All the Way (18 page)

And they were right.

By the beginning of the 2010–2011 season, things had gotten really bad. I was drinking twelve cans of beer on a Saturday night, and then fifteen, and then adding shots, and
the next thing you knew, I was hung to the gills for two or three days afterwards. It was affecting my play, and everyone knew it. I needed someone to lay down the law, to tell me I couldn't do it anymore. Otherwise, I would have just kept on going, and really lost something that I love.

ELEVEN

O
n December 18, 2010, the Predators were beaten 6–1 by the Los Angeles Kings in front of a disappointed home crowd of 16,734 at what was then known as the Gaylord Center, now the Bridgestone Arena. The loss broke a five-game winning streak and it was the first time the high-flying Predators had lost in regulation time since November 28.

With three days off before their next game in Chicago, and with a busy schedule throughout the holiday season, the team held its Christmas party after that game. It would be a landmark day in Jordin's life, for reasons that had nothing to do with hockey.

My buddy Troy was down from Rankin Inlet for what turned out to be my last night of drinking. Troy and I have been pretty much blood brothers since almost our first day of life; we were born two days apart. It's kind of funny how it all went down. We
were together the first time I tried booze as a kid, and he was the last person I partied with before I quit drinking.

That week we played on Saturday night and had Sunday off, which was always a recipe for hard drinking. Troy was going to be in town for a few more days, and so it was a green light for us to have at 'er. The first night was pretty close to an all-nighter. Troy's mom and girlfriend were staying at the condo and we came barging through the doors at four o'clock in the morning, all pissed up and causing a ruckus, waking everyone up.

But that wasn't the end of it.

The next day, the Tennessee Titans were playing at noon, so we got up and said, “Let's find some tailgate parties.”

Troy's mom, who has always been there for us, was worried. She said, “Make sure you guys behave yourselves. I think you're kind of out of control.”

Of course, we told her we were okay, even though we weren't. We went to the football game and that turned into an all-day drinking event. Then, in the evening, Garth Brooks was playing at the arena and we had a mandatory team function there; I had to show up. We went to the Gaylord Center and, of course, we were three sheets to the wind by then. We got to the concert and Troy and I were stumbling around looking like idiots. Then, after the concert, we decided to go out again. It was turning into almost a forty-eight–hour binge. Troy and I ended up going out downtown. He finally called his girlfriend to come and pick us up. She basically had to carry us into the taxi and get us home.

The next day I got up, went to practice, and played what
most hockey players call “guilty hockey”—where you work extra hard to try to show that you weren't really out the night before. After practice, David Poile called me into his office to explain a phone call he'd received the day before. I think what happened was that a few of the workers in the Gaylord Center saw me and told someone that Tootoo was out of control, and word got back to Poile.

I was still hung to the gills and I reeked of booze. I was thinking,
What the fuck did I do now?
—and I really didn't know. I tried to trace events back to Saturday night, but I had no clue. I had been so drunk I'd blacked out. Of course, the first thing I did was deny any wrongdoing. I said that it hadn't been me. I played the “popular” card. It had been a team party and of course I was singled out of the twenty guys that were having a good time, because people know who I am.

Poile had heard all of that too many times before, and he wasn't buying it anymore. He gave me an ultimatum. He said, “If you don't accept what we're offering you, we've got to let you go. You're damaging our team. You have to enter the NHLPA substance abuse program and go into rehab or we're going to cut you, and everyone will know why.”

Right then and there, I decided I wasn't going to fight it anymore. I said, “Fuck, I'm done. Let's go.”

I haven't had a drink since. Not one.

I didn't tell Troy what had happened, though he knew I was in some kind of trouble. I didn't tell a fucking soul. On December 20, I went to a facility in Nashville to have what they called an assessment. I told Troy that I had a meeting and had
to leave for a few hours, but I didn't tell him where I was going. But I think he knew something was going down.

