Ryan Getzlaf a rising star in NHL Department of Player Safety – with lofty long-term goals

Credit: Ryan Getzlaf

There’s “into the great unknown,” and there’s…whatever Ryan Getzlaf was feeling on April 24, 2022. That’s when he played the final game of his illustrious NHL career, which spanned 17 seasons and 1,157 games, all with the Anaheim Ducks.

It was about as special a goodbye as pro athlete could have. It happened on home ice, with his wife Paige and four children right there on the bench after the final seconds elapsed. Getzlaf addressed the Honda Center crowd on a microphone at center ice and even posed for a team photo.

But it wasn’t necessarily a heartbreaking goodbye for him. It hurt to hang up the skates, obviously, but no part of him felt he was walking away from the sport forwever. Getzlaf always knew he’d stay close to it – and that he wouldn’t stop moving for long.

That was the case even in the surreal first year, post-retirement, when he got used to, as he explained to Daily Faceoff, integrating himself into his family’s world, adjusting to being home and helping with more typical parent duties than he ever could before. By 2023-24, he was back with the Ducks as their new player development coordinator, helping educate their bustling prospect pool and prepare them for life in the pros. He enjoyed the role for the most part but didn’t sense it was his permanent place to settle. Maybe that’s because NHL commissioner Gary Bettman had already floated him an idea one year earlier.

“Gary actually called me right after I retired, and it was really nice of him to pick up the phone and give me a call,” Getzlaf told Daily Faceoff last week. “And basically just made it known that if I ever was interested in working again, to give him a call.”

It wasn’t difficult for Getzlaf to surmise where in the NHL org chart he’d fit best. George Parros, senior vice-president of the NHL’s Department of Player Safety, played six seasons with the Ducks, all with Getzlaf, and they won a Stanley Cup together in 2006-07. They remained very close friends ever since, and they both settled down with their families in Nashville. They spoke frequently about the idea of Getzlaf joining up with the DOPS in the weeks and months after he stopped playing.

This past August, they turned theory into reality, with Getzlaf officially signing on with the DOPS as director of player safety. For Getzlaf, a cerebral playmaker as a player and ponderous person, it was a chance to learn about the sport from a new perspective and sponge up information. For Parros, it meant bringing a player aboard who had a unique profile suited to the department.

“I’ve put the bug in a few different players, over the years, players I think can really help our department, high-profile, marquee guys,” Parros told Daily Faceoff last week. “Because I think it’s important for our department to have representation of players who played a long time and played the game well and who know the game really well.”

When Hall of Famer Chris Pronger worked for the DOPS, he brought a wealth of knowledge from often playing on the wrong side of the line. When Parros hired longtime NHLer Ray Whitney in 2017, the idea was that he brought a different perspective as one of the cleanest players of his generation. And Getzlaf represents a player who brought a ton of skill as a perennial All-Star and two-time Olympic gold medalist, but also someone who played an intimidating, physical game without taking it too far. As Parros notes, it’s also extremely helpful to have someone on board who has played the game recently, with exposure to its modern form.

“I’m one of the few players at the moment that have played through this big era change,” Getzlaf said. “When I came into the league, the league was a lot different. You were allowed to get away with a lot more. Concussions and headshots weren’t quite a focal point. And towards when I retired, the game had done a 180 and we were all about speed and skill. So I think I bring a unique perspective, because I had to adapt my game as well as watch others do it. I played on the edge but very rarely was I across that edge, and I think I had [gotten] myself to a pretty good standard when it comes to the integrity of the game and how I think it should be played.”

Getzlaf, 39, has settled into the day-to-day of his role. Most nights he’s empowered to follow whichever games he chooses, unless there’s a particularly busy schedule and Parros needs to assign specific games. The next morning, Getzlaf will get the kids launched for school and check his inbox, which will almost always contain clips to look at after a busy slate of games the previous evening. Filling a role Parros once did under Stephane Quintal, Getzlaf will apply his relatively modern viewpoint and provide formal feedback on the plays in question.

“He’s not afraid to ask questions,” Parros said. “There are people in his department that have been working there for a long time, and [he’s] learning about where we’ve been and how we’ve done things in the past and rounding out his observational view of the world.”

Getzlaf is a quick study, so it should come as no surprise he’s already extended well beyond his day-to-day role. That included going to NHL rookie tournaments before the season to educate younger players on how to use their bodies properly and protect themselves from various hits. He also applied that expertise when the PWHL reached out to the NHL look for similar instruction. It was Getzlaf who recently gave the players a presentation on safe practices for dishing out and receiving body contact.

“That league has come a long way, and they’re really trying to encourage the strong physical play in their game,” Getzlaf said. “And they reached out to me and George to ask if I was able to come out and speak to that point. Because of the fact that a lot of these women grew up not playing with any contact, their preparation to be hit, to put themselves in bad spots when contact is coming, through no fault of their own, they just never experienced it before. So I was able to go in and give a small presentation and hopefully help them a little bit, even if they just took a few things out of it.”

Not even half a season into his new gig, Getzlaf has made a tangible impact. It feels like he’s a rising star in the department. But could his time there be relatively fleeting? It’s not much of a secret that Getzlaf, like his contemporary Rick Nash, is soaking up as much experience as possible in hopes of someday working in a prominent decision-making position with an NHL franchise. Getzlaf has already gotten a head start by serving in Hockey Canada’s 4 Nations Face-Off management group as a player relations advisor. His phone was ringing plenty last week leading up to Canada’s roster unveiling. He provided input during the assembly process from the perspective of someone who’d succeeded at multiple levels representing Canada and understood what type of team construction worked.

And is learning from the likes of Doug Armstrong and Doug Sweeney one step toward the GM dream? No doubt.

“Yeah, that’s kind of the end goal,” Getzlaf said. “I’d love to be part of an organization or part of building a team. I’m getting a lot of experience from the Hockey Canada stuff, which is cool. Listening to the GMs go through things, talking with them about how to build a team, what they’re doing, as far as our preparation for the 4 Nations and the Olympics. My goal is to hopefully be front office in some capacity. I don’t know what that looks like at this point, but I’m just trying to get all the knowledge I can and participating along the way in the league and helping grow our game.”

Based on the speed at which Getzlaf is vacuuming up experience post-retirement, it might not be long before we see him fulfill his new dream.

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Ryan Getzlaf a rising star in NHL Department of Player Safety – with lofty long-term goals

Article presented by Fountain Tire

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