{"id":73240,"date":"2020-04-14T12:48:05","date_gmt":"2020-04-14T16:48:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/?p=73240"},"modified":"2020-12-26T16:30:12","modified_gmt":"2020-12-26T21:30:12","slug":"kris-versteeg-announces-retirement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/2020\/04\/14\/kris-versteeg-announces-retirement\/","title":{"rendered":"Kris Versteeg Announces Retirement"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>NHL veteran <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hockey-reference.com\/players\/v\/verstkr01.html?utm_campaign=Linker&amp;utm_source=direct&amp;utm_medium=linker-\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kris Versteeg<\/a><\/strong> has announced his retirement from hockey. The 33-year-old has not played in the NHL since 2017-18. He had been playing in various leagues overseas or with the Rockford Icehogs of the AHL. The Athletic&#8217;s James Mirtle announced the news Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Kris Versteeg announces his retirement. Only played 53 games for the Leafs, but they were memorable. All the best to him.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; James Mirtle (@mirtle) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/mirtle\/status\/1250082213045166080?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">April 14, 2020<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<h2>Kris Versteeg Retires<\/h2>\n<p>Versteeg&#8217;s last NHL season was with the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/nhl-teams\/flames\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Calgary Flames<\/a> in 2017-18. He was a marginal player on that team with three goals and eight points in just 24 games. Versteeg played for three different teams in 2019-20 including Team Canada for the Spengler Cup. He was productive for the Canadian team with three goals and five points in four games. Versteeg also played briefly for the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/nhl-teams\/blackhawks\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Chicago Blackhawks<\/a>&#8216; AHL affiliate in Rockford with one assist in six games.<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonhockey.com\/nhl-teams\/bruins\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Boston Bruins<\/a> originally drafted Versteeg in the fifth round of the 2004 Draft. His best season came in 2008-09 with Chicago. That was the year that Versteeg scored 22 goals and 53 points in 78 games. He also placed third in Calder Trophy voting that season. Versteeg&#8217;s career totals were 149 goals and 358 points in 643 games. He also scored 18 goals and 48 points in 93 playoff games.<\/p>\n<h3>How Versteeg Will Be Remembered<\/h3>\n<p>Versteeg will be remembered as a productive bottom-six skater. He won&#8217;t be in the conversation for the Hall of Fame but he still had a very solid 11 seasons split between seven teams. The Blackhawks will remember Versteeg as someone who helped them win two Stanley Cups. Fifth-round skaters aren&#8217;t typically known for being major contributors, but Versteeg made the most of his skills. Versteeg was a steady performer who could be counted on for 30 or more points almost every season while he was in the NHL. He was also a very good possession player with an above-average career Corsi For of 52.9 percent. Most fifth-rounders can only dream of Versteeg&#8217;s career. He maximized his talent every time he skated. That is worth celebrating.<\/p>\n<p>Main Photo:<br \/>\n<a id=\"ZyZWrxr3ThVAkkWE-2e1Fw\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/874244602\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'ZyZWrxr3ThVAkkWE-2e1Fw',sig:'qyeeuZlWTiSMDnk5anvhKrkHpjVRIz6zw5Ygp6OwSLg=',w:'594px',h:'475px',items:'874244602',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NHL veteran Kris Versteeg has announced his retirement from hockey. The 33-year-old has not played in the NHL since 2017-18. He had been playing in various leagues overseas or with the Rockford Icehogs of the AHL. The Athletic&#8217;s James Mirtle announced the news Tuesday morning. Kris Versteeg announces his retirement. Only played 53 games for [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3127,"featured_media":73246,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[27,4547,34,4548],"tags":[4532,37,5738,696,2569,38,955,4190],"class_list":["post-73240","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blackhawks","category-hockey","category-news","category-nhl","tag-chicago-blackhakws","tag-hockey","tag-hockey-news","tag-kris-versteeg","tag-news","tag-nhl","tag-nhl-news","tag-retirement"],"modified_by":"William Grigsby","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73240","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=73240"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73240\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/73246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=73240"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=73240"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/hockey\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=73240"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}