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The Chad LaRose blog

September 24, 2013, 11:55 AM ET [12 Comments]
Matt Karash
Carolina Hurricanes Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
I will get back to the business at hand of trying to round out a 2013-14 Carolina Hurricanes roster either tonight or tomorrow but am taking a break for something else important.

I originally drafted this story about 2 months ago when it became pretty clear from interviews with Canes GM Jim Rutherford that Chad LaRose would not be returning to the Carolina Hurricanes. But it felt premature to post sort of a farewell story before Larose had officially signed to play somewhere else. So feeling like I am both early and late at the same time in posting this, I guess it is as good of a time as any to finally put this up despite the lack of certain finality with Chad LaRose’s tenure as a Carolina Hurricane. And just maybe the karma of it will get him his next professional hockey contract. If nothing else, someone needs to do a better job of giving LaRose credit for his contributions to the franchise compared to the strange article posted in the N&O that read more like a troubled missing person report than what I think LaRose deserved.

Personally, I found it fitting that Chad LaRose’s exit was timed almost perfectly with the wonderful Sergey Tolchinksy story from this summer. You can find that _HERE if you missed it. Chad LaRose was a fairly rare undrafted free agent who faced the challenge of being an undersized scorer who therefore did not make it high enough in the scouts’ rankings despite being a very good junior level player. Chad LaRose of course made the climb all the way to the NHL just like Tolchinsky will try to do. Somewhere along the way LaRose became arguably the 2nd greatest lightning rod for organization frustration (Paul Maurice being #1) when things were not going well. The issue with Larose was not that he was not a good player during his days but rather that I just do not think he was ever truly a 1st or 2nd line NHL player. But he seemed to keep finding himself there when the organization failed to develop enough internal depth to fill out the top half of the roster with top-tier young talent.

But especially in retrospect, I think it is a shame to remember Chad LaRose for what he was not instead of what he was.

Chad LaRose was an underdog in the greatest sense. He was NEVER supposed to play in the NHL. He was too small and per the scouting reports just not a good enough hockey player. In his draft year, 210 players were drafted. He was not one of them. It could be argued that the primary reason he even got a shot at all was because he was a good citizen in the Peter Karmanos hockey operation coming up through juniors with Karmanos’ Plymouth Whalers.

He started his professional career at the ECHL level that most of the better prospects never see. Despite his size and draft situation, like Sergey Tolchinsky this summer, he never missed a beat. He just showed up and played solid hockey continuing his scoring at the lower levels of the minor leagues and quickly made the jump the AHL. But even at that stage, it is not like he was vaulting up the prospect rankings lists for the Hurricanes organization.

Coming out of the cancelled 2004-05 season and into the 2005-06 training camp, there were plenty of story lines for hockey-starved Canes fans to latch onto. There were literally a bunch of new veterans (Gerber, FKaberle, Commodore, Stillman, Whitney, Cullen) in camp from the not 1 but 2 off-seasons. There were 3 first round picks to watch in Eric Staal who played the full 2003-04 season in Raleigh before spending the lockout in the AHL, rising young goalie Cam Ward and Andrew Ladd who was the #4 pick in the 2004 draft. As training camp started, very few Canes fans would have even known who Chad LaRose was. But those who attended the preseason scrimmages and games could not help noticing him. My first memory of Chad LaRose was at the Red-White scrimmage that fall. There was this undersized guy who I had not even heard of who just seemed to always either have the puck or be doing his darndest to make things miserable for whoever on the other team did. I do not think he scored much, if at all, that preseason, but if you watched the games he was just a full-bore pesky, difficult player to play against. When training camp was all said and done, the numbers game with a limited number of roster spots saw LaRose sent to the AHL to play for Lowell Lock Monsters, but the impression had been made with the team’s coaching staff.

