Sanderson recounts story with Wild fans, members of recovery community

ST. PAUL -- For a man who spent the better part of his professional hockey career drunk, high or both, Derek Sanderson can recall scenes from throughout his harrowing tale of addiction and recovery in vivid, spirited detail.
Sitting at the wooden desk in his hotel room on the fifth floor of the Hampton Inn and Suites Downtown St. Paul, the 72-year-old they nicknamed "The Turk" during his playing days waves his hands as he describes his 13th and final trip to detox: "Are you sick and tired of being sick and tired?" asked a counselor at the Hotel Dieu Shaver Health and Rehabilitation Centre in St. Catharine's, Ontario. "If you don't stop it'll kill you." Or the day Philadelphia Blazers president James Cooper sat him down and offered him a $2.3 million contract, making him the richest man in professional sports history; Sanderson was so taken aback at the Blazers' original offer he gaped in silence until Cooper finally said, "fine, we'll make it $2.6 million." Or the first time he ever took a drink, when his uncle offered him several swigs of beer at a family Christmas party. Sanderson's father became so indignant when he saw his son "dancing around, acting like the village idiot" he threw Derek's uncle out of the house.

Derek was 7.
The notorious recovered hockey star was once featured in Cosmopolitan, drove a Rolls-Royce, made frequent television guest appearances and was the one who passed the puck to Bobby Orr for his infamous Stanley Cup-clinching goal in 1970. But The Turk was also an infamous drinker, drug user and womanizer who squandered his entire fortune after surpassing Bobby Hull, Wilt Chamberlain, Joe Namath and Pele as the highest-paid athlete in 1972-73.
Before Tuesday's game against the Los Angeles Kings, Sanderson addressed a group of more than 500 Wild fans and members of the recovery community as part of the team's "Recovery Night."
"I went from 25,000 to 2 1/2 million, I'm 25 years old, I don't know whether I'm on foot or horseback," said Sanderson, who's friends with former North Stars general manager Lou Nanne and player Bill Goldsworthy. "What do you do? I'm alone in the city of Philadelphia with no soul. I bought a Rolls-Royce because I was bored.
"That's not normal."
It's important for him to share his story, he said, because those fighting the same battle take the most solace and joy in uniting with those who are on the front lines with them.
"You can't keep it unless you give it away," Sanderson told Wild.com.

Sanderson traces his addiction to his childhood. His father abused alcohol, he says, and "I was always a drunk, but I never drank until I was 20," Sanderson says.
Sanderson grew up watching his father work long hours with low pay as a machinist -- their backyard rink in Niagara Falls, Ontario was bordered by pipe and scrap from dad's work. There, he learned to skate and soon blossomed into one of Canada's top young prospects.
He spent the first part of his pro career with the Boston Bruins. Then the World Hockey Association's Blazers made him an offer he couldn't refuse.
When he first entered the league, Sanderson said, he didn't drink. Most of his teammates ribbed him about it. But an innate propensity toward addiction he says existed from the beginning soon took root, and as his playing career ascended, the 1968 Calder Trophy winner and two-time Stanley Cup Champion watched his life off the ice head straight toward the gutter.
"I had a choice," Sanderson told the crowd Tuesday at the St. Paul Rivercentre. "Nobody put a gun to my head and said 'start drinking.'"
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But Sanderson did. And he couldn't stop. Practices and games were sandwiched between binges. He smoked marijuana. Got into cocaine. And lived lavishly, hence the Rolls-Royce and five-figure charges for traveling and partying. He also fell victim to bad investments made by a lawyer with whom he partnered.
After just one year with the Blazers, they paid him to go back to Boston. Sanderson bounced from team to team until his career in 1978. By then, he was broke and sleeping on park benches.
But that's not the end of the story.
Orr was the one who checked Sanderson into rehab in 1979. Sanderson sobered up, got married and now has two sons, 27 and 25 years old.
"After a while, fear runs your whole life," Sanderson said. "Alcohol creates it. You don't even know what you're afraid of.
"You have to let go and let God [work]."

Sober since 1980, Sanderson speaks to members of the recovery community after a successful professional career as a broadcaster with the Bruins, and investment management centered on sports clients. He also wrote a book: "Crossing the Line: The Outrageous Story of a Hockey Original."
And while his former lifestyle was partially enabled by the money he made playing hockey, the sport itself can play a central role in bringing together members of the recovery community, Sanderson said.
Most of the fans in the room Tuesday have a connection to Recovery Community Hockey, a group of sober players who skate together every Wednesday, October-March, in partnership with The Retreat, St. Paul Sober Living, NuWay, Beauterre Recovery Institute and the Hazelden Betty Ford Foundation. One player from that group, Jared Jenkins, works for the Wild as a premium seating service executive, helped bring in Sanderson to speak at the Wild's Recovery Night.
It's the second year the Wild have hosted Recovery Night, believed to be the first event of its kind in the NHL.
"Part of the process is we're not counselors. We're not professionals," Jenkins said. "The one thing that works and the only people that can actually help us are other alcoholics. For us to share our experience, strength and hope in our own stories and for someone else to hear that and say, 'Oh, I've been through that, too. That was me.' When we're in active addiction, we think we're alone.
"When you hear someone else tell their story about being in the same place and how they got out of it, it makes you realize, 'Hey, I think I can do that, too.'"
Minnesota is regarded as having one of the United States' strongest recovery communities. Using hockey as an extension of those efforts -- along with hearing stories of triumph like Sanderson's.
"It's the State of Hockey and the State of Recovery," said Sol Ryan, director of housing and online services at The Retreat and another Recovery Community hockey member. "You look at different ways that you can connect and create a community. We're creating community around a sport that a lot of people love, a lot of people still play in Minnesota. You connect that with recovery ... so it's a larger place for people to be able to find people with common stories and help each other."