Title: Journeymen - Brendan Perlini: Style, Confidence, and Staying True to Yourself and the Game

ProStockHockey.com proudly presents Journeymen, our ongoing blog series — a raw, unfiltered look into the lives of elite players at various stages of their individual hockey journey, told entirely in their own words. This series isn’t about stats or headlines — it’s about the miles, the grind, and the road that shaped them. Each story dives deep into the successes and failures, the setbacks and celebrations, and those moments when walking away might have been easier — but they didn’t. Through honesty and reflection, these players share what kept them moving forward and what they want young, aspiring players to know from their own experiences as they chase their own hockey dreams.

What’s up guys? This is Brendan Perlini here, current professional hockey player having played six years in NHL with Detroit, Chicago, Arizona and Edmonton. Currently I’m in my 10th year pro now playing over in Europe with Lugano Hockey Club in Switzerland. I’m pretty happy to be writing this just because I feel like it comes at a great time of reflection for me in my life of the last 10 years pro, but also before that and my path to get not only where I am currently as a hockey player but mainly as a human in general. My story here will be very interesting probably to many out there. And I just want to let you know that yes this is me writing and typing not ChatGPT or some AI that will take my words and write for me, so if things seem all over the place that is why haha! I also want to say I’ll probably jump sometimes back and forth between timelines or different stories so don’t worry about it just try to read and understand the best you can. Hopefully you can take away something from this and try to either do it yourself or not do it. Always an opportunity to learn!

Before we jump into the usual run around of “my life was like this and this” sorta thing, I wanna talk equipment and style! Besides, this is Pro Stock hockey, so I figured it was a good omen to start there. I’ve always loved equipment my whole life, even to this present day of writing. This morning December 5, 2025, I just tried three pairs of different skates during my skate today?. Wild right? I know … or is it? I grew up watching and really idolizing players with flair and style in hockey but also golf, soccer, tennis you name it. If there was a guy that was different plus unique and stood out a bit, chances are I liked him. People sometimes confuse “style” with cockiness or something along those lines, but I just always seen it as “that person being themselves” and expressing what they like. Let’s run through some guys names that you may or may not know across different sports that for me I always loved!

HOCKEY

MARIÁN HOSSA

(tinted curved visor, white skates, always cool gloves, 81 great number, cool curve, spray paint)

ILYA KOVALCHUK

(same cool visor, cool skates, yellow laces, HUGE curve, awesome style)

SERGEI FEDOROV

Arguably the GOAT of ‘90s style (white skates, cool visor, just looked so dam cool, 91 number) He needs two pics.

ALEX KOVALEV

(One of my FAVES, just so sick, silky smooth, AK27 stick, no visor, flow out the helmet, white skates, tongues out)

In fact quick funny story I just thought of for the first time in years! I used to get my sticks through my brother when I was young. He’s six years older, so he would break one and my dad would chop it where it broke and put a “Easton Z Air Focus Flex” blade in the shaft. Then, boom I’d have a new stick! (If you don’t know that blade look it up, I LOVED those. It had this weird like little indent thing where it went in and out near where you put it in the shaft … funny to think about). So one time my brother broke this “AK27”— Kovalev’s custom cool stick! So I’m licking my chops at this one. I’m so cool … I got the Kovalev stick … blah blah blah my dad makes it for me. I spray paint the blade black to make it look all black at the bottom like Kovy’s (yes you read that right at 11 years old I was already spray painting sticks) and I play a few games with it feeling good. Then my dad comes to watch me play next game, and I absolutely SHIT the bed out there. When I get back in the car for the 10 minute ride on the way home my dad talked for 10 minutes about how that “wasn’t the stick for me, its way too heavy and your not using that anymore yada yada.” Safe to say I was crushed about the stick, but I also knew that my dad was 100% right.

Also, I’m going to link in this goal. If you haven’t seen it, it’s one of my favorites of all time. Kovy loses his helmet, then grabs the puck and literally takes over ending up scoring with NO HELMET and his flow just flapping in the wind. THAT’S STYLE.

I’m pissed when I look back at my time in the NHL, and I never got a shift with no helmet. That seems hilarious to say, but growing up watching this goal all the time it was always in my head like one day it’ll happen and my helmet will get knocked off, and I’ll be flying around like Kovy too with no bucket during the game. Now they have since changed the rule and you can no longer do it.

