Former NHL defenceman Ryan Whitney enjoyed a respectable 11 year NHL career in which he played 481 games and reached a Stanley Cup Final with the Pittsburgh Penguins during the 2007-08 season. Whitney wasn’t exactly known as a fighter, but he was regarded as a big, tough defender who could log in big minutes.
On an episode of the Spittin’ Chiclets hockey podcast, Whitney recalled a hilarious story in which he was mistakenly awarded a fighting penalty against former Dallas Stars captain Derian Hatcher. According to Whitney, his bout was actually with his 5’10 buddy Freddy Myer.
Myer didn’t exactly accumulate the most penalty minutes during his career and is significantly smaller than the 6’3 Whitney. Hatcher on the other hand was a 6’5 225 mammoth who wasn’t afraid to drop the mitts. The former Dallas Stars and Philadelphia Flyers captain managed to amass 1,581 penalty minutes over 1,045 games, which included a 211 PIM total in the 1993-94 season.
Mike Stobe/NHLI via Getty Images
Today, Whitney serves as one of the members of the ‘Spttin’ Chiclets podcast so maybe he’ll be able to convince Hatcher to make an appearance on the show and explain his side of things. Regardless, being able to say you fought against the great Derian Hatcher is an honour that Whitney should just accept, take pride in, and never again look back on.
Hopefully he’s just not telling people that he won the battle.
(H/T Spttin’ Chicklets)