We played our next game on December 23 and I just went about my business without saying a thing. We played on December 26 in St. Louis. Nobody knew that I was going to get shipped out. I played on December 26 and kept my cool. I played, like, seventeen fucking minutes. On December 27, I had breakfast with Troy and his family, and then they went to the airport to fly home. That afternoon, I shipped out.

I didn't have a drink during that period. I didn't want to touch alcohol. It wasn't like,
I'm going to rehab, so I want to get trashed one last time.
I was done.

After my meeting with Poile, he had contacted the National Hockey League Players' Association, and they had taken care of the arrangements through their substance abuse program. My contact was a guy named Dan Cronin. They sent a chaperone to pick me up and make sure I didn't miss my flight. I was thinking I was going to be away for a month, so I'd better buy an iPad and download a bunch of movies and some games—stuff to keep me busy while I was at this facility. The chaperone took me to the Apple Store and said, “Get whatever you need, no problem.” So I spent $2000 on stuff. “No problem,” he said. “No problem.” I had no idea where I was going until I got to the airport and the chaperone put me on a plane to Los Angeles.

The only people who knew what was going on were Poile and Trotz. Not even my family or teammates knew. The team held a press conference that afternoon in Nashville, but only after I'd jumped on the plane.

I went into the program with an open mind. I wasn't in denial. I didn't fight it. I knew it was time and that I had to do it, for me personally and to save my career.

While Jordin was on the plane to Los Angeles, the Predators' coach and general manager informed the other players that he had gone into rehab. Then the team sent out a short, vague press release that revealed no details about Jordin's treatment. “We offer Jordin the full support of his teammates, coaches and the organization,” said David Poile. “There is no timetable for his return and we will have no further comment at this time.” But now the story was out.

I landed at LAX and turned on my phone, and things were just nuts. I was all over the news and my mom was freaking out. So I made four phone calls: to my sister, to my parents, to Scottie Upshall, and to my cousin Victor Tootoo, who used to have an addiction problem but who has been sober for twenty years. I told my mom that I was going to get help and that I needed to figure out my life. She said, “Okay, hopefully everything works out and I guess we'll see you when you get back.” Uppie and my sister supported me, and I knew that, inside, my parents were happy as hell that I was changing my life.

I hadn't really known my cousin Victor until I was in my teens because he was a heavy addict. We kind of got to know each other over time, and he'd seen all of my partying. I called him and told him I was going into rehab. He didn't believe me at first, because we always joked around. So, I had to say it again: “I'm going to rehab, I'm in fucking LA, I'm going to a facility.”
Victor still didn't believe me. I had to say it again. And then he stopped talking, and didn't say a word for twenty seconds. That's when it finally sunk in, not because of what I had said but because he'd just read it on the television news ticker:
Jordin Tootoo Enters a Substance Abuse Program
. He said, “I'm so sorry for how I reacted. I'm really proud of you.” Of course, he could relate to what I was going through.

A car was waiting for me at the airport. It was dark out, so I had no idea which part of Los Angeles we were going to. Finally, I arrived at this place in Malibu with big fucking doors—like a mansion—and I thought,
This is going to be all right.
It turned out it was a famous place called The Canyon. If you follow Hollywood gossip, you've probably heard of it. A lot of stars go there to dry out. It's one of the places they took Lindsay Lohan.

I walked in there and left my bags at the door—and suddenly my bags were gone. They go through all of your shit to make sure you don't have any paraphernalia or booze or drugs. They took away my iPad, my iPhone, all of my electronics. That fucker in Nashville knew I wasn't going to get that stuff in, that as soon as I got there they were going to take everything away. I spent two fucking grand for nothing.

