Farewell, Mike (and nice parting shot at Favre!)

Knubs was not afraid to occasionally give some blood

Knuble was always one of my favorite Caps the past few years.  Worked his ass off on the ice, was never afraid to do the dirty work, seemed to love mixing it up in the crease, and off the ice was also a quote machine who was regarded as the best interview on the team.  He never pulled any punches whether he was critiquing himself or the Caps, and commanded the respect of the entire locker room.  He was never afraid to air his frustration at the "finesse" system the Caps played prior to 2011-2012, and often was one of the only guys you could find around the net getting the "cheap" goals. 

And he was an absolute warrior - I could not even fathom how many stitches that guy has had in his face over his career.  He wasn't a big fighter - but when he did drop the gloves you could tell he was pretty pissed off about something and transformed into a total force of nature - and his opponent seemed to realize as he was getting pummeled, that he just did the equivalent of placing a firecracker in the mouth of a polar bear during the middle of hibernation.

He was also one of those athletes when you see in person they make you think, "Holy shit...that dude is freaking huge."  Knuble is listed at 6'3 235, but in person he somehow looked 6'5 and about 250.  I saw him at the annual "Caps Casino Night" (during that semi-controversial period of my life when I dated a girl exclusively for Caps tickets/access) and, outside of that mongloid caveman D.J. King, Knuble was the most physically intimidating player there (in my opinion).  But he was the nicest and probably most well-spoken guy there as well.  There was a silent auction and one of the prizes was to go on a wine-tasting in Virginia with Knuble and his wife - which sounds extremely gay - except Knuble seems like the type of guy who could drink more than a blue whale, play 2 hours of hockey, and then drink a case of Molson before he takes his skates off.  I mean, I just always had the impression the guy is a drinking machine.  I think that wine tasting would have been hilarious.

Anyway, Knubs will definitely be missed.  And I really don't think I would've have posted anything at all except when I read this article Knubs dropped an impeccably well placed bomb right on Brett Favre's head (quick disclosure:  I cannot stand Brett Favre..probably merits its own post at some point).  It made my day; I liked Knuble before this article but this shot at Favre put him on my pedestal of favorite DC athletes.  Awesome.  Good luck, Mike.

“I’m very thankful for my three years here,” he said. “It was a lot of fun. I’ve got to believe there were some good moments. We had some good moments here. I just want to leave an impression. Hopefully I left a good impression of myself around here with people and friends and teammates. I hope that’s what I accomplished here....

“It was great to see the passion. We play in a sold-out building every night. People like our team, the city enjoys watching us play, great young players here. It’s an exciting place to play. I’ll always think highly of playing hockey here.”
He joked that he wouldn’t be pulling a Brett Favre about retirement, that he wants to play as long as possible, so he’ll look for an opportunity wherever it comes.