away

The NHL All Star Game was in Ottawa. I was in El Cajon, California. It was a quick getaway with the boys, enjoying the sun, playing some golf, and remembering what it feels like to be young. These are the journey’s I will never forget. 

Most people my age have families,  a wife and kids, a job that is demanding, the hours are long and if you live in Denver, a few days in the sun playing golf can be just what the body and soul needs. The plane ride out is always one of great anticipation. The flights seem shorter, the energy is peaking, and the beer seems colder. 

On the way back, it’s completely opposite. The flights can’t be longer, bumpier, the energy is at an all time low, and anything besides water in your body seems like a stupid idea. But I will say this, we all need trips like this to remind us who our friends are, what relationships we’ve created over the years, and what buddies will be there for you in the best and the worst of times. 

Jon, Kevin, Dave and myself played golf for two days and reminisced on the good old days growing up in Wyoming. We laughed, ate and slept without a care in the world. Now Monday morning, a new schedule of work, responsibility and commitments to the family around me, I look back at it with only good memories and a lighter wallet. Love your wife and kids with all that you are, but if you get the chance to do the 2-Day Sneak-Away…jump on it, it’s well worth it.

 

Silence Is Good For The Soul

The television is on as we cook dinner. The radio is cranked as we drive our cars. Streaming audio at our desks, iPods steam into our skulls as we run, and the internet is always alive on our phones.

What happened to some peace and quiet? When is the last time you sat somewhere with nothing to capture your thoughts but silence? I am just as guilty as the next guy, I always have some sort of information link, feeding my brain, telling me what to think, sing, or doodle about. It’s a cultural disease that’s got us wrapped up in a pool of misguided thoughts that we don’t need. We don’t need the switch turned ON every waking moment of every day. Jack Johnson tells the same story in a song he wrote (which is ironic because I want you to turn the music off for a bit) about everyone just “slowing down”…

Brushfire fairytales 
Itsy bitsy diamond whales
Big fat hurricanes 
Yellow bellied given names 
Well shortcuts can slow you down 
And in the end we're bound 
To rebound off of we 

Well dust off your thinking caps 
Solar powered plastic plants 
Pretty pictures of things we ate 
We are only what we hate 
But in the long run we have found 
Silent films are full of sound 
Inaudibly free 

Slow down everyone 
You're moving too fast 
Frames can't catch you when 
You're moving like that

So do yourself a favor, slow down. Take a deep breath. Stare at the sky and everything in it. Watch a tree out your window. Clear your mind for five minutes and hear yourself living in a world of peace and quiet. Trust me, the world will not slow down around you, but you might just gain a step on the world by letting it pass you by for a moment.

Bring on the Patriots! Did I just say that?

f your hand hurts, you’re probably not alone. You are a Bronco fan.

I celebrated my 39^th birthday on Sunday with family and friends at my house watching Denver take on the highly favored Pittsburgh Steelers. What started out as an informal gathering, a few dips, beverages, and pizza, turned into Wrestle Mania 2012. The outcome of the game speaks for itself, but what happened inside millions of homes across the country cannot. I must elaborate.

Picture this: Grown men huddled around a flat screen in one room, 9 maniac children running amuck up the stairs, out the front door, in the back door, while the wives gathered around the island in the kitchen to catch up on all the “He said-She said” stuff around town. Down 6-0 after the first quarter, the room remained intact, and the atmosphere was somber as expected. As the game continued, the mood obviously changed, the blood pressure increased, layers of clothing including jerseys of one #15 became more visible. Strangers became friends and the hand slapping started, and then it became more violent with every offensive drop by the opponent, and the miscues on special teams. The Home team was in this thing. The Fourth Quarter.  By now, plates were not used for the pizza, slices of pepperoni just hung from the beards of many respectful men, runs to the cooler were now perfectly timed at commercial breaks, and the bathroom was just too far and way too risky at this juncture of the game. Overtime. You could hear a pin drop at the moment of the first snap……and then……it began.