MARIAN GABORIK

(Great visor, number 10, sick back tuck on skates, fastest guy in the league)

MY DAD: FRED PERLINI

So just like any kid out there I think you see your dad when you’re young as some type of superhero. My dad almost came off as celebrity like in the area we lived in England where a lot of people knew him and what he accomplished over there, and they knew we were Canadian. So I grew up really being wide-eyed to my dad and respecting him A LOT. Sounds weird for me to be saying a young kid respected his father but I did. I just felt like he really knew everything he was talking about and he played in the NHL, so to me I wanted to get there and tried my best to listen to whatever he would say to accomplish that same dream.

Look at my dad here: No bucket in warmups, black tape, tongues out on his skates, beautiful head of hair flowing. I just knew when I got to the NHL I had to not recreate this picture, but I just wanted a no bucket warmup. And boy, in my third season when I was with the Blackhawks did I take advantage of it haha! Like father, like son.

Golf

TIGER WOODS

The basics of Tiger (fist pumps, unbelievable shots, aura like crazyyyy, red shirt, GAME OVER)

But just look at this picture. I chose this for a reason. He flushes one then twirls that club with so much style it makes every single blade of grass stand up and applaud. You just know that thing is a dart right at the flag. RIP to everyone who had to play Tiger in his prime.

SERGIO GARCÍA

García was my favorite golfer growing up! I went through a lot of heartache being a big fan of Sergio watching him get so close so many times and unfortunately losing at the end. It was all worth it tho as the 2017 Masters was easily one of the top days in front of the TV in my life and when that putt went in in the playoff to beat Justin Rose, almost similar to Rory winning this year I couldn’t help but get teary eyed and feel the energy almost oozing through the TV through me. I was truly so happy for him.

One of my favorite outfits, I actually had this hat when I was young, he just had so much flair and played the game like a Spanish matador!

SEVE BALLESTEROS

Seve was before my time, but really he started the whole flair in golf and I’m not just talking his outfits but the way he played the game hitting shots from his knees and out of crazy wild situations! Although I never really grew up watching Seve on the TV, I would hear the stories through my dad almost like they were mythical stories and just be so wide-eyed and like “WOW”.

CAMILO VILLEGAS

The spider! Man this guy is cool, all white outfit, made that flat top hat cool in golf and the era of like ‘07–‘09 when he was playing well me and my brother really liked him. Quick funny story for you. So Camilo used to be sponsored by this company J Lindeberg, which at the time was fresh on the golf scene and was SICK! It was like an upper echelon clothing brand that was more sleek and cooler than just Nike or Adidas. You always stood out if you wore it, it was like “OOOOOOO he’s got a Lindeberg shirt on). So I don’t even know how we got them I think it was a gift to my brother. And then we both kinda share stuff anyway, so they kinda became mine. But they were two Lindeberg wristbands like a sweatband basically around your wrist, and we just thought we were so damn cool wearing these things playing golf. But the weird thing was you would wear them for 4 hours golfing and then when you took them off your whole wrist was blue — like for a day— almost like someone colored you in marker or something. So we used to just wear them all the time and “look cool” to deal with the fact afterwards that our wrists were so discolored. It’s hilarious looking back on it, and we never did figure out why they did that. I think we still have one in my parent’s house in the basement somewhere. Might have to bring those babies back!

FOOTBALL (SOCCER)

CRISTIANO RONALDO

My fave player growing up, just had it all. I always liked him over Messi purely for the fact of just the style and flair he had in his game with the step overs and cool moves he would do. Up to that point nobody really had ever seen done at the top level with the finishing ability of him scoring record amount of goals like 50-60-70 goals in a calendar year!

One of my favorite seasons of his was when Real Madrid wore this first kit below, which he wore the popped collar all season. Thats style!

DAVID BECKHAM

Becks! This guy revolutionized style. I loved him growing up, he just did whatever style and made it SUPER popular. I love his carefree attitude for that stuff of just being himself and rocking whatever and in the process making everybody else want to do it. Growing up in the UK, when he did a certain haircut I’m not joking like 90% of men then did that same haircut. It’s actually crazy to imagine someone having that reach and reaction from people, from really him just being himself.

