Partnering with The Post’s iconic Larry Brooks created forever memories on and off the ice

I thought we had more time. 

It’s a rare thing it is, when you find someone who is a mentor and a best friend wrapped into one person. That was Larry Brooks for me. 

Having to use the verb “was” still doesn’t feel real. Because if it were up to us, Larry and I would’ve been the New York Post’s Rangers beat duo for as long as the company would let us. He had no intentions of slowing down before he succumbed to this unfair illness at the age of 75 early Thursday. 

We were having too much fun together. There were so many stories left to be written, and so many more memories for us to make. I had so much more to learn from him. 

It’s a lightning in a bottle type of thing it is, when one of the most respected people in the business you’re aspiring to be in steps in to help guide you along the way. I, like many of the people probably reading this right now, had known about Larry Brooks since I started paying attention to the NHL in the 8th grade. 

Larry was a giant in the hockey space with the most formidable reputation. 

His incomparable knowledge of the game, the inner dynamics of the teams he covered (Islanders and Rangers) and the sharp-tongued wit that came through his writing made his weekly NHL column “Slap Shots” must-read material for average and avid hockey fans alike. 

There were league-shaking tidbits he’d just throw into the ninth paragraph of an article. It is a lost style of beat reporting that he was the master of, making every sentence he wrote a gripping experience. If you blinked, you may have missed a juicy detail. 

Whether it was breaking news or his unrivaled coverage of labor negotiations, Larry was on it. 

No one had a pulse on the NHL or the Rangers like he did. And that is on account of the years he spent and the relationships he developed and nurtured all around the league, including his time covering the Devils. 

No one was as creative in their coverage as he is. Larry had a way with words that always resonated. From giving Henrik Lundqvist his forever nickname “The King” to eviscerating a bad performance, Larry’s words always stuck. 

One NHL GM once threatened an agent that he would call off a trade if he read about it in the New York Post the next day.

We cracked up over that one. We laughed all the time. Larry and I talked about anything and everything, but we could go for hours when it came to hockey. Even when we spent every minute of the 10-day 4 Nations Faceoff trip together last season, we were texting the next day like there was so much for us to catch up on. 

Even after an entire season of spending almost every day together, we still asked our editors to coordinate our U.S. Open schedules so we could hang out and work the matches together – but mostly hang out. 

Fifty straight days working the 2022 playoffs wasn’t even enough for us. 

That was the case from the moment I met him as a 21-year-old intern in the summer of 2018. 

We quickly became a package deal. 

Larry was a private person, but he let me in. It was the greatest accomplishment of my career to be printed alongside him as a professional, but it was the honor of my life to get to know him on a personal level. 

He wanted to be the best, and he was. He cared so much about his craft. He lived and breathed hockey and the NHL. 

There was an originality to Larry we probably will never see again, considering his time spent on both the team side as a PR executive for the Devils for 10 years and the independent media side. 

He was a Hockey Hall of Famer as the 2018 recipient of the Elmer Ferguson Award, named one of hockey’s 100 people of Power and Influence by The Hockey News five times and one of the most brilliant sports writers of our time. 

But, more importantly to him, he was a proud father, a loving and devoted grandfather and a fiercely loyal friend and coworker. 

Love him or hate him, you respected him — and you were DEFINITELY reading him. 

Larry, this job we both love so much will never be the same without you. Thank you for your guidance, for being the most supportive beat partner, but most of all, for your friendship. I will cherish the time we spent together. I’ll spend every day trying to honor your legacy. 

I wish we had more time.