A friend sent me this:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: 17 September 2002 22:45
Subject: Alex


Daigle's enthusiasm to play aroused again with Penguins


Thursday, September 12, 2002


By Dave Molinari, Post-Gazette Sports Writer








Alexandre Daigle will tell you this is not about padding his bank
account. That he has no desire to show up the legion of critics who
skewered him so often for so long.


That the comeback bid he will launch when the Penguins begin training
camp workouts tomorrow morning at Southpointe has been inspired by
nothing more than a rekindled passion for hockey.


"I fell in love with the game again," he said yesterday.


If that sounds a bit simplistic, well, there is a fairly compelling
precedent. After all, if his comeback works out and Daigle develops into
a valuable contributor for the Penguins, he won't be the first
French-Canadian forward to do that after taking a few winters off.


He wouldn't even be the first French-Canadian forward to be chosen in
his draft year to pull off such a feat in this town.


It's not realistic to expect Daigle to duplicate the success Mario
Lemieux had after three-plus years away from the game, but Daigle, 27,
should be approaching his prime.


It's too early to measure the full impact of Daigle's extended time off
-- he contends his greatest concern is regaining his timing -- but there
appears to have been little, if any, impact on his skating, long
Daigle's greatest asset.


"He's still got the speed he had when he played," said Lemieux, who has
included Daigle in his workout group at the Island Sports Center for the
past week or so.


Daigle entered the NHL in 1993, after Ottawa claimed him with the first
choice in the entry draft that year. He subsequently played with
Philadelphia, Tampa Bay and the New York Rangers before abandoning the
league in 2000, when he moved to California.


There were reports Daigle wanted to pursue a career in acting, but he
insists that never was in his plans, that his reasons for going to the
West Coast were widely misrepresented and misunderstood.


"I never talked about [seeking work as an actor]," he said. "Because I
lived in California, people assumed that. ... When you live in L.A.,
people assume a lot of things. They never asked me. Ask me, and I'll
tell you. It's 'No.'"


Daigle grew up in Montreal, and the media in the province of Quebec can
be a relentless, intense -- and sometimes inventive -- lot. Hockey
players are among the most prominent of celebrities there, and one with
Daigle's profile is scrutinized even more than a starting quarterback
endures in this market.


Every aspect of his life, from his finances to his romances, has
provided fodder for the public prints for most of the past decade.
Several French-language newspapers and television networks are expected
to dispatch staffers to the Penguins' camp to file reports on Daigle.


Daigle doesn't appear to crave media attention -- he has kept an
extremely low profile since accepting the Penguins' offer to try out --
but he said he won't hide from the French-Canadian reporters who seek
him out. Even those he feels always haven't reported fairly or
accurately on him.


"That's part of the game," he said. "I'll give them 20 minutes and that
will be enough. I'm not going to have lunch with them, that's for sure."



Lemieux believes that laboring in a market such as this should benefit
Daigle -- "It's certainly not like Montreal or Ottawa or any of the
Canadian cities for a young French-Canadian. It's a good fit for him" --
and that the player-friendly environment the Penguins provide also
should work to his advantage.


"That was one of the reasons he came here, because this is a good
organization for players like that, who want to come in here and play
their game," Lemieux said. "I'm sure that's what's going to happen with
Alex if he does well in training camp."


Daigle disputed suggestions swirling across Canada that the Penguins
promised him a contract to prevent him from accepting a tryout offer
from San Jose, saying he came here simply because "this was a better fit
for me."


Mind you, Daigle seemed to be in an ideal situation when he joined the
Senators. The combination of his boyish good looks and exceptional
skills figured to mesh perfectly with a new franchise seeking a
cornerstone for its future.


Ottawa gave Daigle a generous five-year contract, but the investment
never paid off the way the Senators had hoped. Daigle never put up the
numbers that were expected -- he had 51 points in his rookie season,
then matched that career-best output three years later -- and the press
and public began to sour on him.


"Obviously, there were a lot of expectations," he said. "The problem for
a young guy is that you don't have a blueprint of how to do it. Fair or
not, that's the way sports work. You have to build up your stars, make
people stars. And especially on a new team, you have to find somebody
you're going to target to be the leader.


"As far as expectations, I think everybody who comes into the league has
a little bit. But when you go first overall, it's a different dimension.
Especially when you live in Montreal and you go to Ottawa."


Daigle and Alexei Yashin, who had been drafted a year earlier, were
counted on to provide a foundation for the Senators' future. Neither
succeeded, and both have moved on to different places.


While Daigle acknowledged that his personal statistics never reached the
level many anticipated -- "The expectations were that I would score 50
[goals], but not too many guys scored 50 in those days" -- he said his
modest numbers didn't persuade him to leave the NHL.


"If you ask me if that was part of my decision [to retire], not really,"
he said. "Obviously, I don't think the numbers were the main issue for
me.


"I think enjoyment of the game was the key, and that's what I've
recaptured."



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]