Lee Norwood-NHL A Tough Road Back

Mike Hartman, performance mindset strategist. This is Develop the Mindset of a Champion with former Stanley cup champion Mike Hartman.

Hello and welcome to another episode. Before I introduce our guests, I just want to be mindful of everybody as we are going through these tough times and I'm excited to do this, but again, I just really want you to enjoy this. And let's put everything behind us. We have a great guest today. His name is Lee Norwood. Lee was drafted 62nd overall in 1979 by the Quebec Nordics. Now for you young people, that's the Colorado Avalanche. Today, Lee also played with the Washington Capitals, the St. Louis Blues. We have a lot of Detroit Red Wings fans here. Lee, I know for sure you played for the Detroit Red Wings, New Jersey Devils, Hartford Whalers, and the Calgary Flames. And before I get a little bit into this, like every story has a struggle. So we love doing these stories. We're going to listen to Lee. Lee fought through some of these struggles. He had adversity going on in his everyday life and today we're happy to have him. Lee, great to have you. The listeners would really love to hear your story.

Well, thank you, Mike. It's great to be here and share some time with you. This is new for me, the podcast. I'm not technically savvy, so to speak, but we'll do the best we can to share some insights. I grew up down river, Trenton, Michigan, a neighbor of yours actually, and learned to play hockey there in Trenton with the Trenton Hockey Association. And then as I grew, grew up, I gravitated towards the Little Caesars program. And I was very fortunate to be the first Little Caesars prospect to actually play for the Illage owned Detroit Red Wings in man, that would have been in 85, 6, I think it was. But yeah, growing up there, I had a lot of fun, a lot of friends, a lot of fond memories back home in Detroit and Trenton. And it's just great to be here with you today. So let's get started.

That's great. Well, it's so great because I knew you growing up just because of the whole Little Caesars things. And I'm going to get into that a little bit. You know, I, I want to talk to you a little bit about that later. But I also know some of the struggles you endured because we talked years ago and you mentioned you may have had a father figure in your life, but you didn't have a father growing up. And can you talk about that a little bit?

Well, right. I was born in San Francisco, Oakland, California, and then I moved to Michigan when I was very young. I was three years old, never knew my father. We came to Michigan with my grandparents, my grandmother and grandfather and my two sisters, my mom and my mom's sister. This would have been in 63. So grew up there. And you know, I got introduced to hockey actually at a PTA meeting my mother was at. She was a teacher at Flat Rock High School. And a gentleman by the name of Del Galliferous approached my mother and said, you know, I know your son doesn't have a dad. Maybe it'd be good to be around the boys and play some hockey. You know, we're from California at that point. So they knew nothing about hockey and put a hockey stick in my hand. So. Oh yeah, he shoots left handed and off we go. But you know, it was great. Tell you a quick story. My first time on the ice, my mom goes out to Corvettes, which was a department store back then that's dating how old I am. But she went to Corvette, bought me a pair of skates. You know, she just thought they were top of the line. Ends up being made out of cardboard. And I sat on the fence and just cried. Basically my feet hurt so bad. Del Gal Ferro took me out to the store the next day and bought me a pair of bower skates. And after that I never grabbed on the fence again. And I was off and gone. But you know, it was neat growing up in that atmosphere with a lot of kids that loved the game. We just absolutely. It wasn't just on the rink, we were playing in the park once the part the ponds froze over and everything else. We were 24 7, skating and playing hockey in that town. But one thing I will tell you is when I was growing up, it was, you know, you talk about struggles and not really knowing where they fit in, but everybody else had their dads tying up their skates and there I was, my mom was tying up my skates. So it always. There was something different there. And you know, it was always, you know, you can't put a finger on it as a child looking back at my life, I know it was one of the things that drove me, you know, I wasn't going to be a mom and a boy, even though I love my mom, you know, God rest your soul, you know, more than anything in the world. But I was not going to be a mama's boy. And at some points I took it too far. But I had to make sure that wasn't ever the case.

