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The Rookie Dinner
After scoring the first hat trick of his NHL career, the last thing Taylor Piers wanted to see when he strode back into the locker room was a massive, blown-up picture of himself in Christmas footie pajamas, perched on the captain’s lap. To be fair, Yuiry Pancek had been dressed as Santa for his family’s annual Christmas card photo shoot. And as an honorary member of the Pancek family, he had been required to attend.
When he first signed with the Seattle Seaporters, Pancek invited all the team’s rookies over to his home for dinner. There were three of them. Andrew Sommers, who had come up from a farm team in Minnesota, was a dynamic forward with one of the strongest backhands Taylor had ever seen. Emilio Sánchez and Taylor were both freshly out of high school when they signed.
Taylor had played against Sánchez a few times back in high school. They were from neighboring towns outside of Sacramento,which had fueled a heated rivalry between them. Running into Sánchez at the signing ceremony, he’d been surprised to learn that Sánchez had taken an offer as a backup goalie for the Seaporters. From what he’d heard, Sánchez had been scouted by both Boston and St. Louis, teams desperate for goalies. Marco Roca, Emilio’s older cousin, was one of Seattle’s star forwards.
Sánchez admitted he’d signed with Seattle so he could play with his cousin, which Taylor thought was pretty sweet. Once they realized they were teammates, the rivalry dissolved almost instantly. Sánchez was proudly one of the first Dominican NHL players, and he felt an immediate connection as one of the few Indigenous players in the league.
Yuiry Pancek had been one of his heroes growing up. With his leadership, Seattle had won four consecutive Cups, cementing the team’s dynasty.
That night, Pancek proudly showed off his barbecuing skills while the rookies shared pieces of their lives. A Ukrainian American hockey machine, Pancek had been a star center and the captain of the Seaporters for sixteen years. Taylor kept a poster of him on his bedroom wall as a kid.
When it was his turn to talk about his upbringing, Taylor kept the details intentionally vague. Trust didn’t come easily, especially when it came to the exact truth of his childhood. He told them he’d grown up playing hockey and had always dreamed of making it to the NHL. When Pancek asked about his family, he said he’d been raised by his grandfather and had a much older sister who helped take care of him.
The reality was far more complicated.
He, his sister Mandy, and their younger brother Jesse were all born on a reservation in Wyoming, living with their mother’s family in a double-wide. Mandy’s father had disappearedbefore she was even born. His own father had been a good man—raised in Sacramento, middle class, steady. He worked as a data analyst for a casino chain in the Bay Area before taking a higher-paying job in Wyoming, where he met their mother, a pretty-faced single mom working as a casino waitress.
According to one of his aunts, their parents fell hard and fast. They’d been together barely a year before his mother became pregnant. For the first five years of his life, their relationship had been on-again, off-again, until it ended for good on his fifth birthday. His mother had been cheating. Jesse was born two days after Taylor turned two, and there were concerns regarding his paternity when he was first born. The man she’d been seeing showed up at Jesse’s first birthday party and tried to fight their dad, claiming he had stolen his son.
Her family tolerated her only a few months longer. One day, Jesse accidentally found her boyfriend’s stash of blow and ended up hospitalized from an overdose. Their dad sued for custody but was only awarded partial custody of both kids because of a law that worked in their mom’s favor. They all moved in with their mom’s new boyfriend, who turned out to be a meth dealer. He was six, Mandy was fourteen, and Jesse was barely four when their mom and her boyfriend were anonymously reported and sent to prison. Taylor assumed Mandy was the one who reported them.
Their dad was finally granted full custody, and they moved back to Sacramento to live with their grandfather. When he was ten, his dad died in a car crash. Killed by a drunk driver.
Mandy got into UC Davis on a full ride soccer scholarship and lived nearby, but then she got pregnant at eighteen. She married her boyfriend, Jacob, and had JJ five months later. She lost her soccer scholarship and dropped out of school.
When Taylor was twelve, Mandy and Jacob moved back in with him and their grandfather.
Jacob wasn’t a good man. He drank too much and was verbally abusive. Taylor had suspicions that he was bipolar. When he was old enough to understand what was happening, Taylor urged Mandy to leave. But by then, they had two more kids—Luke and Landon. She was too dependent on Jacob to consider it. Their dad had left all three of them money in his will, but most of Mandy’s went toward the kids. Jacob bounced between jobs, never providing stability. They survived largely on their grandfather’s retirement pension and VA benefits from his Air Force service. Their grandfather had limited time. He was diagnosed with ALS right before Taylor signed with Seattle and it had progressed quickly.
The only constant in Taylor’s life had been hockey. He was four the first time he picked up a stick at a cousin’s birthday party at a local rink. His dad signed both him and Jesse up for a rec team soon after, discovering Taylor was quite the defenseman. And the rest was history.
He kept most of that story hidden from the people he met. But after the rookie dinner, Pancek pulled him aside. Once Sánchez and Sommers left for the night, Pancek handed him a beer and pressed him gently but persistently until the truth came out. A mother in prison for dealing, a father killed by a drunk driver, and an estranged older sister who refused help.
Pancek was a great listener, extremely moved by everything Taylor endured.
Taylor learned he wasn’t the only NHL player dealt shitty cards. Pancek grew up in nearly a dozen different foster homes. His mom had him when she was fifteen, and she was constantly dropping in and out of his life while suffering from a drugaddiction.
Pancek didn’t start playing hockey until he was in high school. He used old, donated equipment and wore hand-me-down gear from his teammates. His coach was truly his savior. He and his wife took Pancek in and adopted him when he was sixteen. They watched their son grow into the determined player and exceptional leader he was today.
Pancek and his wife Gretchen both knew Taylor wasn’t like any of the other players in the NHL. He and Pancek were cut from the same cloth. They were the first people to truly take a chance on the kid.
After they had finished exchanging tragic life stories with one another, Pancek asked if Taylor would consider staying with them. Veteran players took rookies in all the time, so it wasn’t the most outlandish idea. Taylor seriously considered it, weighing the pros and the cons.
With his hefty signing bonus, he had more than enough money to afford a decent apartment in the city. After growing up financially insecure, he had learned along the way to manage his money and be intentional with his spending.
When Taylor was fifteen, he spent the entire summer giving hockey lessons to little kids across the community, which allowed him to save up for his first vehicle—his highly coveted 2003 Toyota Tacoma in Imperial Jade Mica. He still reveled in the beauty of a truck and was annoyingly tedious with the maintenance. Mandy had her kids, but his truck was his baby.
Once he earned his signing bonus, Sánchez had joked with him that he could afford a newer ride. But he knew he could never do that. His truck was a testament to his hard work and dedication to making a better life for himself. And it was also a reminder of his dad who drove thesame model before it was totaled in the accident.
Taylor was slightly concerned that living with his captain would mess up his chances to earn the respect of his future teammates. He was already facing enough pressure to prove himself worthy of being in the NHL. Especially as a man of color. He knew he would have to work twice as hard as some of his teammates to earn respect in the league. Respect was really what mattered most to him because he never really had it growing up. He didn’t want anyone on the team or any of their fans to assume he rose to the top on anything besides his own merit. Taylor knew he was a hard worker, and he wanted everyone else to know that too.
“My coach saved my life. I wouldn’t be half the man I am if he hadn’t taken a chance on me,” Pancek had told him that night. Taylor could understand where he was coming from. He saw a lot of himself in Taylor and knew he could use the support. “There’s no pressure, kid. Just letting you know there’s a home waiting for you if you need it.”
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