Sports history was made last night in Newark, NJ at the Prudential Center as New Jersey Devil goaltender Martin Broduer set the record for most regular-season wins with his 552nd victory. Broduer passed his boyhood idol Patrick Roy to attain the record. It’s kind of shame such a momentous sports feat such as this went relatively unnoticed amongst all the basketball hoopla these days, but props to Marty on this impressive achievement.
Martin Broduer
Broduer has played his entire career with the New Jersey Devils winning 3 Stanley Cup Championships (’95, ‘00, ‘03) and many other awards and accolades. Despite Broduer being arguably the greatest goalie of all time, he isn’t the highest paid goalie in the league. He isn’t even the highest paid player on his team. He has no agent and represents himself in contract negotiations. Broduer realized earlier in his career that the Devil franchise was built to win consistently year after year by focusing on a team first approach and avoiding high priced superstars that would limit the team’s ability to fill out its roster with quality role players. Broduer had several opportunities over the years to make more money with other teams, but has always opted to stay in New Jersey for less money because it offered him the best chance to win. Broduer also found he has been quite comfortable residing in New Jersey where his superstar status goes relatively unnoticed by the locals. He is actually a bigger star in his hometown of Montreal then he is in New Jersey. It’s rare nowadays to see this kind of mindset and commitment from an elite sports figure. Do you think Manny Ramirez or Terrell Owens would ever take less money so their teams could have more to spend on other players to make their teams better?
Congrats to Marty on a sensational career that still has a ways to go and hopefully includes a few more Stanley Cups for one of the good guys in professional sports.