Like a scene from Braveheart, men, women and children rose to their feet, running through the halls of the house, screaming and hugging one another. Two of my friends threw themselves through the front window….car sirens went off, the kitchen was on fire, as the dogs dropped from the chimney to join the chaos. Ok, maybe not, but it was anarchy.

The next morning my right hand was bruised from the insane high-fiving, the low-fiving, the “I’m stronger than you” handshake. All part of the magic of what happened in downtown Denver on Sunday afternoon. Regardless of what happens this weekend in New England, I’m proud of what this team has done, not just one man, but what the collective efforts of an organization and its’ members have done.

“There's no substitute for guts.”
-- Paul "Bear" Bryant

From Scrappin’ to Scooters

I’ve worked with a lot of different characters over the years, but no one can compare to Mark Rycroft.

He was born July 12, 1978 in Penticton, British Columbia and spent the better part of his days playing hockey. He spent 3 seasons playing for the Pioneers here in Denver and time in the NHL with the St. Louis Blues, and more notably the Colorado Avalanche. In his days with the Burgandy and Blue, he became my “go to guy”. You know, the one guy in the locker room that is going to give you the straight answer, no bull, just the truth. He was always fun to see after practice, a big win at Pepsi Center, or even a tough loss to a divisional rival. He always had good answers regardless of the outcome. We were buddies. Heck, he even cleaned my teeth on an episode of Avalanche All Access (although I’m pretty sure he wrecked a few cuspids from my five minutes in the chair). His NHL numbers go like this: 226 games played, 21 goals, 25 assists for 46 points, 6 fights and 113 penalty minutes. Don’t let the numbers fool you, if it’s spunk you are looking for, he’s got it.

Nowadays, he owns “Scooters on Broadway”. Mark runs the shop that boasts the Schwinn Laguna, Sport and Manhattan 200. I know, I don’t understand what any of that means either, but it takes up the majority of his time, when he’s not doing color for the Pioneer Radio Broadcasts or being the Studio Analyst for Colorado Avalanche games…which brings me to my story. Mark Rycroft might be the single most interesting man on the planet. I know what you’re thinking, that guy with the grey beard that climbs Mt. Everest and rides monkeys through the Sahara while drinking Dos Equis XX already has that title…not so fast. All you have to do is watch one hockey game with Ryker, and you’ll know what I mean.

Here’s a few little things I have noticed about him over the past two weeks, you tell me if I am crazy…

1. Don’t even think about touching his makeup. That little compact of powder to him… is like what the blanket is to Linus.
2. His “clips” are like his unborn child. He loves those hidden plays in the game more than life itself. If our server went down, he’d melt right on set.
3. Some of the things that come out of his mouth should be made into t-shirts. “Where mum keeps the peanut butter”, and “that guy is a total wimp” and “He should be knocked on his butt”.
4. He drinks 14 cups of Lipton tea during any given game and never uses the bathroom.
5. His cell phone was made in 1998.
6. He’s a Google freak. Say any name, within five seconds, he’s typing it up on HockeyFights.com, HockeyDb.com, or the last resort NHL.com. If there’s some scoop on somebody, he knows it.
7. He fought Dan Carcillo without knowing that Dan Carcillo beats up people for a living. He said it was the scariest 33 seconds of his life.
8. He loves to golf, but can only play on Sunday’s between 12 and 2. I know, it’s neat. He needs a membership at “Harvard Gulch”.
9. He’s more concerned about his shirt-tie combination than Joan Rivers is about the Red Carpet.
10. Behind closed doors, and certainly not on the air, he talks like an old school hockey player. Trust me, it’s hilarious, I need a thesaurus just to de-code his sentences.

People love to watch him on television for a lot of reasons, but I think the biggest reason is that he is REAL. He says what a lot of you are thinking. His brutal honesty is refreshing. His character is a breath of fresh air. His knowledge of the game is unbelievable. So here’s my little cheer to Scooter boy…I love working with you Ryker, you’re one of a kind.