AND FINALLY

RONALDINHO

Man this guy was good. In my eyes, he is probably my all time favorite just because again he played the game like he was on the streets playing with his friends. (White and gold Nike boots were absolutely ICONIC for the time.)

OK well I could keep going on and on about my favorite guys growing up (there will be a reason for why I shared all this I promise), but let’s get back to the main story now.

Growing up I had quite a unique childhood of living in England, Canada and the United States. Let’s start in the UK first with my childhood there quickly. I always felt different living there. At school I was looked at like “he’s the Canadian kid”, which at times made me feel really special and sometimes it made me feel like an outcast. But I knew that once that bell rung and I was free to go home and then eventually go play hockey, that I could totally be myself. It was almost as if I was two different people with the one at school just trying to sort of fit in and then the hockey player being wild and trying crazy things and being the trendsetter. Think à la Superman being Clark Kent during the day and then throwing the cape on and becoming Superman after work. I’m not gonna sugarcoat it. When I was in the UK, I was the best around my age and even the ages older than me, and same with my brother as well. It was almost as if I felt this feeling that everyone else looked at me and Brett (my brother) like “they’re gonna make it”. I always felt that energy towards us and it gave me a lot of confidence, which is the one thing in sports that I don’t care what league or team or division your playing in, if a kids got confidence then everything else will follow! Our time eventually closed in England with us moving back to Canada to be back home with family when I was 11 years old. In my head now transitioning to Canadian style hockey it was different: smaller ice, a little different style, small town mentality. This was my first real test I would say in hockey where I was the number one guy coming over and now there were some pretty good players I was playing with. In my head, I was still the best and I believed that but now the situation had changed. In the environment where before everyone was praising me and Brett saying, “Look how good these guys are. They will make it” to now In Canada receiving a lot of jealousy, envy, side-eye. Basically to sum it up negative energy towards me trying to cut me up and tear me down, and I felt it . I’m not gonna lie, how could I not? I mean I was 11 years old for god’s sake … haha!

This is your first lesson though in the process, and it’s one that actually I still deal with today in the world but in different cases of life! “IT DOESN’T MATTER WHAT ANYONE ELSE THINKS”… Read that again: IT DOESN’T MATTER WHAT ANYONE ELSE THINKS.

So let me explain quickly: I’ve already told you the scenario. Living in a small town there’s a lot of negativity, gossip, and basically seems like sometimes there’s nothing to do but bitch and complain. So one way I dealt with this with the help of my parents. They always encouraged me to be active and go out and do things. Find friends that make you feel good and go play hockey on the outdoor rink with them, go golfing with them, surround yourself with the friends who are genuine and truly you just enjoy time being around them. That’s one. Then, next I said the words “it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks.” Because the older I’ve gotten, I now realize most people actually aren’t bad people, there could just be a multitude of things that are going on in their life that make them act out a certain way. So I recently got into surfing and now I revert back to the phrase “I’m going to stay surfing on my wave” in reference to you don’t have to go over there and surf on the negative wave with someone, you can surf your own waves and thats perfectly fine! Just to circle back on most people not actually being bad just think of this: Have you ever had a bad day? Have your parents or coach or someone ever yelled at you and then you brought it to hockey or somewhere else? Stuff happens and unfortunately a lot of kids just project their parents or environments feelings on to others. So, for example, Timmy is not actually jealous of you. It could be the fact his father is still upset about his own career and he now raises him in a hostile environment and things are negative and stressed and so on so really it’s got nothing to even do with you. You know what I mean? Sometimes we take things so personal because were each living in our own movie being played out in our eyes but relax, take a step back, and be like ok maybe that person just had a bad day, maybe he’s just grouchy all the time. Whatever it is, I now know like 99% of the time it’s not personal it’s just someone doing something for their own benefit.

