Playing Career
Jeremy Roenick enjoyed his best years with the Chicago Blackhawks from 1988 to 1996 putting up impressive 53, 50 and 46 goal seasons. Throughout the 90's and early 2000's Roenick was the face of USA Hockey representing the stars and stripes at the 1998 and 2002 Olympics. Roenick finished his career with 513 goals making him apart of hockey's elite 500 goal club. roenick became just the third American born player to join this prestigious group of goal scorers. Although Roenick never won a Stanley Cup Championship, he was somewhat redeemed when he witnessed the Chicago Blackhawks win the 2009-10 Stanley Cup as an analyst with NBC. After the Patrick Kane clinched the Stanley Cup Final series for the Blackhawks with a mysterious overtime goal, an emotional Roenick spoke through tears about what the victory meant to him and the people of Chicago.
Personality
The NHL is often criticized for being bland and has never been able to capture the attention of the mainstream media outside of Canada. NHL players are known for using bad sports Cliches and being unwilling to speak their mind. Throughout his career, Roenick was the great exception to this rule. Roenick created controversy with this comments for USA hockey after being left off the 2006 Olympic team, was a mjaor voice for the NHLPA in their collective bargaining negotiations and also engaged in famous verbal exchanges with other players such as Patrick Roy.
Mainstream Media
Roenick has been able to parlay his reputation for speaking his mind into various broadcasting opportunities. Roenick is a regular on FSN’s Best Damn Sports Show Period and TSN’s Off The Record talk show. Roenick has also guest starred on television shows such as The Ghost Whisperer, Leverage, Hack and Arli$$.
Roenick’s most famous guest appearance came in virtual form in the 1996 film Swingers. In the famous scene, Vince Vaughn playing as Roenick and the Blackhawks in the Sega Genesis version of NHLPA ‘93 taunts Ron Livingston’s character by saying:
“Y'know, it's not so much me as Roenick; he's good”
Vaughn’s character also used Roenick’s phenomenal checking ability to try and make Gretzky’s head bleed.
Video Game Legend Status
Jeremy Roenick is widely recognized as the greatest video game hockey character ever. Roenick’s character in NHLPA ‘93 was dominant in terms of goal scoring but was also the best body checker in the game. When asked about his NHLPA ‘93 dominance Roenick had the following comment:
"College kids come up to me and say that they made it through college simply by playing myself on the video games in their video game bets or their weekly playoff games. They've told me that they won money simply because they were me in their video games because I was a stud."
In IGN’s 2008 Top 10 Video Game Athlete of All Time rankings, Jeremy Roenick ranked 4 behind only Madden NFL 2004 Michael Vick, Tecmo Bowl’s Bo Jackson and Mike Tyson in Super Punchout.
In the final stage of NHL 09’s Be A Pro Mode, the player must face off their created character against the NHLPA ‘93 version of Roenick. If you beat Roenick, he sends you an in game text message stating that he will now retire.
Video Game Covers
Jeremy Roenick was also the cover athlete for both NHL 2K3, and ESPN NHL Hockey (NHL 2K4) published by Sega in 2002 and 2003.
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