Patrik Berglund on his no-trade list and how he ended up being traded to the Buffalo Sabres
Andy Strickland: Patrik Berglund on the Cam & Strick Podcast on why his no-trade list was never submitted to the St. Louis Blues and him ending up in Buffalo.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Berglund: “My first year on my big contract there, I had a no-trade. So that year is done. And then my second year and moving forward I had a trade clause for like, I can take off 20 teams.”
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Host: “Limited no-trade clause.”
Berglund: “Ya. So with two weeks leading up to that point, I’m calling my agent, and we’re not going to mention, never going to say his f#@$ing name. And I was like, should I give my list? Like how does this work? And he was like, ‘No, no, no. It doesn’t work like that. If they want to move you, they have to contact us.’
I’m in Sweden. I played golf the day before. Sleeping, and I wake up the next morning and I have a 100 texts. A 100 phone calls. And I know right away.
Like Buffalo was obviously first on my list. First team that I would never want to go to. I’d rather, like I did, I’d rather quit playing hockey then go on this team.
I have to scroll like a while before I even know what f#@$ing team I came to. And then, welcome to Buffalo Sabres organization, blah, blah, blah, we’ll contact you.
On if Berglund regrets walking away from $13 million and his downward spiral
Andy Strickland: Patrik Berglund on walking away from the NHL and $13 million on his contract.
** NHLRumors.com transcription
Host: “Did you ever regret it or no?”
Berglund: “My decision to leave Buffalo? No. Absolutely not. That’s something, do I want those, $11, $14 million? Yes, I’d love to have those cash in my bank but the decision and everything, hell no. Hell no.
That’s the best thing I could do because if would have stayed there, cause I already started, I’m gonna be honest with you, I already start to spiral a little bit. I did more drinking by myself at home. I was not in a good place.
So if I would have just like, ‘ya, I’m just going to go into practice, be a scratch or whatever, and I would go home. I didn’t have anybody else there at the time. I was alone. So I would have gone home and done some drinking and it would turn bad for me I think. So I definitely made the right decision to just like, f#@^ it, there’s other things in life.
I’d rather feel good than just ride, I’m gonna ride this out to just cash in. Because I played 10 years. Made a lot of money. That’s not why I played.
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