In the Cards

Growing up, two of my main hobbies were sports and sports cards. It did not matter which sport (although, over half were baseball cards), I had room in my binder for any and all cards. In fact, I still have that binder to this day and still add a page or two to it from time to time. I was obsessed with sports as a kid, and, probably like many people reading this, dreamt of the day that I could have my face on a card.

So, when Upper Deck approached me last fall about being part of their Heroic Inspiration line of cards, I could barely contain my excitement. But that excitement was not just about having my own card, it was about what that card meant, and what it could potentially mean for kids who were in the position I was in.

I grew up a massive hockey fan. In my hometown of Detroit, MI, hockey was everywhere; from the youth level all the way to the NHL. There were perennial NCAA championship contenders at the University of Michigan and Michigan State University, along with high-level junior hockey and minor league hockey. The Red Wings were in the midst of 26-straight years of making the playoffs, and even had five trips to the finals and four championships by the time I was a junior in college.

I consumed all the hockey that I could, but I could not overlook one glaring fact -- there were hardly any players who looked like me on the ice. Historically, hockey has not been a welcoming place for people from underrepresented and marginalized communities, and I could rarely talk to my Black friends about the game because, "that's not a place for Us". Even my white friends thought it was odd that I was taking an interest in hockey. Throughout my life as a fan, hockey has sometimes been a lonely place. You sometimes feel like you're on an island.

I never played the game, but always knew I wanted a career in sports. I started broadcasting hockey games during my freshman year of college, and instantly fell in love with it. I quickly decided that I wanted to be an NHL play-by-play announcer.

Throughout my time in college and over the course of my career, I started to have the same realizations I did as a kid -- there are even fewer people who look like me in press boxes and in front offices. I was the only full-time Black play-by-play announcer in North American hockey, and one of a handful of Black people working in the various leagues and front offices I was in.

When I was hired by Seattle, the main headline was "He is the first Black Announcer in the NHL". Throughout my career, I had just one goal in mind -- get to the NHL. Even though I noticed the lack of diversity in our game, I never really paid too close attention to it. It was not until I joined the Kraken that I truly started to understand what that meant, and how big of a responsibility that carried.

I do not believe anyone sets out to be the "first" of anything, but, and without coming across as self-aggrandizing, when you find yourself in a position of being the first, you owe it to the sport, the culture and, most importantly, yourself to help bring people into that space with you.

That is why this card is so important to me. It is more than just stats and numbers on the back, (even though I did win seven of nine faceoffs in a Men's League game once) it is about showing that young Black boy or girl growing up in South Park here in Seattle, or back in my hometown of Detroit who was told that hockey is a white sport that they belong in our game and do not deserve to feel like they are on an island.

It is about telling everyone who is a member of a historically underrepresented or marginalized community that not only are their voices, love, passion, and fandom for our game wanted -- they are needed. YOU are welcome. YOU are allowed. YOU are needed in hockey.