Maybe this is as good as it gets. Maybe being a January call-up by the Hamilton Bulldogs of the American Hockey League stands as the singular highlight of his professional career, the closest he will ever get to calling himself a National Hockey League player.
If so, Andrew Long can live with it happily, if you want to know the truth. Having made it this far after enduring so many surgeries and so much pain, so many doubts and so much disappointment, Long has rediscovered the joy in playing what was once as automatic as putting on his skates and breaking a sweat. A joy that was taken from him on April 17, 1998, when an opposing player's stick destroyed Long's face, leaving him hospitalized with broken bones, stitches and a blood clot on his brain.
"At times I felt, 'Maybe I shouldn't do this. Maybe I'd be better off doing something else.' But I always kept it in the back of my mind that I should give hockey one more try," Long explained before last night's Bulldogs game at the Copps Coliseum, in Hamilton.
"Over the summer, I finally asked myself, 'How can I not play knowing I'd never really gotten an honest chance?' If you get an opportunity then fail, then you know. So far, things are good. The more fun I'm having, the better I'm performing."
Long was performing well enough in the East Coast Hockey League this winter to earn his call-up to Hamilton. The 6-foot-3, 190-pound Newmarket, Ont., native was chosen the ECHL's player of the month after scoring 12 goals and 23 points for the Tallahassee Tiger Sharks of north Florida. And yet, the fact he was even playing this season says more about Long than any point-scoring or plus-minus statistic.
Less than three years ago, Long was on the receiving end of one of the most vicious stick attacks seen in hockey. It happened during an Ontario Hockey League playoff game in Michigan between the Plymouth Whalers and Long's Guelph Storm.
Long was battling for the puck against the Whalers' Jesse Boulerice when the two players shoved at one another. Then as Long skated away, Boulerice took his stick and swung it at Long's face, catching him between the nose and upper lip. The force of the blow broke Long's nose, his nasal cavity, a cheekbone, opened three cuts on his face and left him unconscious. He suffered a seizure and was taken to a nearby hospital where he was treated for head trauma.
OHL commissioner David Branch later suspended Boulerice, a Philadelphia Flyers' draft pick, for a year. The AHL then suspended Boulerice for a month, preventing him from playing for the Philadelphia Phantoms, the Flyers' minor-league affiliate. Eventually, criminal charges were filed against Boulerice. He pleaded no contest to a reduced charge of aggravated assault and was put on probation for a year.
To this day, Boulerice has declined to talk about the incident other than to say he never meant to hurt Long.
"Has Boulerice ever called to apologize for what he did?" Long was asked.
"No, not really. There was one day when I was in the hospital. I didn't know what was going on. I thought I'd been in a bus crash. I was out of it and he called. I don't remember it," Long said. "Later, his lawyer said it wasn't good for [Boulerice]to say anything because of the court matter. For three months, I was sitting there, passing out on the couch, feeling half brain dead. There was no communication. That bothers you. I mean, how do you feel bad for him?
"I've had people say, 'It's good to forgive. Do you forgive him?' I don't forgive. But I also don't care to waste my time [thinking about it]"
Long's physical injuries healed with time but his emotional wounds were tougher to get past. Selected in the fifth round of the 1996 entry draft by the Florida Panthers, Long had hoped to be a well-established prospect within three years and bound for the NHL. Instead, the injuries put uncertainty in his mind and in everyone else's.
He floundered with the New Haven Beast of the AHL before being sent to the Miami Matadors of the ECHL. He jumped back up to the AHL with the Louisville Panthers only to injure a knee and find himself glued to the bench upon his return to the lineup. At one point, Long was playing for the Port Huron Border Cats of the United League. It was there, at least, that he began to score goals and feel confident.
Then one day last summer while reading the hockey transactions in a newspaper, Long found out he had become a free agent. Florida's decision not to qualify him left him unsigned and unwanted. He viewed it as the final straw and thought about quitting. His agent believed what Long needed most was playing time and a chance to develop his game.
"We talked and I urged Andrew to go to a level in which he would be getting 25 to 30 minutes of ice time," Anton Thun said. "I explained to him that sometimes you have to take a step back to go two steps forward. Andrew has always been a walk-before-run run type of guy."
"I had a signing bonus from Florida and I invested that," Long said. "I was thinking of taking business classes -- going to school and keeping my options open. Law enforcement is another one. Being a police officer is not a safe job but it is a stable job. So when I decided to come back and play hockey, I was thinking, 'If this doesn't work out, I have Plan B.' Its helped me relax."
Long signed with Hamilton last fall and was sent to Tallahassee where he got the 25 to 30 minutes of playing time he needed. Suddenly, it was like sunshine cutting through dense clouds. Long became the forward he was before the Boulerice incident. He skated hard and was unafraid of working the corners and taking his hits. When Hamilton called and asked him to take that next step forward, Long was so ready he wasn't the least bit concerned about playing in the same league as his one-time attacker.
"My first year [in the AHL] it was unbelievable. The first two times we played Philadelphia, he was a scratch. One time, I was a scratch. My second year, we did [cross paths] I think we were only on the ice together for one shift," said Long, who has refused to blame the sport for what happened to him in 1998. "I like the game. I like the way it's played. A lot of things in hockey are not about violence. It's about individual acts of violence. That's how I see it."
As for his long-range hockey plans, Long would love to play in the NHL some day, even for just a game. Like all Canadian kids, "you try even if you only have a 1-per-cent chance to get to the NHL," he said.
But if this is the height of his hockey glory, Long can accept it and be happy. By coming back, he has reclaimed what was taken from him -- a chance to compete, a joy of playing.