Well, you end up having A great career. But we all start somewhere. And I tell this, no matter any sport you play, any job you have, you work your way up. And you were always known as that character type of player. But I'm going to backtrack a little bit. And you left home to go play in the Quebec Hockey League. So for people that don't know, you have the Quebec League, the Ontario Hockey League, the Western League, or you end up going to college to play. But once you play in those other leagues, you pretty much lose your eligibility. But you went during a time when it was the French and English war. So what was your mindset like? You're a young guy leaving home in Detroit, you were living with your mom, you go all the way to Quebec to play and you're in the middle of all that chaos. What was your mindset? What were you thinking? Were you nervous?

Oh, well, that's interesting you bring that up because when I went up to Hull, there was a Hall of Fame defenseman, Marcel Conable, who was coaching and general manager of the Hull Olympics at the time, and they drafted me as an underage midget with little Caesars. And my mom went up and you know, my thought was everybody, you know, if you want to play in the NHL, you had to go to Canada prior to the 1980 Olympic victory that the college kids won. And deservingly so you went to Canada if you wanted to play pro. And my mom always used to tell stories, you know, Lee, when you were 8 years old, you telling people you're going to be a pro hockey player. And everybody would say, oh that's so cute, that's really nice. And then when you were 12 and 13 and you were still saying you're going to be a pro hockey player, everyone said, well Mrs. Norwood, you might want to get him some help and maybe change his thinking. Because back then not a lot of Americans were able to make that step into the NHL. So when I was drafted into Hull, we knew very little about what was going on with the French and English divide at that time. And Hull is right across the river from Ottawa, which is the natural capital of Canada. And oh, what a, what an eye opening event happened. You know, I was getting attacked in school and everything else just because I was English. I didn't even get to tell them I was an American, not just English, but I was American and I wasn't involved in their stuff. But after that, after that year, it was one of those things, I didn't want to be part of that any longer. And I went To Oshawa. And so that. That was kind of an interesting transition. But in Oshawa, I really went. Was lucky. I had great teammates and I was able to, you know, kind of blossom as a player and as a defenseman and, you know, got drafted that year.

Oh, that's. That's fantastic. And I. Did you ever get to skate in Ottawa on the canal that.

Absolutely. We used to practice out there.

That is unbelievable. So you go across and it's pretty incredible. That canal is beautiful the way it's set up. I don't know how many miles is it? 10, 15 miles?

I can't tell you. I don't know the exact number, but it was long. And when he's doing wind sprints and laps in that. And it just keeps going on and on and on. And Marcel Pronovo left Hull weeks after I got there. So my idol, one of my hockey legends, left. And the reason I went to home left. And. And then we got a coach, Guy Trottier, and he spoke very, very little English. So there were three or four of us Americans on the team at that time. And we're all kind of going like, now what do we do? And, you know, we just follow the rest of the guys when we start skating laps up and down that canal. It was crazy.

Well, yeah, you were one of the first people to leave. And it was tough for Americans back then. If you look at the draft, I mean, it used to be that, like, I know, like in my day, like in 86, I think like 8% of the players in the National Hockey League were American and the majority were Canadian. Then you had a few people come from. It wasn't even Russia back then that until, like, probably, I think the. The little bit of the late late 80s, but we had people from, you know, we had Fin, you know, Finn, Swedes. And it was tough. If you were an American player, you really had to scrap your way in. So you paved the way. And in fact, I remember there was a book that came out in Detroit of all the players that played in the national hockey. Little Caesars had a book. So it showed all the college players. There was a lot of guys on that list. Then you look at the junior players. There was a handful of OHL players. I remember back in the day in Little Caesars. And then the pros, it was so miniscule. They had, well, John Van Biesbruck. And you're one of them. And I have to ask if you had any influencers along the way in Detroit.

Well, you know what I did. I grew up and I lived down river, which is south of Detroit, and I used to go to Gross Point. And my mother. I was 14 years old. My mother was driving me up to Grosse Pointe to skate on Monday night with. There was a guy named Gary Morrison who played for Philadelphia, a guy named Craig Rail, who, you know, still dear friends with to this day. Rick Palmer, who was a goaltender, I think it was you, University of Michigan, Billy Lecane, who had a stint in Pittsburgh. But my mother was driving me up to the growth point. And so these guys were a lot of, you know, influential people, and they were on the edge of playing pro hockey. And, you know, and then Chris Corey was the one who actually invited me, and he smiled when he. When I mentioned Chris. You know, Chris was really huge influence in my. In my career and getting to where I got to, you know, he was my coaching digits with Little Caesars.