So I’m going to skip forward a few years to now my next lesson. I do well in Canada and then we move to Detroit where I really found a home and life. I played on Belle Tire, which was the number 1 team in the USA and arguably North America when you include Canada. We had four first-round NHL draft picks from that team that included the likes of Zach Werenski, Dylan Larkin, Kyle Connor, and myself being the other. We had a multitude of others from the team drafted and played pro. So to say I leveled up was an understatement moving to this team. After two really fun years of Bantam and Midget hockey, I was drafted first round to the Barrie Colts in the OHL entry draft. Now this is where the lesson comes in. So quick backstory: being a Canadian playing in USA, I was very on the fence of what direction I wanted to play the next level at NCAA or OHL. It’s not like now where you could do both, it was one or the other back then and it was a crucial decision at 14 to 15 years old. My brother Brett was at the time playing NCAA at Michigan State University, so naturally I was fielding lots of scholarship opportunities from schools. In fact, Michigan State had offered me a full-ride scholarship when I was still only 14 years old, which one person said the last guy they did that with was hall of famer Joe Thornton. I loved watching my brother at Michigan State but I knew in my heart that college hockey wasn’t for me. Something kept drawing me back to the OHL, and the style of hockey, slowing it down, making plays and so on. So we turn down a multitude of full ride scholarships to take my talents to the beautiful Barrie Ontario (Lebron reference). Everything seemed like it was set up to be a great fit. A coach who was a great player in the NHL for a long time in Dale Howerchuck. Multiple guys moving on to pro, which opened spots. The area wasn’t really that far from home as well and also the team just seemed like they really liked me. Boy when I say we were wrong on this one that is an understatement, because we were wayyyy off. The NHL lockout happened, so we got Mark Scheiffele back as well as a couple other players who should have moved on. Coaching wise, development of players was sold to me and that turned out to be the complete opposite mindset with a dog-eat-dog mentality of players cutting players down to get their own egos ahead. Everything just wasn’t what we thought it was gonna be. AND … that turned out to be the best thing to ever happen to me. Let me explain. So when I played, it was 4th line, terrible minutes, or not even being in the lineup. Actually now that I think about it, I’d love to know a stat on this cause I might be the only ever first-round OHL draft pick to be scratched the first game of the season ? —hilarious looking back. So why did it turn out so well for me? 1. First time being away from home and dealing with an uncomfortable situation. You have to look at your problems big picture. This is so hard to do, but the more you can separate yourself from the solution and learn to be grateful for the little things, it’s truly life changing. So my dad gave my brother this “list of 10 commandments” in college he had on his wall in his room that basically said 10 ways to be grateful and make use out of every situation. So naturally I felt like one day “oh that helped Brett, so let me put that on my wall,” and I would look at these and study them everyday just changing my outlook on where I was at. 2. Next, you have to know the circle of life for this one. All bad things come to an end, just like all good things come to an end. It’s just facts of life. You’ll never be on top of the clouds your whole life, everybody deals with adversities. Don’t believe me? Just think of your favorite athletes. Michael Jordan was CUT from his high school basketball team. The GREATEST player of all time didn’t make his high school basketball team one season. Nuts right? Sidney Crosby missed YEARS off his career dealing with concussion problems in fact at one point almost retired I remember.

So everybody deals with things both bad and good. You have to understand that right now might be a bad day, but tomorrow who knows! That could be the day things totally change.

(In the two pictures above: 1. We have when I was 15 playing for Belle Tire. 2. When Michigan State brought me on my visit there, they rolled out the red carpet bringing us [pictured here with my brother Brett] to the football game.)