It was not long until he was recalled from the AHL to begin an improbable 7-year run as a Carolina Hurricane. His speed, quickness and uncanny ability to win one-on-one battles even against bigger players through pure desire and scrappiness was a great fit for Laviolette’s system. In this new NHL that outlawed the old school holding, hooking and other general obstruction to hinder faster players, suddenly players who could skate had the upperhand. LaRose spent most of the next couple months playing on a line with veterans Ray Whitney and Matt Cullen. The Canes skated Brind’Amour’s (early on with Kahnberg or Ladd at LW and Williams at RW) line as a checking line (with scoring) against the other team’s best. Stillman/EStaal/Cole were the top scoring line. And Laviolette adeptly picked perfect situations where he could get the skating and skilled line of Whitney/Cullen/LaRose on the ice against skating mismatches in bumbling old NHL 4th-liners and 3rd pairing defensemen. And with LaRose in the role of puck winner, this undersized group feasted on opponents who could not skate the new NHL game. When Canes GM Jim Rutherford went all in leading up to the trade deadline bringing in Doug Weight and Mark Recchi, LaRose moved down the depth chart. In the playoffs he saw fewer minutes on a 4th line with Kevyn and Craig Adams, but the line was sound defensively when needed and LaRose also filled an important role on the penalty kill. By the end of the season Chad LaRose had gone from an unknown and an unlikely to a regular NHL player and one with his name on the Stanley Cup.

From here I could go on to detail Chad LaRose’s statistical career as a Hurricane. His best season was probably his 2008-09 campaign where he came up just short of 20 goals, notching 19, finishing with 31 points and also playing a significant role in the team’s surprise playoff run scoring 11 points in 18 playoff games that spring. But doing a rundown of his Chad LaRose’s statistical accomplishments as a Carolina Hurricane misses the point. Career stats are not what defined him. What defined Chad LaRose’s years as a Hurricane was who he was as a person, his personality, his character, his work ethic, and what he meant to the fan base. After a Stanley Cup win it is not uncommon to see a bunch of newly minted jerseys on the backs of fans soon thereafter. And there were a huge number of great options. You had rising stars Eric Staal and Cam Ward. You had new veteran heroes in Ray Whitney, Cory Stillman and Matt Cullen. You had the hilarious personality and robe-wearing newsmaker in Mike Commodore. Of course you had the captains Rod Brind’Amour, Glen Wesley and Kevyn Adams plus a couple other veterans (Bret Hedican, Aaron Ward) who had now been part of 2 Stanley Cup finals runs. But not to be crowded out by the bigger stars were the number of #59 jerseys that were part of the mix. Sure there are newer options, but I continue to see Chad LaRose jerseys at PNC Arena. Maybe what is most telling for me personally is that I now put those jerseys in the category of “Canes nostalgia” not just a random former player jersey.

After the 2005-06 season, Chad LaRose grew as a fan favorite.
--His after-the-whistle yapping at anyone and everyone to stir the pot endeared him with fans.
--His personality and regular part in some of the fun behind the scenes stuff (taking verbal shots at Mike Commodore and others a in joking way, etc.) further made him a likeable guy.
--His “second only to Brind’Amour” work ethic also endeared him to fans. He later became 1 of the unofficial “Camp Brind’Amour” leaders after the captain’s retirement.

I guess one could make a case that Chad LaRose is leaving the franchise on a bit of a down note after 3 consecutive playoff misses by the team and a declining role for himself. But I think this is clearly one of those situations where it just takes a little bit of time for the tension to settle down, any negativity to fade into the background and broader perspective of the full 7 years that Chad LaRose wore a Canes uniform to set in.

I have no idea where Chad LaRose’s hockey career goes from here, but I appreciate the significant role that he played in building the Carolina Hurricanes franchise and the important lore tied as much to people as accomplishments.

Either tonight or tomorrow, I will put up a poll to select a winner for my first annual “Chad LaRose Story of the Summer” award to be selected by die-hard Canes fans who track the team even during the offseason and given to the player that most exemplifies the qualities of succeeding (or even just making a darn good try) as an underdog. Fittingly, it is a great summer of those types of stories.

Twitter=@CarolinaMatt63

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