We.

He promoted me as a player, which was. Which was wonderful, and tried to get me all the opportunities that he could to be exposed. We played in a lot of Canadian tournaments and that were riddled with NHL junior scout that, you know, we're looking for young talent, and that's kind of where I got. But, you know, from when I really got serious about the game and figured that, you know, I got a chance, you know, Chris was really influential in that regard.

Well, the reason I smile is I had a note I wrote down, and I put down Chris Corey because, you know, he really helped us so much. Like, when you're a young guy, and I came from, really double A, played a little Triple A the next year and struggled, you know, I struggled as a player. I would go. Chris would tell me to go right, I'd go left. We would do these drills. But he had patience with me until he said, we'll just say. He said, ah, jiminy crickets, Mike, come on. Go the other way. But he really taught me the game, like, because we never did breakouts. We never were. We weren't taught that stuff. We were taught, okay, three guys up the ice, you get a shot, you go to the net. But Chris was one of the first guys that really educated us on the game. And when he was at the rink, he was a really. He was tough. He was tough on us, made sure we executed our passes, make sure everything went smooth, but we were done in the room. He was a friend with everybody. When we would go on our tournaments, we had a tournament in Hull, Quebec, with Chris. He would take us to Hall. He would take us different parts and the one thing that he wanted us to do is have culture. So he would go, okay, we're going to Quebec, we're going to hall, but we're going to walk around the city. We're going to Calgary, but we're all going to go skiing. That's the first time I ever went skiing in my life. So I could talk about Chris Quarry all day in the development that he had with us. And I, you know, I, I understand exactly where you are with that.

Yeah, Chris was, you know, a huge part of it, like you said, in the skills. He was really, really, you know, wasn't so worried about this, you know, the strategy to break out the vortex, things like that. He was worried about the skills, the skating, the passing, the shooting, you know, the moving the puck that are open guy, finding that open man, wherever it might be. And that was one of the things we worked on relentlessly with Chris.

Well, yeah, I agree with you because he looked at Everybody. We had 20 players on the team and everybody was equal. He just wanted you to work hard. He didn't favor anybody. He made sure everybody developed and we could talk enough about, we could talk about Chris all day long and definitely. But so I got to ask you, like, so do you have any regrets because your name was brought up a lot to play for the 1980 Olympic team that they talk about so much today and what they did, you know, Lee Norwood was like, what I remember was Lee Norwood was a shoe in to play on that Olympic team. They needed a guy like Lee Norwood to play on the 1980 team. So do you have any regrets about that or.

Well, I don't tell many people this story, but I'll share it with you here. 1980, I was 20 years old. Okay. So that was my, quote, unquote, Olympic year. This is before all the professional athletes got involved and got invited to the Olympics. Back then I was playing juniors In Canada, making $60 a week, food money, just for an opportunity to play pro. And when they were picking the team, I played on a. There was a tryouts during the summer of that prior year and we played against all the, you know, Mike Ramsey's and the Ken Morrows and the Christians and all, you know, the Broughton boys and all of that. And this was all my contemporary guys. And then they said, no, Lee, you're a pro because you're playing juniors in Canada. You can't play in the 1980 Olympics. And then they went on and what a great team, what a great story. But then they went on to win the gold. So that was one of the hard things to swallow, that I didn't get that chance to play on that team. And after that, I really didn't have much to do with USA Hockey at that point. You know, rightly or wrongly, it was just one of those bitter pills to swallow.

Well, then you turned pro in 1980. Yes. What was that experience like? So that was your first year pro?

