Hutcheon “living the dream” in blog

BATTLE CREEK, Mich. – Life as a hockey player doesn’t get any better than it is in the National Hockey League. Chartered flights. Five star hotels. Top of the line equipment. For some players, it is all they know because they had the talent to make the jump quickly. For the rest, they know that their road to the “show” – the road rarely seen – was paved by toiling in the minors. Battle Creek Revolution forward Jon Hutcheon is aiming to change that with

the help of the world wide web. His blog, titled “Living the Dream”, is an account of his travels and experiences along the highways and byways of the minor league circuit. “It’s just something I do because I like to write. I’ve always wanted to be a writer when I get out of hockey so I thought this was a good way to start,” Hutcheon said. “I wanted to not only do the writing part but I wanted to have something to look back on – stories, games, being on the road, all that stuff. I wanted something to look back on to remember it all.” The Billerica, Massachusetts native certainly has more than his share of stories to tell. Like most hockey players, it was his dad who taught him to skate and handle the puck. His talents led him through high school hockey to the Eastern Junior Hockey League where he played for the Lowell Jr. Lock Monsters and the Valley Jr. Warriors, both junior-A level squads. His play with the Warriors earned him the captain’s “C” for the 2003-2004 season. In 2004, he enrolled at the University of Massachusetts – Boston where he saw limited action and decided that after one semester, college just wasn’t for him. In 2005, he attended the camp of the UHL Danbury Trashers which was followed by an extended period away from the ice due to a knee problem. In 2006, he returned and played two games with the Rocky Mountain Rage in the CHL before getting cut and bouncing around the semi-pro NEHL. 2007 brought him back to the CHL and Amarillo where he played two games before heading to the Knoxville Ice Bears of the SPHL for two. After leaving Knoxville, Hutcheon hooked on with the Valley Forge Freedom of the fledgling MAHL. In 17 games with the Freedom, he had 12 points and 50 penalty minutes. All of the success with Valley Forge came to a screeching halt when the MAHL ceased operations mid season. Hutcheon said that the league folding came as a bit of a shock. “We knew that the league wasn’t doing so well but we were under the impression that we would be able to make it all the way through because there was a month left in the year,” he said. ‘We were under the impression that everything was going to be OK. When it happened it was pretty shocking. It kind of left you with a what do I do now feeling.” Then in July of 2008, former Valley Forge coach Brendon Tedstone called Hutcheon with an offer to join him with the Danbury Had Hatters of the newly formed EPHL. Hutcheon accepted but by the time he got there, Tedstone realized he had too many players in camp so he traded Hutcheon to the Copper City Chiefs along with Brett Riley. He hadn’t even been with the Chiefs when fate dealt him a double whammy. Back at home in late September, Hutcheon and a couple of friends were coming back from downtown Boston and a celebration of Jon’s birthday. Somehow, a car had gotten on to the wrong side of the road and in an effort to avoid that driver on a rain-slickened road, Hutcheon was involved in a five car accident that was horrific to say the least. Doctors told him later that the fact that both he and his friend in the passenger seat walked away was a testament to their both being professional hockey players with bodies that were used to being banged around. “When the accident happened, I wasn’t thinking about hockey. I just wanted to make sure that I was OK number one and that my buddy in the car was OK also because he was getting ready to head down to Brooklyn (Aces of the EPHL),” Hutcheon said. “When the accident was over and a couple of days later, my head was still fuzzy from the concussion and all that. It wasn’t a good time.” Within days of the accident, Hutcheon got word that the Copper City Chiefs were not going to play and that the EPHL might have problems. Instead of contacting the remaining EPHL teams, he began contemplating what to do next. “It was a pretty bad week. It (the accident and the folding of the Chiefs) all struck at once. A bit overwhelming would be the best way to put it,” he said. “I contemplated just giving up hockey and moving on but then Battle Creek called me.” The AAHA had just been formed from the ashes of the MAHL and the MWHL so Hutcheon was naturally a bit skeptical at first as he recalled the MAHL and EPHL disasters. Still, his desire to play was stronger than any doubts and he headed for Michigan where he says things are going well. “It’s been great. We’ve got real good guys and the housing situation is good. It’s been pretty good and things are getting better each day,” he said. “At the beginning, there were some growing pains in the league. I think they’re starting to get ironed out now. It’s definitely moving in the right direction from what we see from the players’ standpoint.” In his spare time, Hutcheon sits in front of his computer and puts his thoughts into cyberspace for everyone to read. He said he was surprised that there aren’t more players writing blogs because there’s plenty of things that people don’t know about life in the minors. “In the lower leagues – single A – there’s a lot of stuff you don’t hear about too often. Weird things happening,” he said. “A couple of time last year, we showed up to practice and didn’t have the ice because it was rented out to somebody else. Busses breaking down, anything small like that. It happens a lot that you don’t hear about because obviously we’re not the NHL.” By his own thinking, Hutcheon has maybe a couple of playing years left. As for his post-playing days, he’d like to be a writer, especially if he got to be a hockey beat writer. So what is Hutcheon’s best hockey story? Two years ago, he was chosen to participate in “Be A Bruin”, a reality TV show produced by the New England Sports Network. Players participated in a week long camp, receiving training from the likes of former Bruins Terry O’Reilly and Brad Park. Each day, the players deemed to not be making the grade were cut with the final three players (one forward, defenseman and goalie) left standing getting an invite to the Bruins main camp. Hutcheon made it to Friday of that week, one day short of being a finalist. The experience left him feeling good about his abilities and with plenty of good memories. “There were a lot of good players in that camp. A lot of Division I (college) guys and guys who had played a couple years of pro. I was able to go out there and prove not only to myself but to other people in and around the pro ranks that I could play,” he said. “We went to the bar one night and sat down and had a beer with Brad Park. Not a lot of people can say that.” Now that’s something to blog about. Hutcheon’s blog can be found at http://minorleaguehockey.blogspot.com/ Contact the author at don.money@prohockeynews.com