Brad Richards would have been a great Red Wings player, except for the timing.
Had he arrived early in his career, when he worked for the late Bill Davidson, owner of the Pistons who also owned the Tampa Bay Lightning, Richards would have skated with Henrik Zetterberg and Pavel Datsyuk in his prime, and theirs.
Instead, he played with Vincent Lecavalier and Martin St. Louis, and they won the Stanley Cup in 2004 and helped establish the NHL in Florida.
Richards, who announced his retirement this week, was a marvelous player. Ten 20-goal seasons, 932 career points and two Stanley Cups offer some evidence, and the testimony is long, through his service with five franchises, that he was an anchor “in the room” and a good guy.