Correct, that was. I turned pro in 1980, right after the Olympics. And, you know, guys like Kenny Morrow and the. Broughton, Neil Broughton, Dave Christian, you know, Silk, a lot of these kids came right out of the Olympics, stepped right into the NHL as I finished my last year. Juniors the following year. You know, I look at a guy like Kenny Morrow, who I just absolutely, you know, what a wonderful guy. Example of a professional player, you know, consummate pro. But he steps out winning an Olympic gold, steps right into four Stanley cup championships. You know, I always said, oh, that could have been me. That could have been me, you know, but Kenny was a heck of a hockey player. But, you know, when I turned pro again, I'm back up in Quebec City now, turning pro. The gentleman who drafted me was Jacques demers in the 79 draft in 1980, he gets fired. All of a sudden, I get another new coach, Michelle Bergeron, who was. When I was in Hull, he was coaching in Three Rivers, and, you know, he asked me to come play with. When I said I wasn't going back to HUL Quebec, he asked me to go play in Three Rivers with him. And I said, no, I'm not going to do this anymore. I'm going to play in the Ontario League because I had that option being an American, I had that option and jumped through a few hoops and they allowed me to move. But he always. He kind of resented the fact that I wouldn't go play for him. So when now all of a sudden he's my coach in Quebec, I get called up to a game in Philadelphia, didn't play a shift the whole game. And then Michelle Bergeron walks behind me as I'm doing my hair. When I had hair, he walks behind me and he says, you remember me from. And he had broken English. He said, you remember me from Three Rivers? And I said, oh, yeah? And he said, good. And he just walked away. And we never spoke again. That was it. That was the last time I spoke to him. And then, you know, the following year when I was in the Miners, I was. My coach was Brian Murray and Hershey at that point. So I was going back and forth with Quebec my first year, and then next year, Brian Murray got hired by Washington and traded for me. And I played the second half of the season in Washington and put up good numbers, 26 games or whatever it was. I think I had 17 points, 125 minutes in penalties and, you know, playing, you know, typical game that I like to play and. But then again, you know, injuries, I was. I always struggled with injuries, always like you, Mike, you know, we aren't heavyweight, you know, but we try to play in that heavyweight role and when we have to. And it was. It took a toll on the body, for sure.

Well, you really had a hard time staying healthy. I was going to talk to you about that, because every time I would look at the. The rosters, I remember playing against you. You've had so many injuries, and in professional hockey, you played 500 games in the National Hockey League in a lot of years. But the question I have is how did you stay mentally strong during these injuries? Because the hardest thing, when you get hurt, then you have the rehab, you have to come back. So how did you stay mentally strong during all this?

Well, I'll take you back. I was 18 years old and I came back from junior and I got a job at the Chrysler engine plant for the summer and working in the plant, and at that point, about a month and a half into it, I decided I was never, ever going to do that job. I was never going to work in the plant, and I was going to do whatever I had to do to make sure that I played professional hockey wasn't a job to me, it was just a game. I just absolutely enjoyed the game so much. So when you got hurt, I always reverted back to, what else are you going to do? Pull yourself up, put it back together, train as hard as you got to do and give back. You know, there was. There's 1982, I got jumped outside of a restaurant bar in Georgetown, Washington, by three guys, was almost killed. I ended up in the ICU of Georgetown University Hospital, right where Ronald Reagan, when he was shot, right next door to that room. And, you know, what are you going to do? The first thing I remember after that incident was a phone call from Roger Crozier, then GM of the Washington capital, saying, well, we got to make the team now after such a good second half of the season the prior year. And I struggled again, you know, but it was one of those things that until I got, you know, until I got back to where I wanted to be, you know, I was going to do whatever it takes to get there. Whether it was training, rehabbing, focusing on my hockey and trying to become a better hockey player.

So this is what I wanted to talk with you about. This is one reason I really wanted to have you on. Because it's stories to develop the mindset of a champion. And it doesn't mean winning the championship. I keep saying, oh, it's all about winning the championship. Yeah, I have a lot of guys that won championships, but it's nothing to do with that. It's about having the perseverance and the fighting you to always get ahead. And what I remember is because we, we spent time in the summer together. We trained one summer and I got to really know you. And I even remember my father saying, boy, there's not a nicer guy in the world than Lee Norwood. But we play hard against each other. We had that. Hey, we didn't, you know, we hung out in the summer. I remember we skated, we trained. In fact, there was a lot of great guys. I remember we had McSorley and Blake and a bunch of guys came down, Fedorov, Yzerman. We had a skate that was unbelievable. But we were friends and then, but when we played, we played hard against each other. That was the key when we really played.

