Brute tough guy Andrew Peters is a legitimate top ten NHL heavyweight who enters the 2010 season desperate to make the Florida Panthers roster. The 6-4, 250-pound winger spent 2009-2010 with the Devils, picking up nine fighting majors, including two in one game against Brandon Prust of the New York Rangers. He joined the Panthers as a free agent in the off-season after having his contract bought out by the Devils.
Andrew Peters Hockey Fights
Peters, who has an unquestionably rugged ratio of four goals and 80 fights to 229 games, has a two-way contract: he can be shipped to the minors without having to clear league waivers. Peters is anticipated to divide time with the Panthers and the club's AHL squad in Rochester, N.Y. The Florida Panthers, a notoriously unphysical hockey club, could definitely use Peters’ services; if they permanently downgrade him to the minors, the rugged winger’s NHL career would essentially come to an end. Alas, there is a good chance he will end up in the AHL tough guy’s graveyard alongside perennial musclemen Francis Lessard, Jesse Boulerice and Aaron Downey.
Selected 34th overall by the Buffalo Sabres in the 1998 NHL Entry Draft, Peters played for the AHL’s Rochester Americans and the OHL's Oshawa Generals and Kitchener Rangers. He racked a career-high 32 fighting majors in the OHL during the 1997-98 regular season. Peters' NHL career-high 23 fighting majors dates to 2003-04.
Slow and lumbering, Peters is relatively one-dimensional – he has scored just four goals in 229 contests – and has been at the center of several dubious incidents in his career. In 2008, Peters received a one-game suspension for his confrontation with New York Rangers forward Colton Orr. The episode occurred at 20:00 of the third period of a game on February 28, 2008. While on the players’ bench, Peters was drawn in to an altercation with Orr on the ice. He was given a 10-minute misconduct on the play.
On January 6, 2009, Peters was enmeshed in a skirmish with Jarkko Ruutu, the Ottawa Senators highly petulant agitator. During the first-period fracas, Peters jostled his glove into Ruutu's face, and Ruutu bit his gloved thumb, puncturing the skin's surface. Peters was whistled for unsportsmanlike conduct on the play; Ruutu was suspended the next day by the NHL for two games.
Peters played one season for the New Jersey Devils, dressing in 29 games and collecting 93 penalty minutes. On June 30, 2010, the Devils placed the enforcer on waivers. A few days after, he was bought out by the team. The Florida Panthers signed Peters in August 2010 to a two-way one-year agreement worth the NHL's league bare minimum of $500,000 US and 75,000 in the AHL.
Peters’ greatest rival on the ice has been Brian McGrattan, whom he has fought seven times. McGrattan, one of the league’s top five heavyweights, was released this summer by the Calgary Flames. Similar to Peters, McGrattan – recently offered a tryout with the Boston Bruins – is struggling to keep his NHL career from plummeting into minor league obscurity.
Brian D'Ambrosio - Brian D'Ambrosio is the author of more than 500 published articles and seven books, including From Haikus to Hatmaking: A Year in the Life ...