So we get to Christmas break, and I actually come back from the break and am ready to go and rejuvenated that I’m going to have a great second half of the season, when I get a call in school in the middle of class from my agent. This is hilarious cause it would happen only in Canada! I put my hand up and told the teacher “I’m getting a call from my agent I have to take this” ???. So I went outside and answered, and that’s when I heard the news the team wanted to trade me. Part of me was angry. Part of me was crushed. I turned down all these scholarships to come specifically here to play, and you guys are giving up on me half way through the season? It went on a few days and I ended up getting traded to the Niagara Icedogs. Who would have thought that was the turning point? Not me. But man did it work out. I went from barely playing 5-6 minutes a game to my first game playing with Ryan Strome (1st round New York Islanders) and Brett Ritchie (2nd round Dallas Stars). Two Icedogs legends already in their last seasons Jr before going pro who told me, “Don’t worry dude we got you. Just go to the net with your stick on the Ice and we’ll find you.” It was a total opposite situation that I played a ton and had a great finish to the season with those guys. And I actually owe a lot of gratitude to the coach Marty Williamson at the time just giving me the opportunity, but also the owners (the Burke family) for creating the best environment with all the guys. It was a total 180 from players all cutting each other up in Barrie to a real family atmosphere where the guys were all great friends. And the crazy bit thinking of it now? I mentioned Ryan Strome, but I hadn't mentioned what he did. He, just like me, was also drafted at the same age to Barrie and traded at the exact same time as me to Niagara only three years prior, which then the next season knocked it outta the park and got drafted 1st round in the NHL. So everybody in Niagara was saying “he’s the next Ryan Strome for sure”, which for me almost felt like England again where everyone else confidence in building me up really made me believe it more than ever too. And what did I do? The exact same thing as Stromer the next season, and got myself drafted first round in the NHL! Sometimes things happen for a reason. Here’s a good quote I like: “These things aren’t happening to me, they’re happening for me.” I try to keep that in mind a lot.

(First picture was January 2013 at 16 years old after being traded, going from what I thought to be a disaster situation to lining up with three NHL draft picks on the opening draw in the picture.)

(Second is a month and a half later in early March 2013 scoring the winning shootout goal. Confidence is amazing thing!)

So the third lesson of today I want to share with you comes in the form of a word called “PERSPECTIVE”. This sometimes has troubled me and sometimes saved me big time! Perspective I think is key in what we do as hockey players and athletes, but I think even more in general life. The act of looking at a situation without bias or an outside look per se. So let me break it down to you like this:

My first season pro was an awesome season, it didn’t really start out in my head as planned. But as you read earlier, what plans actually go 100% how you thought anyway right? I was sent down from the Arizona Coyotes to the AHL in Tucson. Now it totally wasn’t the place I wanted to be. I wanted to be up with the big club, but thats where I really leaned into the perspective shift and it all kind of clicked one day very early on when I was at the rink. I was listening to some guys complain at the arena that “this isn’t right and why are they doing this and this?” And I just sat there listening to these teammates of mine who were all around a similar age (young 20s) just moaning and complaining basically about nothing. I told myself right then and there, “I’m not getting sucked into this. I noticed most of the things they ended up complaining about I actually really liked. And I began every time flipping the scenario whenever they would say something in my head such as “OMG I’m so bored at home I wish I could go back to jr with my friends.” And I would think in my head “I’m having so much great free time to do extra workouts and lay by the pool and wow I’m actually getting PAID here thats incredible!” I developed like this inner positive voice that would always just flip every scenario that did wonders for me. Try that next time you get in an environment you don’t really like being around, it definitely helps!

So the perspective shift of:
Always complaining.
Never good enough.
This is a joke.

To:
Wow I have so much great free time!
I feel like a billionaire cause its the first time I’m ever being paid!
Playing pro is the best!

(First picture I’m in Tucson with the Roadrunners and the second Celebrating a goal with the Legend Shane Doan in my rookie season a few months later being called up.)

And trust me, I wrestle with perspective to THIS VERY DAY. It’s an ongoing battle every season but also in life, being able to look at the situation and say, “Hey, this is actually great!” I think of it like Star Wars where someone is always trying to get you to go over to the dark side because it’s so easy to be negative. But you’ll find the more you fight it and be grateful, add positive value to a situation or conversation, and every now and then take a step back and be like “wow I’m really doing this right now”, you’ll find your life and hockey to be amazing! Give yourself a pat on the back!

So to finish off here you’re probably thinking “What the hell man ? You didn’t loop us in on the pictures at the beginning!” Well here ya go … the reason I put those pictures there talking about equipment and styles and everyone having different style is a reminder to always be YOU. Always!!! Listen to your heart and what’s inside you and be courageous to be different and take chances along the way. The world has a lot of people who are the same and who do the same things and live their whole life always following the crowd never having the courage to step a pinky toe over the line. Life is meant to be lived, and the only way to do that is to be 100% nothing but YOU! So go out there and be grateful for each day as it comes, and enjoy every single moment because it goes quick! Thanks for reading my story guys. If you want to hear more stories or are interested, check out my YouTube channel at the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/@Bubzp11

-Bubz

-Brendan Perlini