Oh, you're absolutely right. And I remember those days. And I was running a hockey school back in my hometown at the Icebox in Brownstown, Michigan. And the Norians owned it. They're just great family friends and just always loved and appreciated Jono and his father and his mother. But yeah, we had that hockey school and then we had the skate with all the guys coming in. We, you know, it was so much. But the competition level, we wouldn't give an inch to anybody. We always competed hard against each other because that's what you do. Because we knew that this is how you succeed. You have to focus on what you're doing, you know, and somebody once told me that, you know, if you want to play perfect hockey, you just don't practice. You have to have perfect practice to get to perfect hockey. And so just doing it half witted, you know, then you get guys like Sean Burr, who I know is a dear friend of yours, of mine, you know, passed away a few years ago. God rest. But you know, Sean would always be chirping and just. But you know, what if you didn't pay attention, Sean would just run over you with that 211 pound body his. And you know, and then you just chirp at you, make you madder, but you learn you know, you never, never take your mind off what you're doing on the ice. And, you know, keep focus, set. What you set out, your goals, what you want to accomplish, get that done. And, you know, because every practice there's a certain thing we're trying to accomplish and just, you know, even as small as it might be, it's trying to get a little bit better, a little bit more cohesive and, you know. But yeah, those were some great. A lot of fun skates out there.

Well, you mentioned Sean Burr, and I'll tell this quick because it's. It's all about stories. And I played in junior against him, and he was a first round pick to the Red Wings. People knew him, never talked to him in my life. And I'm driving down Northwestern highway in Detroit. That's where I live in the summers at times. And I was in my third year pro, and I see Sean. He's looking at me out the window, and I see him, and we're driving down Northwestern highway, and he gives me the fist and he rolls down his window. He goes, hey, what are you doing? I said, nothing. He goes, hey, Mike, nice to meet you. Are you hungry? I said, sure. So we go eat. Actually, we went to a friend's house. Family relative in Detroit? Never met him. The greatest guy. Then over the years, I got to know him. And then one time I was skating in the summer with the Red Wing guys, which was a little uncomfortable. We had guys like Mike Donnelly and other guys join us. So I was training with the Red Wings, and there's Eiserman. And it was after the 94 year, and I'm sitting there with all these guys I don't know, which I kind of know. And he says, mike, Mike, Mike Hartman. I got gotta say something. I said, I look up, I go, what's he gonna say? He says, I, what do you have? This is before the Red Wings won the Stanley Cup. So I'm thinking something different. He goes, what do you have that? Or what did you do that nobody did with the Detroit Red Wings? I go, oh, man, he's making. I got Iserman next to me. And I. There's Fedorov and all the boys, I think. And I said, what? He goes, you had a hot dog in every building in the NHL. I said, okay. And I had. I had to bring that in with Sean. So that was great. So I just want to go a little bit more because you had this. The injuries. Then you had the motorcycle accident, which was devastating in St. Louis. Share with us a Little bit about the motorcycle accident.

Well, you know, that was one of those unfortunate things that we played in Detroit on Thursday night. We beat Detroit, I think it was 2:1. And there was a big melee at the end of the game and we were playing back home in St. Louis, I was with the Blues and we were playing back home in St. Louis on Saturday night. So back then we didn't charter much. So we waited, we stayed the night in Detroit, flew home to St. Louis the next morning, Friday morning and we got in and then I think it was Sutter called the practice. So we went to practice. Then after practice was just one of those beautiful days in February, beginning of February or 70 degrees. I said, you know what, I'm going to go grab my motorcycle and I'm going to go for a ride. Well, I'm cruising around, just not paying attention. I hit a guide wire on the side of the road, flips my bike, I go do somersault, land on my feet and blew my foot right off my leg. Compound fracture and everything else. Then the motorcycle comes and lands on top of me and I Finally get the 800 pound bike off me and I'm taking a look at my, my ankles pointing one way, my knees pointing the other, my legs the other way. And all it came into my mind was I looked at that and I said, I don't care how good they take this thing, I ain't going to be able to play tomorrow night. So I get back in and I had in my contract I wasn't supposed to ride motorcycles at that time. So I hopped over, picked the bike up, put my foot back on my leg, picked the bike up and rode my bike back to Brendan's house, put it in the garage and never told anyone anything and you know, finish my career. And you know, the Blues were kind enough. They were, they were really kind, good to me. I love St. Louis Blues too. They were big shout out to them for last year's Stanley Cup. That is so awesome. But you know, that was one of those things that, you know, the career didn't end, you know, that was basically the end of the career because once you lose a half a step, especially when you're a guy like myself who didn't have a half a step to lose in the first place, you know, you start reaching, all of a sudden the injuries happen. And basically the next year I tried to come play again and you know, I just kept getting hurt. And then finally I had a head injury into the board. When Calgary had sent me to the minors to get in state and that was pretty much it for my NHL class.