By the time I walked into The Canyon, I'd been sober for a week, a week and a half, so it wasn't like I needed to go through detox. But I still had to go through a process where they monitor you for a week. I had arrived in the middle of the night, when everyone was sleeping. I got up the next day, walked into a room, and saw all of these fucked-up people sitting around. We were sitting in a circle and I was looking around and thinking,
Am I really like this? Do I look like these people? What the fuck is going on? These people are in here for hardcore shit: heroin, cocaine.
But I had to understand that I was one of those people, too; I couldn't separate myself from the other patients. We all had problems and we were all trying to fix them. I couldn't just sit there and think,
I'm not fucked up like them.
I was there to fix myself. And at the same time, I couldn't be worrying about the other guys and how fucked up they were and stressing about their problems. I was there to fix myself.

The surroundings at The Canyon may have been luxurious, but Jordin's first accommodations there were relatively spartan: a simple, dorm-style room with two single beds and a door that was locked from the outside every night. This was the detox phase of treatment, although because Jordin hadn't had a drink since that last night in Nashville, he wasn't experiencing any of the physical symptoms that often come with withdrawal. He felt relatively normal. For the first couple of nights, the second bed in his room remained empty. And then, he got a roommate.

The door came flying open and this fucking guy who was just blitzed walked in. The orderlies were yelling: “Jordin, Jordin, we may need your help here! We need you to help calm him down!”
Fuck, I'm a patient. I don't work for you guys. I'm just going to sit back and watch the show.
The guy came storming in and I didn't know who he was. All I was told was that he was a big-league baseball player. I guess I don't watch that much baseball, or maybe I would have recognized him.

The guy walked in and he was just fucking mangled. I was looking at him, thinking,
I know that look. I've been there.
It was actually kind of entertaining at that point. I had my back against the far wall. And then the guy noticed me and started giving me the fucking gears. I was thinking that things might be a little out of control. He was screaming: “This is fucking bullshit! What the fuck? I'm forty-some years old and I'm in fucking rehab. What a joke!” Remember, I was dead-cold sober. I wasn't on any detox pills. Nothing. And by then, they'd locked us in there together—just the two of us. He was yapping away, blitzed, and going on and on, screaming at me: “You fucking asshole. Who the fuck do you think you are?” I kept telling myself,
Just keep your cool, Jordin. Keep your cool.
But he kept going on.

Then he said, “I'm going to knock you out with my baseball bat. I can fucking swing a baseball bat pretty damn good.”

Finally, I said to him, “You don't have your baseball bat here. You see these fucking fists? That's what I fucking work with. So you'd better fucking shut up now or I'll shut you up.”

Then it turned into a “fuck you” match and the next thing I knew I had my fist cocked and this guy was going to get it. But I didn't want to cause any shit because I didn't want to be in here any longer than I had to.

Finally, the orderlies came back in and they gave him a couple of doses of something and he just conked out. A halfhour later, it sounded like there was a fricking volcano on the other side of the room. It was four o'clock in the morning and the guy's snoring was just unbelievable. I was looking for earplugs and then I started banging on the locked door, and
nothing happened. No one came to my rescue. I didn't get much sleep that night.

The next day rolled around and my new roommate came to. As he started snapping out of it, we clicked right away—
you're an athlete, I'm an athlete.
It turned out he was a guy named Jeff Bagwell, who played for the Houston Astros. I guess he was a pretty big deal. We got to know each other and like each other, and after that it was a piece of fucking cake.

A few days later, Jordin completed the detox phase of his treatment and moved out of the room he shared with Bagwell. Now, the harder part of the process would begin. Sealed off, with no contact with the outside world—no phone, no television, no internet—he began the process of changing his life. The challenge wasn't just to stop drinking. Jordin had done that, at least temporarily. It was also to dig down and try to find the root cause of that drinking, which, for Jordin, meant embarking on a painful trip through his past— though, initially, he thought it was going to be easy.

They took me to a different part of the building where I had more freedom. A month seems like a long time, but it didn't feel that way because I knew I was there to work, so the time fucking flew by. The hardest part for me was leaving the game and not being in contact with anyone who I could relate to or talk about hockey with. Remember, this was December and January, right in the middle of the season.