Ducks’ George Parros: Season starting slowly, fight-wise

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Ducks forward George Parros has a job that’s rare among his fellow Princeton graduates: He’s an NHL enforcer -- and he’s immensely popular in Anaheim for his muscle as well as his impressive mustache and generous charity work.

Like most enforcers, he’s soft-spoken and articulate off the ice. He’s going to share some of his thoughts on the Ducks, his role and other issues as the season goes along.

Feeling pretty good today, because we just got our first win at home. And also because training camp has come to an end, always a good thing to be done with camp and the long hours at the rink.

I guess the whole idea of this blog would be to provide an inside perspective of the life of an Anaheim Duck or perhaps just a hockey player in general, so I will start out by confirming that training camp is a total grind. I guess that is the whole idea, though. Since the games don’t count (especially being a fighter), there is no point in risking an injury during a fight when there are no regular-season points on the line. Listen to me, though, jaded already after a whopping four seasons in the NHL... Training camp is also a proving ground which can change a guy’s career, especially a fighter’s.

While we are on the subject of fighting (shocking that it would be discussed on my blog!), I had a pretty bad start to my season, fighting-wise. I’m coming off of a hand injury from last year so I have been a bit tentative, which is probably the worst thing that anyone could be in a fight. If you need evidence of this, I would invite you to watch my first fight this year against John Scott of the Minnesota Wild. He caught me with a pure right that sent me to the ice, probably one of the cleanest punches I have eaten in my career. (Note: You can watch the video of the fight below).

Admittedly, I had no business fighting him with a three-goal lead in the third period on the road, but I did anyway and sparked a Wild comeback. So if there ever are any doubters out there who think that a fight can’t change momentum in a game and that it is just some excuse we use to justify our roles, simply watch this game.

Just in our last game at home versus Minnesota, John asked me to fight him again after we were up by two goals and I burst out laughing and said, “Are you kidding me? Do you know how much heat I caught for fighting with the lead last game?” I told him if they came back and had momentum on their side, then we could have another chat.

Sometimes that’s the way it goes out there. Other times all it takes is a look and the gloves start flying. It’s definitely a difficult job, though I wouldn’t say the toughest job in hockey, like some people do. In my opinion, scoring 40 or 50 goals a season seems a bit harder. Some days the job gets really easy, just like today.

Randy [Carlyle, the Ducks’ coach], gave us a day off, which was great. We had a long road trip and a couple of days in between games, so I guess it made sense to let the guys rest a bit. I was able to squeeze in a round of golf with Bobby Ryan and Mike Brown. The best part of the day, however, was when Bobby lost a game we played while waiting on the tee box.

We have a team signing tonight and Browny and I get to autograph Bobby’s arm with a Sharpie the whole evening. The best part about the bet is that I am sure every one of the fans will be asking Bobby why the signatures are on his arm, and he’ll have to answer the same question for three hours straight. I think one of my favorite things to do is invent stupid stakes for proposition bets.

I’ll post a couple of others as the season goes on, but if you have any good ones send them my way. I’d love to incorporate them into my next wager.

-- George Parros