And then I know because I talked to you years ago and you know, and I felt for you because a lot of us go through it. You had, I call it the hockey identity crisis. That I can't say all but a lot of us go like Randy Gregg, he went, he quit hockey early to be a doctor in the NHL after he won Stanley Cups. Some of us didn't have that luxury. And I remember you went through a lot like you had it tough and thank goodness for the NHL because they've been good to a lot of the guys. But I'll just explain the identity crisis. So yeah, it's like you have a Cadillac and somebody takes it away and now you're driving a Pinto. And I'm not talking about money, I'm talking more about you play the NHL, they carry your bags, they're great to you. You stay in five star hotels, pre game meals even if you're not dressed and you get a good nap and it's. You fly your own plane and now.

We'Re out in the world.

How did you deal with that? Because I know you went through a lot.

Yeah, that was, you know, that's, we don't talk about this very often because obviously we're playing a very macho sport. You know, a lot of bravado and you know, a lot of egos in it too. And you know, so many people didn't talk about the toll, you know, I worked. I started when I was 6 years old and all I wanted to ever do was be a hockey player. So my identity became that I was going to be a hockey player. I looked through my childhood and once people started patting me on the back and saying good game, there was my male reinforcement of self worth. So my self worth became all tied up in my identity as a hockey player. I didn't realize it was life after hockey when they didn't carry me off the ice on a gold shield to bury me, you know, and then all of a sudden I was put out there in the real world saying, okay, now here's the rest of your life. I had no idea how to really manage that and which way to go from there. You know, mind you, I'll always be a professional hockey player. X But you know, there's so much more to life than just that. And it was a learning experience and a lot of hit and miss. I got into a partnership on built a golf course out in Brighton Township. Unfortunately, some things happened in that regards and the golf course got sold to another party. We were friends to mine to this day. But it was very tough because as athletes we don't like to fail. This was something that I did fail at the golf Course Open. It was beautiful. Golf course sold, the residential homes around the golf course, all of that happened. Then we get into 9 11, the.com bust and you know, back there and things changed and all of a sudden the money dried up and I wasn't able to pull it out and save it. But, you know, I learned a lot on it. And then I went into coaching. I was coaching at Eastern Michigan University for a brief time and I just loved coaching there. And then I was president of the Red Wing Alumni and creating these giant charity events that were at Joe Louis arena at the time. You know, it was a lot of fun and enjoyable and I was doing some repping for a construction company friend. And then in 2008, my life changed in a minute when I was hit head on by another driver on Hagerty Road. I was going 50 and she's going 50 and you know, she hit me head on and thank God she wasn't hurt seriously. But my life changed. I've had, you know, over 20 plus surgeries since then. The last 12 years have been pretty much spent putting myself back together physically and trying to stay mentally focused. That okay, after this one, I'm going to get back in the gym. After this one, I'm going to get rehab. All I got to do is get back to the gym and rehab my injuries and I'll be okay. And I keep saying that and saying that and saying that. And it's funny because, you know, last June, my daughter approached me. She said she was living with me down in Florida because I had to move out of Michigan because I got all these rods and plates and screws in my body now. You know, I couldn't do the cold anymore. And my daughter approached me and she said, dad, did you ever think of moving? And I said, no. And she said, would you? And I said, would I what? She said, think I'm moving. I had a night home in Naples and I said, what's going on? She said, well, I was offered a job in Vegas and I was thinking maybe we'd take a change of scenery. And in my mind, all of a sudden I go, oh, this is going to be great. New location, another new, new start to life. I'll go to the gym every day and this and that. But I got to Vegas and it was the same thing. It was the Hot tub, the bed, the couch. If I tried to do something, it was two weeks back on the bed, the couch. You know, the only good thing was no more surgeries. I think I'm done with the surgeries for a while. You know, the last one, they had to reattach my clavicle to my sternum that got broken, separated. Now it started moving up into my throat, so I had to go repair that. But, you know, it's just one thing after another. And when you talk about, you know, staying motivated and staying focused, what do you want? There has to be more to life. I was sitting there thinking it was just. It was just crazy.

