Why I Love Mike McKenna
Anyone who knows the hockey side of me, knows that my favorite player is (was) James Wisniewski. That may be changing. Wiz has failed to impress me this year and someone has taken his place.
Mike McKenna has a effervescent personality and one of the more interesting professional athlete twitter profiles that I’ve seen. In addition to that, he has some pretty impressive stats for a goalie. Hockey DB states that he has played games for 12 (soon to be 13) professional ice hockey teams. Check out his statistics below:
He has 1 career NHL shutout, 4 wins, 9 losses, a Goals Against Average of 3.49 and a Save Percentage of .887 (all NHL). He was named the
for the month of November. He was watching the Blue Jackets game against the Tampa Bay Lightning when
Sergei Bobrovskywas hurt. See him talk about it here:
In addition to his goaltending career, he has some pretty interesting hobbies. He loves auto racing and even got to know a few of the people involved in it. Take a look at his interview with The Republican. He also loves heavy metal bands such as Opeth, Pantera, Slayer and Children of Bodom.
Timothy T. Ludwig-USA TODAY Sports
He has an adorable young daughter and a really cute dog. He is really friendly on twitter; he responds to a lot more tweets than most professional athletes do. He also offers youth hockey advice to those who ask for it. He’s not afraid to post silly pictures of himself and is pretty forthcoming about his current emotions on twitter.
That’s why I like him so much as a player and as a person. He is genuine. You can tell he loves his daughter, dog and job. There isn’t some marketing person running his account and he actually uses it to interact with fans. There are other players on the team that have twitter accounts but only tweet once a month. I don’t like that because it doesn’t seem real to me.
Mike McKenna presents himself as genuine and down to earth. He is still in awe with the hockey profession, like he can’t believe he actually makes a living doing it. He isn’t disappointed when he is stuck in the AHL. He is just happy to be playing. He seems to enjoy moving around the country and exploring new cities.
The Columbus Blue Jackets play back to back games on Monday (Pittsburgh) and Tuesday (New Jersey). I am really hoping that the Blue Jackets give McKenna a shot in net on Tuesday so that I can see him play. He would be playing against his old team, which would make for a great story. McKenna could go a long way for any organization.