Out of the grey winter’s sky fell a bomb.
“Zdeno Chara has signed with the Washington Capitals.”
For real?
So unique are the man’s talents, so indistinguishable was he from the bedrock of the Boston Bruins, that even in this age of salary caps and free-flowing player movement it seemed slightly implausible.
That’s not logical thinking, of course, not at the precipice of a season where Joe Thornton is a Maple Leaf, Mikko Koivu is a Blue Jacket and Alex Pietrangelo is a Golden Knight. Not in a time where Henrik Lundqvist would have been standing in the Capitals crease absent the shocking discovery of an ailment that requires open-heart surgery.
But how you felt when you first heard Wednesday afternoon’s Chara news says something about the towering defenceman and his immense standing in Boston.
Incredibly, he played parts of eight NHL seasons in Long Island and Ottawa before even arriving in Boston as a free agent in July 2006. The Senators chose to keep Wade Redden over Chara that summer and almost immediately came to regret it.
There has never been a player quite like ‘Big Z’ in the history of the league.
[radioclip id=5032072]So large at six-foot-nine, 250 pounds, that he has special dispensation to carry a stick a few inches longer than the NHL-mandated maximum and so unmatched in the ways he can use it.
In his peak years, Chara was as feared as any of his peers and rarely ever had to throw a punch. He produced points, killed penalties and was a matchup nightmare for anyone trying to come down the left side of the ice. He gained a reputation as being a fierce competitor in opposing dressing rooms and played a massive role in changing the culture inside the home one at TD Garden.
Chara was the consummate Bruin for 14 seasons, wearing the captain’s ‘C’ for each of the 1,173 regular-season and playoff games he appeared in for the organization. That included the Stanley Cup victory in 2011 and two other trips to the final, the most recent of which in 2019 featured a spine-tingling standing ovation before Game 5 when Chara played despite suffering a broken jaw.
No wonder his Instagram sendoff was so heartfelt and included the line “I will always be a Bruin. I will always love Boston.”
No wonder so many former teammates rushed to fill their own feeds with tributes. Tom Brady, who left New England for Tampa this season, even commented on Chara’s post by saying “Best of luck to you Zee” and tagged it with a couple ‘100’ and ‘heart’ emojis.
Fourteen years is a long time in life. It’s an eternity in pro sports.
As for why business ultimately forced a separation that few saw coming, well, that’s a story we’ve seen play out time and again. The summer’s return-to-play was not particularly kind to Chara’s game and the organization felt it was time for him to step aside and make way for others behind him. But even at age 43, Chara did not share that view.
There doesn’t seem to be any bad feelings about the way things went down — Chara said he respected the Bruins’ decision — but it’s worth noting that he’s ended up with a rival in the realigned East Division and the teams are scheduled to meet eight times in the next four months.
Chara’s arrival in Washington set off a wave of excitement. The Capitals have a new coach in Peter Laviolette, plus all the familiar offensive weapons, and are trying to win another championship before their window of contention slams shut. It’s the ideal destination for someone in Chara’s skates.
Big Zee, welcome to D.C.! My guest bedroom is available#ALLCAPS https://t.co/ypN2TLyJ9d
— Peter Bondra (@PeterBondra12) December 30, 2020
And it’s telling that more than half of the teams in the league inquired about his services while he remained unsigned deep into December. Chara is joining the Capitals on a contract paying him $795,000 and even if there are questions about his foot speed and doubts about how many minutes he can handle it’s difficult to imagine him not delivering excess value.
We’re talking about a fitness fanatic famous for biking Tour de France stages and climbing Mount Kilimanjaro during the off-season. A player who has been dragging teammates into the battle for more than two decades and skated with a broken jaw 18 months ago.
A guy who very easily could have done the safe thing and retired when he found out the Bruins were moving in another direction and instead chose to play on.
Viewed in totality, the surprise wasn’t so much that Chara is coming back for another NHL season. It’s that the Bruins are choosing to let him finish a Hall of Fame career somewhere else.