Well, Lee, it's been great. I got a couple things to share. There's a couple things that came in. I'll read them really quick. Lee's a nice guy. Keith Starr in Detroit. Lee's a nice guy. Played in a couple charity games against him. I look forward to, you know, hearing more of with Lee. Stefan, Matteo, Mike. I remember Lee. In 1992, we fought at the old Chicago stadium. Oh, no. You know what? You would, you would love you guys. You would be best friends with Steph. There's not a better guy. He's got like one of the biggest heart, you guys. I know you fought once. I don't know if you ever talked to him, but you guys would be good friends.

Never got a chance to talk with Stefan, but, you know, he had a big, long reach. He's a big man and a very strong man. Good, great player. And, you know, those are the type of guys you gotta love. They're meat potato type of guys that go out there every day and earn their money and play hard. I have total respect for stuff, you know, one day I'm sure a path will cross.

So you've been through so much. I just want to know, like, can you share with us? Like, what are you doing today? Like, I know you. You went from not walking then your lifestyle has changed. I talked to you yesterday for five minutes to see how you're doing, and you told me you played around a golf. You didn't hit them that well. We don't have to talk about that, but let's talk about what are you doing today. Share with. Share with us what, what exactly you're doing.

Well, I'm glad you brought this up. You know, I. I was telling you about my struggles over the last 12 years. I'm walking out of the coffee shop. It's January 11th of this year. I'm walking out of the coffee shop. I Turn left and there's this guy in this blue suit and he's got a name tag on. And being the, you know, prankster that I like to be, I walk by and I said, hi, Michael, how you doing? And Michael looks at me, this guy, and I've never met him before, and he says, how do you know me? And I say, well, you got a name tag guy. We laughed. Anyway, he was a kicker with Seattle Seahawks for a short period of time. And, you know, and then I just asked him, I said, what's this DNA stuff about, this DNA? Nutrition. And he took time and shared it with me and, you know, it changed my life. You know, I'm back up, I'm active, I don't have the pain anymore. I'm healthy, you know, getting healthier by the day. I'm losing weight again. And actually, you know, I'm playing golf a couple times a week now. And, you know, little did I know that the proper nutrition and putting the right things in my body that my body needs would actually let my body become the miracle it was intended to be. And I had no idea. All I thought was steak and pasta and I'd be all good. But it's so much more than that.

But, you know, that is so awesome. Lee, really quick here because we're wrapping up. It was so great having you, Lee Fitch. Can I. How can I contact Lee for nutrition? So I. It's great when I get people asking other guy, hey, does it. Is it natural? I said, maybe. Can they. Can you get their email? Can they get your email address so they can reach out to you?

Yeah, I'm not, you know, I'm not a salesman, so I'm not trying to sell, but yeah, absolutely. I have a gmail account. It's Lee23.2U. Lee23. Uh, to youmail.com so if anybody wants to know what I'm doing, what's happened in my life, please feel free. I'll get back to you and we can have a conversation about it. Absolutely.

I'm going to wrap it up. I'm going to say, personally, I know there's about seven years difference in our age. You know, I'm 33, you're 40. But. But there's a. The thing, Lee, is you've been an inspiration to all of us from the Detroit. Everything I do here is about stories and I'm really excited that you did this for everybody. You've been an inspiration to all of us and you continue to be an inspiration for those that have ailments. For those that have different injuries going on, for those that have had setbacks. I don't know as many guys that had as many setbacks as you. Lee, great to have you and thanks again.

Mike. I thank you so much for taking the time to let me share my story with you. And you be blessed and everyone out there be safe.